Banged up

Posted on January 3, 2025 by Purupuss

3 January 2025

We were so lucky yesterday. Whilst we didn’t awake to rain, it was heavily overcast and had been, and was threatening to rain. The Israeli family that we got off the train with were lucky too. They were going whale watching yesterday morning, before catching the train south again. They would have had perfect weather, unlike the day we arrived and today.

I got up, had a shower, and left Pen sleeping to go and finish off my fruit salad, and apple and cinnamon yoghurt. No photographic stops today!

Lady Penelope’s motto. Elegance, Charm, and Deadly Danger

We packed up our gear – why is it so much more difficult part way through a trip, even when you haven’t bought any souvenirs? We were then permitted to leave our bags in the lounge whilst we went out to the Emporium Brewing Company’s Escape Room, which had the advantage of being about four doors down from the Lazy Shag. If there was 100% chance of rain, we wanted a chance to remain dry. Which we pretty well did on our walk there.

Our original, pre-booked plan, had been to do the “Kaikōura Lights” outdoor escape room. We figured that this would be a way of seeing the town and having fun along the way, and the theme – about Kaikōura’s Dark Sky status appealed. Plus, I figured we may get some pointers for the Thames Historical Museum. But, we received a cancellation notice on the 12th of the 12th to say that the app wasn’t working properly, and they weren’t prepared to give any further customers a negative experience.

Pen had never done an escape room before, and didn’t really know what to expect. I’ve done one “professional” one, and one “amateur” one (at the Thames School of Mines). I’ve also played several Android operating system apps where you’ve got to try to escape a room, so it meant I had an idea of what to do to start off. The story was that “my brother”, Billy, had written a letter to me, which just didn’t ring true, so I’d gone to the school to try to find out what was wrong. Upon arrival we’d been “locked” in this room by the prefects. But, to our good fortune, Billy had left us plenty of clues to find the answer to what was going on. Those clues take the form of, say, a series of pictures and you have to count the number of people sitting in each picture and then enter that number into a combination lock. Unlocking that puzzle gives you a clue that will assist you to the answer of the next question. We had an hour to find out what had happened to Billy and his friends, and we did it in only 56 minutes. (The record was 26 minutes, but we wanted to get our monies worth. Ha. Ha.) We only required one requested assistance from the guy watching us via the CCTV camera. And also had him come in once as we had the right solution, but for some reason the lock wasn’t unlocking.

Two puzzles that I just have to record. On the wall was ten volumes of a Funk and Wagnall Encyclopaedia series. These were out of order, which to my “having done escape rooms before” brain, could have been in the order of the solution of one puzzle. Pen, with her (genuine) librarian’s brain, was itching to put them back in order. In the end, we compromised and she put them in their existing order on the desk, which I was on the opposite side of, which meant that I could see that there were words and numbers written on the edges of the pages opposite the spines. Even then I was unwilling to let her put them in order until I’d put two that I could see that clearly belonged together, together. Pen was then able to confirm that they were numbers two and three of the order, so she relieved her Librarian OCD and put them in order. And I was able to unlock the next combination.

The other one that I’ve got to record was that there was a weird-shaped, but otherwise unremarkable box on a couple of wall brackets on the wall. It was about 30 cm long, with each ten-centimetre segment at a different level to the others. Kind of like the Olympic medals podium. We gave it a push and a prod in case there was something mobile about it, but there was nothing. But then we started finding trophies: One for second place, one for first place, and, finally, one for third place. Upon placing these trophies in the required place, there was a sudden clunk. We both jumped about six feet in the air, (Better than six feet under) before continuing to push and prod the box and manipulate the trophies.

There was a voice over the intercom: “Look at the back wall.”

Oh-kay.

What’s different about that?

It was then we realised that one of the panels on the backwall had popped out slightly. Pen pushed and attempted to slide it, and then I suggested pulling on it. It swung open to reveal a normal door to a secret room.

As I said, we succeeded in 56 minutes, and had a lot of fun in the process.

And then we walked out into the rain.

Wanting to get something we could eat on the train, and something light for breakfast tomorrow, we went to the supermarket. And came to the conclusion that if Kaikōura’s ever in drought, they should hire me to come down and walk out of their New World.

We squelched back to the Lazy Shag where we’d stashed our gear, and did some blog catching up. And hour before the train was due to leave, we did even more squelching and walked to the railway station.

Kaikōura car drivers are very courteous. Both on the way back from the supermarket, and when we were dragging our bags in the rain and trying to cross State Highway 1 on a stretch of road with no pedestrian assistance, someone flashed their lights at us and stopped to allow us to cross. Thank you whoever you are.

I was glad that I was wearing my new raincoat and waterproof over trousers when we got to the Whaleway Station. (Yes, that the railway station is where Whale Watch Kaikōura is based and that is what they’ve called it.) But my shoes were soaked. And there was nothing I could do about it.

Pen was still Kaikōura T-Shirt hunting and she found a T-Shirt she liked and a “tie-dyed” hoodie with “Peace, Love, Whales” on it that she also liked. After a bit of hemming and hawing, she bought both.

And then the Coastal Pacific train from Picton arrived.

I’m sitting on the train when I’m typing this. And listening to the commentary when I’m aware that it’s due to pipe up – although I do wish that they’d got a narrator who could speak New Zealand English properly. The worst example of his speech bloopers, which doesn’t really come under the heading of New Zealand English, is that, apparently, the Victoria Cross is made from a cannon “liberated” during the Crimeraia War. And the town is “Chevy-ot”. And most small towns in New Zealand had a “senotaff”. And the train follows a rout rather than a route (root).

There are moments of (forced) humour. For instance, when talking about the wildlife on the Kaikōura Coast, the commentator said that if you saw a bird with a white front, it most likely wasn’t a penguin, but rather a shag. If you saw a bird with a white front wearing a top hat, then it was definitely a penguin… And you needed a nap.

The service now has helpful TV screens in the ceiling, so you can see occasional snippets of information. Like, the fastest speed that we were travelling at that I’ve seen displayed was 92 km/hr. Now, before you start saying that that’s proof why New Zealand should be concentrating on roads and forgetting about rail when the 3’6” gauge track clearly can’t match the speed of a vehicle on the open road; there are technologies that will enable trains on narrow gauges to go much faster than this. (Think Australia’s tilt trains.) What we don’t have is the political will, and desire to reduce greenhouse gases, to do so. And, (and I’ve just learnt this), the 3’6” was good for economies of scale, and the most practical for getting through mountain passes.

The train arrived in Christchurch in drizzly rain, and we probably could have walked to the Jailhouse Accommodation if we’d known/remembered where we were going, but we figured a $19.50 taxi ride was an investment if it meant getting out of our wet gear sooner.

He seemed to take a very circuitous route.

But we got there to be greeted by a sign saying don’t let the cat in and a cat sitting by the door. We were assigned to room 18, which was upstairs, and the guy on the desk carried Pen’s case up for her. I decided I was going to assert my independence and carried my own bag myself. (With Pen carrying my pillow.) It’s more awkward than heavy. Even with two Kaikōura stones in it.

So now we are locked up in jail.

And I’m up to date with my blog, if my computer doesn’t run out of battery first.

Only 8002 steps today

And walking 5.5 kilometres.

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Zipping all over the place.

Posted on January 2, 2025 by Purupuss

2 January 2025

Once again, I was up before Pen, so I had my fruit salad and apple & cinnamon Greek yoghurt breakfast. Only interrupted by the sun shining on Kaikōura’s almost snowcapped peaks.

I had to go and get my camera.

I stood in the middle of State Highway 1 to get that shot!

Pen was still asleep, and I understood D.C.’s frustration whenever she’d see a lovely sunrise and I’d still be in bed and miss it. Fortunately, Pen did get up before the mountains decided to hide away for the rest of the day.

But it was only the first bit of things going our way today. Although, it was linked to much of it. We were told several times that this was probably going to be the best day of the week. The last two days were wet and the next two were predicted to be wet as well.

Once we’d both got ourselves sorted, we walked around to the EcoZip Adventure Kaikōura, getting there about ½ to ¾ hour early. There we got weighed in. (I’ve gained five kilos because I was fully dressed with a camera and phone in my pockets, right?) and I decided that, as we were going to be travelling in 4WD, that Seabands motion sickness bands might be in order. So I hiked back to our room, which only literally took five minutes. Plus, another five minutes for the return journey.

