The day starts pretty early when you sleep on a boat. First, at about 6am, the generator starts (incidentally, that also means the toilet will once again be flushable – an important point, and, I suspect, the rock upon which many a relationship has dashed itself to pieces). Then the anchor is hauled up, which when you’re anchored in a fjord with sides that go straight down 40 metres, involves the winding of quite a lot of noisy anchor chain. Finally, the engine coughs into life, and you’re off. I consider myself to be pretty adept at sleeping, but if you can sleep through all that, you’re a more accomplished sleeper than I.
Category: New Zealand
I keep thinking I hear wine. Rain! I mean rain!
Holly looking out the window after completing a Pinot Noir tasting flight.
This is the Sound
We’ve had a few days in the wilderness (sans wifi) so here’s a quick catchup of our recent activities.
Dunedin Bonus Feature: A Majestic Murder
While in Dunedin, we stayed for two nights in accommodation located on the beach in a suburb called St Clair, in a building proclaiming itself to be MAJESTIC MANSIONS. As a lover of Agatha Christie from a very young age, it immediately occurred to me as the perfect spot for an unlikely amateur detective to solve a murder.
Disaster in Dunedin
Don’t let that photo fool you – today was not the best day of the holiday.
Lake Tekapo
Leaving Christchurch behind, yesterday we set out for Lake Tekapo. We’d been driving along for a while when suddenly, out of nowhere