They had a full load of ten today, most of whom were paired off. There was a family of three – Mum, Dad (Simon), and daughter, and a single Asian man who were the odd ones out. I’d asked for a front seat for the ride (which, it turned out, wasn’t really necessary) and the EcoZip team were more than happy to help out. I got into my front seat of the mini-bus and we travelled out to Kaikōura Airport where we met up with our two guides – Alex and Mathilde. Alex is from Winton way via various tourist hotspots and Mathilde is a French-Canadian over here on a work visa. Both were fantastic at their jobs.

Before we were able to move on, Alex and Mathilde helped us get kitted up in our harnesses, helmets, and have a brief lesson in how to ride the zipline. They said that their focus is on safety first, and our enjoyment second, and they succeeded with both. The safety aspect was put across in such a way to be fun (if we come in for a landing with our legs stretched out, we’re likely to knock out Alex, in which case, this is what you need to do to use the radio to call for help.) We also had a demonstration about what to do and not do when descending the lines.

I have a suspicion that, from the airport, we were meant to be travelling in something like an army transport vehicle. We were meant to ford a river, but after the rain for the last two days, the water level was still too high for the mini-bus, so we went further on than the ford, drove across the State Highway, and parked in the shadow of what had to be rockfall protection barriers. (Probably installed sometime after the 2016 Kaikōura Earthquake. Here, some of us were installed in a ute, while Pen and I crawled into what I think they called the Polaris. This was a quad-bikey, four-wheel-drive with seating for four people and was fun to ride in.

But, naturally, with only being able to take four in the ute and two (we had a guide) in the Polaris, we had a bit of a wait for the rest of the team to join us. This wasn’t a problem as we were able to chat with Mathilde.

Finally, we were all together and shepherded into a larger “mini” bus and hauled up the hill to almost our first stop. I say almost, because we then had to walk, which included a stop to point out two toxic plants: the Tree Nettle/Ongaonga – which has been known to kill humans. And the other was the foxglove, which is probably better known. The reason why they permitted the ongaonga to remain close to the path, was because it was the preferred nursery plant of the native endangered Red Admiral Butterfly.

I think the ongaonga gives you plenty of warning that it’s not something to be messed with.

Finally, it was time to descend 380m – but not all at once. There were five ziplines, totally 2.2 kilometres in length, and each of them enabled you to zip down the hillside with a friend at your side. Or racing ahead of you, which tended to happen when Pen and I were ziplinging. So I’d try to “cannonball”, that is draw your arms and legs in to reduce the drag – and then decide that I’d rather the trip took longer instead of speeding it up. I did tend to spin a little, and it wasn’t until nearing the end that I finally managed to work out that a) it was easier to stop the spin with both hands (I only took video on the second zipline) and b) how to actually achieve this.

The usual way of beginning your descent was for Mathilde to count up to three. Pen and I (naturally) asked her to count down from five, at which point we would launch ourselves with a “Thunderbirds are go!” At the fifth run, she finally asked why, so I explained what Thunderbirds was, and then when we were at the bottom and waiting for the other zipliners to catch up, we had a chat with Simon, who was originally from England, about the joys of Thunderbirds and Supermarionation shows in general – and how we all wish we’d kept our old toys which would now be worth megabucks.

There was one run where I asked another couple if they’d like to swap descent partners for that run, so that we could all get photos and video of the other starting off and descending.

Once we’d all completed our fun, and pronounced that we’d like to go around again, we had to wait for our transportation to return. Apparently, the Polaris had got a flat tyre which needed changing, and had probably held up other tours. (They have three on the go at once.) This gave us time to stand, and chat, and see Australasian Harriers ride the thermals in the valley.

So we were lucky there.

Once we were dropped off back at our original mini-bus, we were taken back to the airport where we were divested of our harnesses and helmets, and got the gear we’d left behind back. This included my raincoat. I’d started out wearing a merino, a blouse, my jacket, and my raincoat to act as a windbreak. I did leave my raincoat at the airport and after we’d done all the walking between runs, I could have quite happily have left the jacket and merino behind too. Still, better to be safe than sorry, and I was concerned about the windchill factor.

$CoMmEnt
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$CoMmEnt

Proof that I did it! Thanks for the photos, Pen.

My heart rate according to my watch.

So, how would I compare this to Coromandel’s Driving Creek Zipline? I am glad that we did that one first, as it was sort of a training run to get us up to speed for the main event. But, it did do some things better. You could hire cameras for your helmets or selfie sticks, which saved endangering your camera/phone. (You could buy bungees for your phones at Kaikoura.) Plus, for a couple of descents, your guides would take your photos as you leapt off, and these were uploaded to the Internet for you to download later. So, Driving Creek had better ways of recording memories, Kaikōura ZipLines had “better” ways of making them.

Driving Creek Zipline with Jan. Warning, it’s a long video.

After all that, we were ready for that long promised ice cream, so I had a fresh fruit mixed berry one. Yum!

After that excitement, we returned to Lazy Shag to offload our gear. Following that, as they’re predicting a 100% chance of rain tomorrow and it may be more pleasant indoors, we continued on to Emporium Brewing to book a slot for an escape room. We could have chosen “The Gangster’s Hideout” which was for people with some experience, and “Mystery at Shaw House School” for beginner/intermediate level. We figured that we were beginners.

Pen wanted a Kaikōura T-Shirt, so we did a bit of souvenir hunting, but the only one that she liked, they didn’t have in her size. So that was fruitless.

Having reached the end of town, we kept on walking. Walking along the foreshore and past Fyffe House.

Yes, I know it’s pink. Yes, I did consider painting my house pink. Yes, I did look at Fyffe House when I was considering painting my house. Yes, I did decide that the blue and white would look better.

But there is a reason why Fyffe House is pink and that’s because it originally was pink. It’s the oldest surviving house in Kaikōura and was lived in by the owner of the whaling station. The pink colour was because it was originally coated in whale oil mixed with (I think) creosote to protect the weatherboards.

They can’t be true New Zealand Pōhutukawa. They’re too intense in colour, and Pōhutukawa don’t naturally occur that far south.

Having decided against visiting Fyffe House, we continued walking until we reached the seal colony. Being summer, there weren’t many about, but we did get to see a couple… Who couldn’t care less about all these people who’d come to look at them.

Why have they got a picture of a parrot when they’re talking about gulls?

And then we had to walk back.

We had this problem the last time Pen and I visited Kaikōura. What was the best way to get back? Last time we had a Whale Watching trip to catch, so we took what was supposed to be a shortcut and turned out to be over a steep hill and with poor signage, only just making it in time. This time we stuck to the foreshore because we at least knew where we were going.

We had originally planned on returning to the Lazy Shag for a wash and to get dressed, but decided that we’d only be using up valuable time, so we went straight to the Strawberry Tree for tea.

Quite honestly, I think we both would have been happier going back to last night’s restaurant. The staff were pleasant enough, but we arrived there before our reserved table was ready. We were offered another table, which seemed fine, except that you had to order at the bar and the queue snaked right alongside our table. And it was noisy enough that it was hard to have a conversation.

I ordered BBQ smoked pulled pork shoulder seasoned in spicy sauce. This came with wedges, coleslaw, cheesy corn bread, pickles, and sauce. It was nice, but, as usual there was too much.

Pen ordered BBQ beef brisket. She was given a BBQ beef brisket burger. She got a replacement. This meant that I had to eat whilst she waited for it to be cooked. Then I had to wait whilst she ate it. Initially, she thought she didn’t have her corn bread, but it was hiding underneath the brisket. The wait staff were good about replacing her meal, but were expecting her to pay the difference, until she pointed out that it was their error (she’d even pointed to it on the menu) and asked that she not be charged that. The wait staff said the difference would come out of her wages and then clearly decided it wasn’t worth making a fuss over.

We went back to the Lazy Shag for a hot chocolate and to work on our blogs.

Steps = 31,266

Kilometres = 21.6

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Happy New Year – 2025!

Posted on January 1, 2025 by Purupuss
  • This year we’re starting off with a bang
  • Down on the shore. It was our plan
  • With hundreds of others, we stopped and stared
  • At a bright, bold start for this new year
  • May all have health, and love, and fun
  • Happy New Year, from bright Picton.

That, more or less, was the poem I sent to my friends as a Happy New Year greeting. I had it all ready to go at about 12.30am, but the Wi-Fi wasn’t cooperating. So I tried to send it in the morning, and it nearly worked, until the Wi-Fi packed a sad again. So I waited until I’d got the Wi-Fi sorted on the train between Picton and Kaikōura and finally got it to go.

Scott and Kally, the night after New Year’s

The first thing we did was have our breakfast – me while Pen was still sleeping. And mine was fresh fruit, yoghurt, and last night’s left over garlic bread, which I could be bothered carting around the country and I didn’t want to waste.

Once we were both fed and packed, we checked out of Picton House B&B, and was farewelled by a very chatty Coral (I got her name wrong yesterday), who called us “Girls”. So we’re both an “Old Couple” and “Girls”. I think we’ve got something of an identity crisis going on here.

One thing that I’ve long wanted to do and have never been able for a variety of reasons, is check out the Edwin Fox sailing ship. This relic is:

  • Last surviving ship that took convicts to Australia
  • Last wooden Crimea War troop carrier
  • Oldest Merchant ship in the World
  • Pioneering refrigeration Ship
  • Oldest wooden vessel that brought immigrants to New Zealand

Every time prior to this where we’ve been in Picton, the boat’s either been less than ready to be viewed, or we haven’t had time. Today we rectified that. (I paid both of our entrance fees of $15.)

It’s another excellent little museum, focussing on just the one subject (with the exception of its mentioning of some notable genuine local shipwrecks – which the Edwin Fox is not.) The building tells you about the Edwin Fox’s history, both in artifacts and with a video. But outside is the pièce de résistance. The boat itself. Admittedly, its seen better days, but it’s being preserved now, rather than restored, so you can get and idea of its size and construction.

This fascinated me as the frame’s all made of string and knots. Probably a bit beyond my macrame level.

One of my highlights was that as we were looking at the exterior of the Edwin Fox, which is housed in a pumped out dry dock, I could see a ray of some description swimming around the platform surrounding it. I pointed it out to Pen, but I don’t know if singing the Stingray theme was entirely appropriate.

We did a little bit of souvenir shopping, and I bought myself a $5, pink, Pōhutukawa embossed, card holder, that’ll fit better into my belt bag.

After that, we decided that we were going to have another Toastie Lords toastie for lunch (I had an Ivan – Pastrami, Sauerkraut (which I don’t remember having), and pickle – and an old-fashioned lemonade. As there was a twenty-minute wait, I left Pen waiting and dashed over to the Picton Society of Model Engineers, aka Rail and Sail, Picton. Being a foundation, subscribing life member of the Thames Small Gauge Railway, naturally I have an interest in other small gauge railways. And, of course, after a chat to the only engineer on their team (they have about 15 volunteers), I had to have a ride. They operate on donation payments, so I gave them $5 and enjoyed my twice around the track. Well, I tried to enjoy it, as I’d just sat on the train when my watch vibrated a message from Pen to say our toasties were ready. So I spent the next five minutes in a mixture of wanting the train to hurry and wanting the ride to continue.

As soon as the train came to a stop, I was off and running back to Pen and my lunch. And I am quite proud of the way I was able to job without needing to stop. All this extra eating can’t be doing me too much damage.

We took our toasties and drinks to the i-Site and sat outside to enjoy them (except that I was still in hurry up mode, so I bolted my lunch down) and then collected our cases from the i-Site. We then wheeled them over the road to the railway station and checked in. The ticket lady knew who we were because we were the only pair they were expecting.

Our seats were carriage B, seats 7A and B and we got ourselves sorted. Eventually. Great Journey’s NZ (aka Kiwirail) used to have an in-carriage system whereby you could plug headphones into the jacks in the centre console between seats, and listen to the commentary whenever the screen in the centre of the aisle told you that you were about to pass something of interest. Now you need connect to the Wi-Fi to download an app (which I’d prepared earlier), log in to the app, and then you have access to the audio commentary. This took me longer than expected because I was trying to log in on my phone and laptop, but couldn’t find one of the characters on my phone that the laptop’s automatic password generator was suggesting. Finally, I got this sorted.

But, one good thing about this system is that, if for some reason you miss a bit of commentary, you can now go back and listen to it again. You won’t have the scenery outside to relate to, but at least you’ll know something about that river you passed a couple of kilometres ago.

I love travelling by train, but this trip was just too short. The fact that we were getting off at an interim stop and not the terminus also made it doubly on-edgy, as I knew that everything had to be packed up and ready to go as soon as the train pulled into the station.

Where it was raining.

There was a shuttle driver and he was willing to take us, and an Israeli couple with their little boy, to the Lazy Shag Hostel, but he was out of room. So we sheltered where we could and waited for him to come back an collect us. It was a bit ironic, really, as if we’d been able to cross the railway tracks and fight our way through a hedge we’d be there. But, honestly, paying $20 between the two of us for a shuttle was much easier than getting wet.

Okay, about the Lazy Shag… It has good Wi-Fi and… and that’s about it. It does have a lovely massaging shower, but there was nowhere in the bathroom to hang your towels, and the window here didn’t fit properly and was screwed shut. The radiator in the room was leaking, so the proprietress, who, to be honest, couldn’t do enough for us, brought us in a heater.

Pen’s bed, a double, had been made up. But the other option was either the top or bottom of a bunk bed. This did have a bottom sheet, but I had to make the rest of it. And, whilst it was high enough for me to sit up in, I had to be careful about where I sat as there was a length of RHS (you can tell I used to work for an engineering factory) metal bar running the length of the top bed for strength – right at head banging height.

There was only one spare chair, the head of my bunk was next to the sliding toilet door, there was nowhere to put anything when you were in bed, but at least everything seemed clean. And the bed was comfortable enough to sleep in.

So we went out.

…And bought our breakfast. I bought a fruit salad and a yoghurt to last me two days.

Afterwards, we were hunting for something to eat, so we tried a couple of restaurants. The first was closed because it was New Year’s Day. The second (the Strawberry Tree) was full, so we booked a table to tomorrow night. The wait staff who assisted us recommended the Whaler, which was in the same block, but we crossed over the road and went to Groper Garage. This was quieter, and I ordered an entre-sized Southern-style chicken and a side salad – and that was more than enough! And very tasty. We had a hot chocolate, with a chocolate fish, for dessert.

And then came back to our accommodation.

Steps = 16,114

Kilometres walked = 11.2

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New Year’s Eve – Counting Down…

Posted on December 31, 2024 by Purupuss

31 December 2024

I was awake at 6.30, so I decided to get up-to-date on my blogs. But my laptop started running out of juice, so I went into the lounge and plugged it in. And got up-to-date! And typed this little bit at 8.31 whilst Pen was still snoring.

The Wi-Fi here in this motel/B&B is still lousy, but I did manage to get a newsfeed to tell me who’s got the New Year’s Honours. I’m pleased to see that Graeme Pearce has got a Kings Service Medal. (Doesn’t that sound odd after a lifetime of QSM?) He has done a lot for heritage in Thames, including keeping the historic cemeteries accessible.

One bit of good news, after about an hour, I managed to get onto my emails and received confirmation that we’re booked into Scoozi for tonight. So we’re not going to starve. (Although, that may not be a bad thing. Or to at least find some place that provides healthy(ier) meals.)

The site of the original railway station

So we gave up on the i-Site and instead cottoned onto the fact that the Kaipupu Wildlife Sanctuary, which we wished to walk, was actually a peninsula cut off by a predator proof fence. The only way we could get there was by boat. So, because Pen owes me about $80 (I can’t remember what for – Rangitoto Ferry tickets and other stuff, I think) she paid for my $30 ticket with Beachcombers ferries.

While we waited for midday and the meeting of the boat to roll around, we went to the Whaling Museum. This was a charming little museum, which reinforced how awful whaling was, but also how it wasn’t a wasteful industry as they used every bit of the poor slain animals.

When it was time to head for the ferry, we joined 40 others at the office and were signed onto the boat. I was the first one there, so they went to tick me off, but because Pen got caught by everyone else I couldn’t board until she turned up.

It was a short trip, only about ten minutes and went around to the jetty. There, we were allowed to get off and had two hours to have a wander along the tracks.

Which we did.

It was a lovely little track, with regular signage explaining about the history of this part of the peninsula (farming and then volunteer replanting), as well as identifying plants, invertebrates, and birds. I think we saw a bellbird. We did see a couple of wētā having a snooze in one of the many wētā hotels.

It was one of those days where one minute you were hot, the next you were putting your jacket on, then you needed a rain jacket against the spits of rain, then the sun was shining again, but we still enjoyed the stroll, getting back to the jetty well before the two-hour deadline. Once there, there was great excitement amongst some of our fellow travellers as there were jellyfish swimming around the jetty.

Our first ferry was a monohull, but this one was a catamaran, and I got some photos from the top deck – including of the Ovation of the Seas looking obscene amongst the bush of the sound. Even if it was moored alongside a timber exporting port.

Back to dry land and we decided to try Toastie Lord for lunch. They had to be good as they were busy, even though it was almost 3.00pm, and we had to wait for our toasted sandwiches. (Mine was Betty – ham and pineapple. Very uninspiring, but very nice.) I also had a custard cream donut, but only had water with my flavouring drops as my drink to counteract some of the sugar intake and reduce me expenditure.

We finally got to the i-Site to find out what’s happening for New Year’s tonight – they were setting up a sound stage this morning – and it’s a family event culminating in fireworks.

This morning’s walk around Kaipupu was located on one side of Picton, and there were a series of walks on the other that we also wanted to do, so we got directions from Beachcombers Cruises and started walking.

It was quite a nice walk… to start with. On the flat and following the harbour. Then it started climbing. This wasn’t too bad – even though the brochure said the track was rated moderate. All was good, and the bush about us was very pleasant, until we got to the point that was, supposedly, called the Harbour View. Except that where we found the lookout, in our minds, didn’t match what the map was telling us. We got some photos anyway.

It was starting to rain, so we packed everything of importance away (cameras, bears, penguins), but didn’t bother getting our raingear out. Which didn’t matter as it cleared up within five minutes.

After that, with a short detour the wrong way down a one-way road (which seemed to be what the map was saying), we retraced our steps.

We still don’t know if we went the right way or not.

Whilst slogging along the steeper parts of the parts of the walk, we were saying how an ice cream would go down rather well about then. But, by the time we emerged into the town, it was after 5.00pm, the shops were shutting up, and we were due to have our dinner at 7.00pm. So we figured we may have our ice creams for dessert.

We stopped off at the local 4Square supermarket on the way back to our B&B/motel to buy our breakfast. I definitely wanted something healthy, so I’ve got fruit salad and yoghurt. And this was after finally finding a café that did what sounded like a very tasty porridge.

So it was back to our unit, a shower, a bit of packing, a bit of photo downloading, and then, having donned my raincoat, up the High Street to Scoozi, an Italian wood fired pizza place. There we ordered garlic bread as starters and Salmon Fettucine for Pen and Macaroni and Cheese for me – as I figured it would be interesting to see how it’s cooked Italian style. The garlic bread was very nice, but it was six big chunks, which was a meal in itself, even with us sharing it. The Mac and Cheese was nice, but it was all just too much of a good thing and I couldn’t eat it all. Plus, with the four cheeses that were part of lunch’s toastie, I guess I’m either getting calcified arteries or plenty of skeletal calcium.

Pen decided that she’d like a hot chocolate to finish off, so we waited for the menu.

And waited.

And the wait staff packed up around us and another couple.

And, after a group came in for a meal and were told the restaurant was closed, one of the wait staff chained up and padlocked the gate that was the entrance we all came in. As Pen pointed out, being in a room with multiple sources of naked flames (including the pizza oven), having to exit through another room (the Mariner’s Mall), when the fire station was over the road, was not a good look at the least!

While we waited, we looked with concern at the weather outside. The rainclouds that were capping the neighbouring hills seemed to be lifting, but the wind, which was more of an issue for the fireworks, seemed to be just as intense.

Finally, after we’d done a bit of Internet surfing on our phones, (pity the laptop was back at the unit) Pen went up and asked for a hot chocolate. She was sold this and paid for everything then and there – so it’ll be my turn to pay for lunch and tea tomorrow.

And then it was back to the unit, type up today’s blog, get photos ready for uploading when I’m finally somewhere with decent Wi-Fi, and get into our PJs with our clothes over the top ready for the fireworks at midnight.

Which we did.

Plus, after a step outside to get the feel of the weather – not that chilly, no rain in the air, and no wind! – we put on our jackets (for warmth, not wet weather protection), and set off.

We wandered down to the foreshore and found a place where we could stand on the bank, looking where we thought the fireworks would be going off, whilst well away from the volume of the concert going on at the soundstage erected this morning. (Unfortunately, it wasn’t well away from the smokers and vapers – many of whom seemed to be frighteningly young.)

It was a good, something like fifteen-minute, firework display that we watched over the trees and the marina. Pen sent a photo of the pair of us in front of the fireworks to her Thunderbirds friends, I tried to take a photo of the pair of us, which was terrible, so I settled for having the camera on the handheld scene setting and holding it at hip level. I’ve succeeded in getting some reasonably good shots, whilst still being able to enjoy the display.

After wishing each other a Happy New Year, we came to a few conclusions.

  1. One of the places we’d tried to book for our New Year’s Eve dinner was the Oxley. (A mere façade of its former grandeur with a big modern monstrosity behind.) When we walked past at 11.45 this evening, we realised that it was pumping, and loud. It would not have been a fun place to try to have a meal. Even if we’d eaten at 7.30pm like we’d originally planned.
  2. One of the places where Pen had tried to get us accommodation, was the Art Deco Hotel, but it was sold out. It was also right next door to the Oxley. I doubt we would have got much sleep during the night.
  3. Our present accommodation may have been a ten-minute walk from the centre of town, but it was ten minutes away from the noise of the celebrations, which meant it was fairly quiet. Aside from, for some strange reason, when you were in the toilet, which was when you could hear everything happening down in the waterfront quarter.
  4. There are going to be some sore heads in the morning.

We returned to our unit in the New Year, spent about thirty minutes trying to connect to the Internet, went to bed and went straight to sleep.

Steps = 23,096

Kilometres = 15.9

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Two Islands

Posted on December 30, 2024 by Purupuss

30 December 2024

This morning, we started out at the Thunderbird Café, where I had French Toast without cream and lemon honey ginger tea. I would really like something healthy like porridge, but nowhere seems to have anything like that.

The Thunderbird café is themed around Texan/Mexican style, but does acknowledge people like us with a Thunderbird Four, Matchbox Virgil, Burger King Bobble Head Virgil, and a Thunderbird One on the till; plus a row of the set of DVDs on a top shelf. Unfortunately, it no longer offers tasty treats like Penelope’s Pancake Stacks or Big Brains Breakfast.

More of a Captain Scarlet and the Mysterons vibe than Thunderbirds

Because of this theme, I’ve assumed that the background music was of a similar genre, but it was while we were eating that Pen said: “That sounds like the beginning of the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy theme.” (For those of you who don’t know the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy theme was originally a BBC sci-fi/comedy radio series; before its script writer, Douglas Adams, wrote the accompanying five-part book trilogy, and it got made into a TV series and then Hollywooded into a movie. It’s where you learn the answer to the Ultimate Question of Life, The Universe, and Everything… But you don’t learn the question.) It’s been years since I heard the theme, but I realised she was right. We also realised that it not only sounded like the theme tune, it WAS the theme tune. So what that had to Texas or Mexico I’ve got no idea.

And I’ve decided that, even though I think it’s a stupid idea, if we’re going out for breakfast, I’m going to clean my teeth before we leave. That way, if we don’t come back, at least my teeth will have been cleaned once in the morning.

There are some things that we would have liked to have done in Wellington. Seeing Wētā Workshop’s Thunderbirds are Go display was one, but they don’t have it anymore. Some of their Thunderbirds (or maybe Thunderbirds are Go) models are on display at the Roxy Cinema, but that would have involved a roughly ¾ hour bus trip and fretting about whether or not we were going to get back in time for our ferry.

So we went for a ride instead.

Firstly, I showed Pen the statue of John Plimmer and his dog. (Since she’s a dog person.) We then walked 100 metres along the same street to the cable car. Okay, so it’s actually a funicular and not a cable car, but everyone knows it as such, and you can’t really go to Wellington without having a ride on it. So we enjoyed the trip to the top and then got photos of it heading back down the hill again.

I think the tunnel lights are a new thing.

And then I saw a sign leading to the Begonia House. Now, Wellington’s Begonia House has been in the news a lot lately. It was built in the 1960s, is a much loved feature of Wellington’s Botanic Garden, and because it’s “earthquake prone” (which I insist is the wrong phrasing as it’s not prone to earthquakes, it’s prone to falling down in them) and the Wellington City Council can’t afford the repairs, is going to be pulled down… Except it’s not.

Whatever, we had a very enjoyable wander downhill through the bush track – listening to the bird song including what I think was the cry of a kākā in flight – saw some interesting plants, patted a very friendly cat, and just had a relaxing, pleasurable walk… Until it was time to head back to the hotel for our gear and we had to walk back up the hill to use our return journey tickets on the cable car, having to leave about six minutes before we reached the Begonia House. So that’s one thing we haven’t seen.

We did check out a neighbouring souvenir shop that was offering a free gift of some paua chips and had some very nice trinkets, but there was nothing we needed to get. Unlike the stop off at the Woolworths supermarket next door, where we bought our lunch. (Ciabatta bun, lemon honey and ginger juice, and some banana chips to snack on.)

Whereas our walk around the Botanic Gardens had been in near perfect conditions, we emerged into light rain. We couldn’t have timed it better.

Back to the hotel, got our bags, and over the road to the Bluebridge ferry terminal.

I’m always astonished that the Bluebridge terminal is pretty much in the centre of town, within cooee of the railway station and parliament’s grounds, whereas you have to travel a bit further to get to the State run InterIslander.

Booking in is not dissimilar to booking in on a flight. You hand in your bags, they get weighed and put on a conveyor belt/set of rollers that whisk them away to somewhere safe, you wait in the boarding area, and then you have to walk to your vessel. In this case a ship that has loaded up with auto carriers of cars and a whole lot of vehicles towing mainly caravans. There must be an exact science into loading up.

Once we were on the ship proper, we had to walk through the vehicle storage bay and then climb several flights of stairs. I said to Pen to keep an eye out for (George) Mallory, the man who disappeared attempting to climb Mt Everest before Sir Edmond Hillary.

We emerged onto the deck with the café and bar and found ourselves a seat.

Taken the day before

Despite Wellington’s reputation of being a windy city, and being grey and dismal when we left, it was a smooth sailing. I ate my ciabatta and some of my banana chips. They’re good. They’ve got just enough sweetness to give you a boost, but (I hope) also have some healthy qualities.

Close to where we were sitting, the café was offering a snack-sized “cauliflower bites”. Deep fried cauliflower with two dipping sauces. This didn’t sound as unhealthy as chips, so I bought some. What was delivered to my chair was enough for a meal, rather than a snack, and genuinely deep fried. It was presented on a dinner plate, with a small deep fryer basket filled with cauliflower resting on a red and white gingham bit of greaseproof paper that wasn’t as useful as a serviette, and surrounded by even more cauliflower. I ate most of these and attempted the basket, but gave up. Pen didn’t want any, so, unfortunately, they will have gone into the food scraps bin… I hope.

And that was after I’d eaten a fear swag off the plate!

Pen and I spent a bit of time on the deck as we sailed across the Cook Strait, through Queen Charlotte Sound, to Picton. And there were times when it was breezy enough that we needed to do Marcelle Marso impressions, and you could see white horses on the water, it barely affected the ship. There was a slight swell when we turned into Queen Charlotte Sound and was side on to the wind, but nothing really noticeable. The Strait has the reputation of being one of the roughest stretches of water in the world, but it was kind to us today.

It was grey and overcast, with patches of sunlight, as we chugged down through Queen Charlotte Sound. And chugging was what we did. Just a continuous hum of the engines with barely a variation to their tone until we were getting close to land. Apparently, we were supposed to travel on the southern side of an island through the Marlborough Sounds, but travelled north of it, which extended our trip somewhat.

But that was okay. We moored without a hitch, waited for Thunderbird Two’s pod door to open so we could exit, were escorted onto a bus, welcomed to rainy Picton, and driven around to the ferry terminal, where we were able to collect our bags.

This astounded me a little bit, as we were off the boat as soon as the entrance hatch had been lowered, yet our bags were ready and waiting for us. Then I remembered that waiting patiently for the hatch to lower and then the first thing off the boat, was a BlueBridge liveried truck. It would have been carrying our bags. Once we’d claimed our bags, we wrestled them back onto the bus and the driver did a little bit of a Tiki Tour to drop people off to where they were going. He didn’t know our establishment – the Picton House B&B, but knew the street (it’s a pretty main thoroughfare, maybe even the State Highway) and Pen was able to point it out to him and we were dropped off right over the road.

Having wished our driver a happy Hogmanay (he was Scottish), we wheeled our bags over the road, dragged them up the steps to the house, and signed in. Our host’s name is Carole (I don’t know why I feel the need to put an E on her name, but I do), and she was nattering away to give us all the details we needed. But she couldn’t catch Pen’s name when Pen repeated it several times. In the end I had to say it, and, finally, with my Kiwi accent and even through my mask she got who we were. (I don’t know how many others she was expecting at about 6.00pm at night.)

This is one of those places which are called a B&B, but only offer a B. And our B was in Unit One of the Anglesea Motel next door. Once again, it’s comfortable enough, but the WiFi is lousy. Carol(e) admitted as much, as the walls are concrete block, so she said that we could sit on her porch and use her office WiFi. When I attempted that after dinner, that WiFi started out good and then dropped out. So I’ve dropped all plans to post my blogs daily. At least there’s no chance of anyone hacking into our devices.

I was happily typing my blog when I suddenly looked at my laptop’s clock. 7.11pm. Surely not! But it was. So we decided to give up on our blogging and find somewhere to eat, since we wouldn’t know our way around in the dark.

Carol(e) had recommended the two places over the road for meals and had recommended booking in for our New Year’s meal. Both restaurants looked very nice (one being the Picton Sailing Club), but they also looked very expensive and beyond our present dress code. So we went to on to another place she recommended, which was not only quite expensive, it was packed. And sold out for New Year’s. The next option was an Irish Bar, which I found too cramped and noisy, so we ordered fish and chips from a chippy.

Whilst Pen waited for our order, I took our Bundaberg fizzy drinks back to the unit and went over the road to the restaurant to see if we could book in for tomorrow. The restaurant was closed and, when I finally saw someone, was booked out for New Year’s. But she suggested a place called Scuzzi, which did wood fired pizza, but also offered a dine in experience. Later, when I was sitting on the porch trying to find out what was going on in the world via my laptop, I did manage to check out the web site and (hopefully), book us a table for 7.00pm.

We had our fish/chicken burger (me) and chips at the unit, listening to a Don Snow’s History Podcast on Christmas customs, and then tried to write our blogs. My photos were taking so log to download, that I started playing a Jacquie Lawson advent calendar game. That was a mistake as I did really well in it and didn’t want to finish until I’d lost. And I even managed to score three Santas when I’ve never scored one before.

Walking = 14,943 steps

Kilometres (not by boat) = 10.3

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Lousy WiFi. Next posting on the 2nd probably

Posted on December 30, 2024 by Purupuss
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We Survived… Just.

Posted on December 29, 2024 by Purupuss

29 December 2024

This is being typed, whilst sitting on the Bluebridge Ferry “Strait Feronia” on the 30th. Having left at 1.34pm.

But now we’re looking back to a different form of transport.

Our long bus trip finally arrived in Wellington at about 6.30 am. We stumbled off the bus, thanked the driver, had a sort out in the concourse, and then hauled our bags over the road to the Downtown Backpackers. This Art Deco style building was once a full-on hotel called the Waterloo Hotel. One so flash that the late Queen Elizabeth II stayed there. And I have to tell you, that she wouldn’t be seen there in her current state.

Not that it’s a bad place to stay when in Wellington. The room we eventually got was clean, had its own ensuite, and we had a good night’s sleep. We were probably too exhausted to do otherwise.

Anyway, before that we straggled into the reception and asked to book in. As it was prior to checkout time of 10am, let alone check in time of 3.00pm, we couldn’t go to our room. However I doubt that we’re the first to arrive on what other trips have been called the redeye run, as they could put our cases into a locker and we were welcome to take the access key to the lounge and have a sleep on the couches there. This we gratefully accepted. We each found a couch, got out my pillow (and my neck cushion, which I let Pen use as a pillow), covered myself with my “Keep Calm and Call International Rescue” blanket, put on the eye mask was too hot to wear with the face mask on the bus, placed the cover that the pillow and blanket had been residing in under my feet – and promptly went to sleep.

We both woke up about 1.5 hours later, still somewhat groggy, but feeling a little more alive. After a bit of a wash we decided that we needed a sugar hit of some type to up our glucose levels, so we went hunting for a café that served breakfast at 8.00 am. Not an easy task the Sunday between Christmas and New Years in a city that’s being decimated by the current government’s desire to save money no matter what the consequences are to people’s wellbeing.

But, having said that, we did find a café nearby that sold what I thought were somewhat doughy, but edible pancakes and homemade lemon, honey, and ginger tea.

We could feel our energy levels get a much-needed boost.

As we still had hours before we could check in proper, and the weather was quite good for Wellington, we went for a walk around town, starting with the Parliament grounds. If you didn’t know it had happened, you wouldn’t even be aware that the area had been occupied for some days, culminating in a riot that burnt down the playground and some trees in the grounds.

The Beehive

We also checked out the rata in the grounds of the Old Government Buildings (now Victoria University’s School of Law). Being both part of the Metrosideros genus, many think that they are extra intensely coloured Pōhutukawa, but when you get up close, you can see that not only are the flowers more orangey, the flowers have larger “bulbs” that they sprout from.

It was about now that I came to the conclusion that the sun was too intense to be outside bareheaded, so I guided Pen to the Maritime Museum on the waterfront and dashed back for my hat.

When I rejoined her, I noticed that the New Zealand Portrait Gallery had a retrospective of Sir Toss Woolaston’s work.

Who the heck is that?

He’s a nationally renowned painter and we happen to have a painting by him at home. As it’s one of his early works, and therefore you can actually see who it is, then it won’t be worth much. But we’ve got it because Toss Woolaston wanted to go to Nelson, but he didn’t have the money for it. So he told Nan’s cousin that he’d paint his portrait in exchange for the boat fare. Uncle Fred wasn’t too keen, but in the end, he conceded and we’ve got that painting (including prevenance) hanging on the wall at home.

Because of this “family interest” and the exhibition was free, I suggested that we go in there for a brief look, which Pen agreed to. And it was basically in, once around the room, and out because, as I implied, I don’t like his work much.

It was starting to get really hot by this stage and Pen was looking for Peter Jackson’s biography. One second hand bookshop directed her to another, who did have it – in large hardback form, which isn’t great for lugging around the world. So she’d going to continue looking.

We went to a supermarket and bought our lunch and dinner and then took it back to the Waterloo Hotel/Downtown Backpackers, with a detour to what had been the BNZ bank. (I think.) What’s interesting about this place, apart from the way it’s been done up, is that down in the basement is what’s known as Plimmer’s Ark. In other words, the remains of John Plimmer’s boat had been found beneath the bank, taken away to be preserved and were then returned.

By the time we’d done all that and eaten our sushi lunch, it was just on 3.00pm and we were able to get the card to our room and hand in our general pass cards…

Once I’d found mine.

I’m finding with these things that I’ve lost, that I’ve put them in a safe place where I’ll know where they are and then forget where they are. This time, after searching my expected pockets, and returning to the dining area, and wondering where else it could be, I found it safely secured in my zip up breast pocket.

Like I think I said before, we had a good room with ensuite, even if I was concerned that it was going to be a little hot because of the low ceilings… Although Pen claimed they were high. Not compared to my house they’re not!

After doing a little blog recording and Lylo researching, I did a bit of emailing. I’d given Pen a personalised luggage label for Christmas and it had come out of this morning’s bus trip broken in half. As it had only travelled from Rangitoto to Auckland and then Auckland to Wellington, it didn’t last very well. The other thing I put in a warranty claim for was my water bottle. It too is personalised, but it had been getting harder and harder to remove the lid. Especially once the O-ring had slipped off and I’d had to hurriedly replace it – probably into the wrong place.

After our half a roast chicken and salad for tea, we went for a walk to find a place that sold hot chocolate. We ended up at the restaurant attached to the Ibis Hotel.

Following that, we retired to our beds to type up yesterday’s blog.

Steps = 21,144

Kilometres = 14.6

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Never by bus again

Posted on December 28, 2024 by Purupuss

28 December 2024

Even though we had the ceiling fan turning, I found it too hot during the night. Pen, conversely, found it too cold. If we have a similar arrangement later, we’re going to swap beds.

We took our time getting ready, having a shower (two in two days!), having breakfast (blueberry bagel and lemon Greek yoghurt), making sure everything was packed, and then finding other things that needed to be packed and we weren’t sure were going to fit into the bags.

At 10.00 am we were finally ready to vacate our room, so we went downstairs, asked for a twin bedroom next time, (Auckland City Hotel only had doubles available when I booked, so I asked if we could get a twin if it came available, so it wouldn’t hurt to ask again.) We then went out, with our first stop being LyLo Auckland.

Back in January, when I was originally deciding where to stay in Auckland, because the bus got in after the ferry for Rangitoto left, I found a place that was cheaper than most hotels. That’s because you slept in “pods”. The idea intrigued me and the pricing was good, but I was unsure if I would be comfortable staying in such a place. So, with Pen for support, we went hunting for it.

At first, we managed to overshoot the street and had to walk back down again to the road that runs at right angles to Hobson Street where the Auckland City Hotel is. (And more or less over the road from their parking area, which I hadn’t even known existed.) We asked one guy who was manning the information counter if it would be possible to see one of the rooms, and he admitted that he was information about things to do in Auckland, not LyLo per se, and told us who to speak to.

The woman who assisted us was very helpful. She found which rooms were available and took us to see them. One is a standard room with attached facilities, which was all you needed. The second was a standard room, but with shared facilities. (Both king sized beds)

The pods were different, but still looked comfortable. You slept in a room with up to ten others, but in a “pod” that was made up of a king sized bed and plenty of room to sit up and get changed in. You also got a locker to put your bags in. It actually looks quite fun and both Pen and I were keen to try them. There’s a Lylo in Queenstown, where we were already booked in to a six-room female only dorm, and we figured that trying the Lylo pods at least this means we wouldn’t have light in our eyes when the concert goers come back after the summer concert.

So, I’ve done a bit of surfing, and it turned out that not only does Lylo Queenstown have two spare pods in the female only room, their building is something like three minutes and 180 metres from the InterCity bus stop; as opposed to the 17 minute, 1.2 kilometre walk we would have had to have done to Haka House. Upshot? We’re now booked in to Lylo Queenstown for two nights.

Anyway, all that planning was in the future. Once we’d had a good look around Lylo Auckland, we went down to Smith and Caughey’s and I got more photos of their Christmas window display.

After that, we continued down to the waterfront and had an ice cream Sunday each at Movenpick. (Mint chocolate and hokey pokey in my case.) Then we walked the 100 metres on to the New Zealand Maritime Museum.

We spent a good few hours moseying around here, checking out such interesting titbits as early Polynesian seafarers, Sir Peter Blake’s life and legacy, America’s Cups successes and failures – and other sailing trophies, and immigrants’ experiences arriving by sea.

Spirit of New Zealand training ship

Dioramas of Auckland’s port then and now

Team New Zealand’s winning America’s Cup yacht. The keel bulb was a replica as the genuine article would have been too heavy to be on display.

Replica America’s Cup made out of plastic found on the sea shore

No. Not modern sleeping pods. Sailing ship sleeping berths.

It was about 3.00pm by the time we decided that we were getting hungry, so we went to Denny’s and I had a Veggie Skillet and an apple juice, which was nice enough.

Back to the Auckland City Hotel where we collected our bags and sat in their lounge for a while – me trying to get my tablet to free up some space. I keep on deleting stuff and it still says its just on full. Very frustrating.

6.30, after a JIC toilet stop, we headed to the InterCity Bus Terminal. That was after I realised that I couldn’t find my sunglasses anywhere. I had a look where they should be… I had a look where they could be… etc. I even told reception that if someone handed in sunglasses with pink frames they were mine. And I could have done with them as we headed out of town.

We were there early enough that we were able to score a front seat, which I was pleased about. We already had a fighting chance, as we’d paid the extra for the GOLD standard of transportation. That was: “InterCity GOLD buses offer a limited number of soft leather reclining chairs, complete with individual USB charging ports and free WiFi. Our premium InterCity GOLD seats provide plenty of room to stretch your legs. And the best thing is, they don’t cost a lot more than the regular fare! Simply lie back and relax – plug in your USB, log on to the WiFi, and watch the world glide by. Very nice.”

I’m not sure that “Very nice” is the adjective I’d use to describe it after 11.5 hours of using it. Still, it had to be better than what everyone else had to put up with. During one stop, I saw one guy who’d hung his hoodie over his face to keep the light out. It wasn’t too bad at the beginning, except that we were driving into the sun and I could have done with my sunglasses. Our seats’ backs, being the front ones, reclined a couple of degrees, but didn’t have the raised footrests of the seats behind. So I ended up, initially, resting my feet on my camera bag, which was lying flat on the floor, and then after the first of three toilet stops, I stood it up, curled up, and rested my feet on it, where it was pretty close to being the right height. Whilst still wearing the lap-belt safety restraint.

Another irritant was the lady over the aisle in the single seat. (Double our side of the GOLD seats, single the other.) I think she’d been upgraded as she was the friend of a friend of the driver, which at first she was thrilled about. By the end of the journey she was over it. But that wasn’t the problem. The problem was that she was an inveterate mobile phone user. Not only was she texting, which made audible beeps whenever a message came in, she was always on the phone and the whole bus knew about how: “I want that blanket back, bro… It cost me $50, bro… I don’t care what she thinks, bro, I want it back. Bro, they wanted someone to come with me on the bus to look after me, bro… You don’t hit a woman, bro, so I was out of there… Bro.”

This last bit of information we all gleaned, seemed to be the focus of her discussions.. With every member of her family. Putting two and two together, she and her other half had been staying with his relatives, and someone had hit her, and she’d got out of there. “I’m cancelling your ticket, bro… Your ticket’s cancelled, bro… When you catch the bus tomorrow, you want to see if the driver knows Renee as he’ll upgrade you and this is primo, bro.”

Pen has got an inflatable footstool that is clever in its construction in that it’s a decent size and has got three different heights you can inflate it to…

The woman adjacent to us: “You want to see these awesome inflatable footstools the old couple next to me have got, bro.”

Old couple!?

We’re still cracking up over that one.

It was a long trip for all concerned. As you can see by the schedule.

STOP LOCATION                       SCHEDULED

Auckland – Central                                 7:00 pm

Manukau City (Auckland)                     7:19 pm

Bombay (Auckland)                               7:49 pm

Huntly                                                    8:19 pm

Hamilton – Central                                 8:49 pm

Cambridge                                              9:19 pm

Tirau *                                                    9:45 pm

Rotorua                                                 11:09 pm

Taupo                                                   12:09 am

Waitahanui                                           12:19 am

Turangi                                                 12:54 am

Waiouru                                                 1:44 am

Taihape                                                   2:04 am

Bulls *                                                    3:05 am

Sanson                                                    3:44 am

Palmerston North                                   4:04 am

Massey University (Palmerston Nth)     4:14 am

Shannon                                                 4:39 am

Levin                                                      4:54 am

Otaki                                                       5:14 am

Waikanae (Wellington)                          5:24 am

Paraparaumu (Wellington)                     5:34 am

Porirua (Wellington)                              6:04 am

Johnsonville (Wellington)                     6:14 am

Wellington – Central                              6:30 am

* Tirau and Bulls were both half hour breaks for a snack and a JIC (Just in Case) toilet stop.

This was originally in neat columns, but that didn’t import too well.

The first few hours weren’t too bad. It was by the time we’d 11.00 pm and Rotorua that I, and my stomach, had had enough. Every 2.5 hours or so we’d stop just for a toilet break, and I’d get out just for fresh air. But by Waiouru it had got too much for me. I wanted to get out, but I didn’t want to worry Pen, but I also needed her to stop fussing about with her footstool and getting everything sorted so I could get out. So I made my apologies and get out to get some deep breaths.

That didn’t really work.

There was a queue for the toilets, so I waited outside…

I’m okay…

No, I’m not…

Yes, I am…

No, I’m…

Botheration.

I didn’t know what else to do, except stand on the forecourt, making sure no one put their foot in it, and keeping an eye on the toilet queue as people went into the toilet, others left, and I’d think that, finally, I could go in for a wash, and someone else would turn up.

Eventually, I was able to duck in and wash my hands and face. I then went and apologised to the forecourt attendant, and asked if they had anything ginger I could buy for nausea. They didn’t. The bus driver suggested a vanilla Up and Go, but they only had chocolate. He asked if there was anything he could do, and I (later on when I thought of it) considered asking if he had a magic want to send me straight to Wellington. Instead, I bought some peppermints and spent the rest of the trip sitting bolt upright in my seat to limit the side on motion. On one toilet stop, after some fresh air (getting away from the smokers and vapers), I decided that a JIC wouldn’t hurt. As it was supposed to be a quick stop and I was the last one in the ladies, I heard him say. “Is there anyone in there?” Another lady said there was and I said: “Yes. The lady who was sick.”

It’s a shame it was night, as the skies were mostly clear and there would have been some stunning views in the daytime. Especially of the Central Plateau. It definitely felt very alpine when I got out at Waiouru.

I’d bought myself a new personalised drink bottle, but the stopper was failing and when my camera bag fell over the bottle leaked. But it was either bend down to sought that out or keep looking straight ahead…

I kept looking straight ahead. Fortunately, it was only my torch lanyard that got wet.

And talking things in my bag. At one point I discovered that the divider between the camera section and the other items section had dropped and my sunglasses had slipped through the gap. So they were found. Then Pen lost her water bottle. Which eventually turned up when some bloke from the back of the bus brought it up to her.

I did manage to nod off a few times. Either just before we arrived at the next stop, which would wake me up; or else just before my head dropped and also woke me up.

So, needless to say, both Pen and I were absolutely Toyota’d by the time we got to Wellington. Pen got our bags, and then I asked her to stay with them as I sought out the driver who’d finished unloading the bags – just to say thank you to him. He commented that I was only the second person… “third” he added when Pen said thank you, to say thank you the entire trip. It’s a bit sad when he’s had the job of staying awake all night to keep us safe. (He was the only driver.)

And so, as it’s now Sunday 29th at 6.30am, I’ll switch to a new blog entry.

After I’ve got some sleep.

Steps = 13,243

Kilometres = 9.1 (walking, not bussing)

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A little breezy trip

Posted on December 27, 2024 by Purupuss

27 December 2024

Today was slightly windy.

Slightly, as in the forecast was for 39 km/h sou’sou’westerly winds. I’d known that this was possible since Tuesday and had been concerned. You see, Fullers 360 Ferries don’t like landing at Rangitoto Wharf’s all weather wharf in anything other than a light zephyr. If the winds were too strong and coming from the wrong direction, then the ferry would bypass Rangi’ Wharf and head to Islington Bay. A walk of about 1.45 hours. With all our gear.

Just as well we’d left Pen’s suitcase at the hotel. Mine I was using rather than a more convenient larger one, because it could convert to a backpack in this exact scenario.

But would I need to do that?

And how would I find out?

Fullers has an app that you can sign up to, and it automatically sends you alerts if there are any changes to the ferry schedules. Things like the Waiheke Ferry’s run aground so the 10:15 sailing can’t go ahead, or the Harbour Bridge has collapsed blocking the Birkenhead ferry run – that sort of thing. (Actually, I don’t know if the Fullers app would comment on the destruction of the Auckland Harbour Bridge, as the Birkenhead sailing comes under the auspices of Auckland Transport, which uses Fullers 360 Ferries.)

As I’ve signed up to the Fullers app, every so often my phone beeps at work to tell me that a cruise ship has taken up more room than it should and Rangitoto Island sailings are operating out of Pier 4 rather than Pier 14. Or that, due to the weather, the ferries will be sailing out of Islington Bay rather than Rangitoto Wharf. (Now that I’ve got a smart watch, I only need to glance at it when I get those notifications at work, rather than picked up my phone and firing up the display.) BUT, that app only works if you’re connected to the Internet, and I only had limited data on my phone. I had every intention of firing it up and seeing if I’d got a message from Fullers, but what if I timed it wrong and missed it?

I texted Shirley. She’s also a long term Rangitotoite, and has the app. Plus, she uses her mobile to keep in contact with her family and always has it with her and connected to the Internet. And so I asked her to let me know if Fullers let her know that they were going to Issy Bay rather than Rangi Wharf.

Almost instantly I had a reply from her saying that she’d just had a message from Fullers to say that, yes, all ferries were going into Islington Bay.

Bother.

Okay, we’d already psyched ourselves up for this. We’d start walking at 10.00 am at the latest, which would give us 2.75 hours to walk to Islington Bay. Fortunately, because of the wind, it wasn’t hot or muggy, so it wasn’t too bad.

And then we had to wait for the boat to arrive.

Remember how the other week I just couldn’t find my camera battery. I’m not sure if I’ve said, but when I was looking for it, I was looking for a small black box, about the size of a matchbox, with a removable orangey/yellow cover on one side – just like the spare batteries for my old camera. The new battery that I bought a couple of days ago, turns out to be a small black box, about the size of a matchbox, with a removable clear/white plastic cap. As I was looking for the orangey/yellow I’ll probably find the clear/white plastic cap looking at me when I get home.

Anyway, I’d recently bought some replacement Seaband anti-nausea wristbands – mainly for car (bus) travel sickness. (Pink, of course.) As I never have any problems travelling between Auckland and Rangitoto I hadn’t worn them on the way out. But, as there were a lot of white horses galloping, I figured there was a chance that I would need them on the way home.

Do you think I could find them?

I searched where they should be. I searched where they could be. I searched where they were unlikely to be. I searched where they shouldn’t be.

Nope.

In the end, Pen gave me one of hers to wear on my left wrist, as she said that Anaesthesiologists put them on patients’ left wrists to help negate the effects of anaesthetics when they wake up after operations. I’ve always believed that Seabands need to be on both wrists, but I was willing to give it a go. Mind you it wasn’t that long a trip between Rangitoto and Auckland…

That’s once we were able to get moving.

The ferry was supposed to leave at 12.45. We didn’t see it chugging into the bay until 1.08 pm and didn’t leave until 1:21. According to the skipper, once we were on board, that was how bad the conditions were. He hoped to make up time on the return journey. I hoped to get a photo of the bach as we went past and got the camera out, but the sailing was that rough I doubted that I’d be able to hold the camera still. Pen did take her camera to the stern of the boat, but she reckoned it got covered in sea spray salt.

We’d arranged to meet up with our mutual Thunderbirds friend Ali Wallis (Pen had Tiki Toured around Northland with her an her family the last time she was here) to have lunch and a chat, so I kept texting her to let her know how things were going: We haven’t left the island yet. And haven’t even seen the ferry. Hope this skipper knows we’re at Islington Bay, not Rangitoto Wharf.

I texted her when we were leaving the drop off at Devonport, and again when we were in the parking area by Shed 10, by which point she was driving along Quay Street and about to turn in. It was a very quick greeting and then she took us back to her office in Shortland Street. (No, she doesn’t work in a hospital. She’s a Senior Instructor in law.)

As we’d hoped to get a roast for a pre-freeze-dried-food-Christmas-dinner and failed, Ali bought us some roast for lunch. So, we all sat around a table at her office and tucked into roast lamb, beef, and chicken. Plus kūmara, carrots, peas, and potato. (My first potato was cooked perfectly, so I had to have seconds.) This was washed down with juice and we had strawberries, blueberries, and some raspberry slice for dessert. We hadn’t eaten so good in days!

Once we’d finished eating and chatting, Ali took us back to the Auckland City Hotel and we said our goodbyes, before checking in.

First point of order? A shower! And recharge our gizmos. And get our clothes together for a wash – $4 for the washing machine, $4 for the dryer.

While our clothes were still cycling away, we went out to buy something light for dinner. I got a “pork meat floss bun”, whatever that is, from a shop called Maggie Bakery, which is over the road from the Auckland City Hotel. But, whatever it was, it was surprisingly light and tasty. They also had very decadent slices of cake, so we got a Magnum caramel chocolate (?). I also bought a blueberry bagel for breakfast. We came back to the hotel, decided that we needed something to drink, and went out again. I object to buying water in a plastic bottle, but I’m also not a fan of filling my water bottle up from the bathroom sink, so I got an apple flavoured “Pump”. Which tasted apple cider vinegary.

From Wikipedia: Meat floss, also known as pork or yuk sung is a dried meat product with a light and fluffy texture similar to coarse cotton, originating from China.

Following that, we settled down, did a bit of relaxing at our relative computers, and uploaded our blogs.

Tomorrow night we’re getting the night bus between Auckland and Wellington, so don’t be surprised if you don’t get a blog entry. Typing when moving is not good for my stomach, so I don’t think I’ll be making use of the onboard WiFi.

I turned my smart watch back on this morning and it recorded that I took 18,310 steps over 4 kilometres. (Yes, WordPress, that is how you spell kilometres.)

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Boxing Day

Posted on December 26, 2024 by Purupuss

26 December 2024

The weather forecast for today was for showers and possible thunderstorms, so we made the decision to go for a walk to Islington Bay whilst it was still fine, and hopefully get back before the weather packed up. Because we hadn’t had breakfast (well, I hadn’t. Pen had a snack bar of some description), I brought some OSM bars (One Square Meal) with us so we could have “breakfast” on the journey.

As the road was easier walking (the coastal track was washed out some years ago and I don’t know if it’s been repaired yet), we took the more “direct route”, aside from the detour I escorted us to. On the way we passed a Department of Conservation worker who was changing the eggs and mice in the rat/mustelid traps that are dotted around the island. He told us that he does this about once a month, trying to see if any have snuck onto these two predator free islands. They don’t use chicken chicks because of concerns with bird flu.

The detour was to Yankee Wharf where the Americans had been based during the Second World War. And of course, being Americans, when they created a road, they made it straight as a die. Even though the logical thing to do was follow the contours of the scoria lava flows.

When we’d finished at Yankee Wharf, and got some day trippers to the island (off a boat moored in the bay) to take our photo, we walked along the coastal track past some of the baches.

We were just walking past one when Steph, who, along with her husband Quincy, is paid by the Rangitoto Island Conservation Heritage Trust (RICHT) to manage the three Book-A-Bach baches. She was just getting “Arrowsmiths” sorted for today’s influx by water taxi. But she allowed us to have a look through and see how the baches are set out for paying customers. A bit like normal baches, really.

We had our “breakfast” (OSM bar) in the shelter shed attached to the gangway leading to the ferry pontoon, as it offered shelter from the passing showers and the sun. After that, we continued on to Motutapu Island, in the hope that we might see some takahē. We saw some Pukeko, and the sign saying watch out for takahē, but no birds. But I do think that we may have heard some.

As it was after midday and getting very hot and sunny, we put another layer of sunblock on and walked back to Whare Taare along the road – keeping a wary eye on the dark clouds in the distance.

I’ve just realised that if you click on a photo within a “gallery”, like above, you’ll get to see the full photograph.

As today is the anniversary of Thunderbirds’ creator, Gerry Anderson’s, death, we filled up our glasses with leftover sparkling apple juice and took a photo of us on the running track saluting him. Wearing our Christmas hats.

The we had breakfast/lunch. In other words, I had my porridge and Pen her croissant and cheese.

The morning was hot and sunny, so I washed two tea towels. When we got back from our walk it was still hot and sunny, so I decided to wash my Rangitoto T-Shirt and socks that I’d been wearing, meaning that I could put them away clean, rather than having them hang about dirty. As at 10pm, they’re still damp, but at least they’re clean. Unfortunately, I’d put too much water in tonight’s freeze dried Sweet and Sour Lamb, and I’d managed to slop it onto the wet dishes draining cloth, so I washed it, and the cover of the “fridge” this evening.

We started packing everything away before the rain hit, so we were able to watch the downpour drench Achilles Point/St Heliers and then draw closer and closer to Rangitoto. It was a dash to ensure everything was inside, but I think we’re pretty well right.

After tea we had another game of Yahtzee, which I think Pen enjoyed more as she had a better understanding of how it worked – and was more awake.

And we head back to Auckland tomorrow. Two full days isn’t long enough to spend on Rangitoto.

My watch’s battery only had 14% charge, so I turned it off today. My phone, however, said I took 22,148 steps, and that was only when I was carrying it around the island.

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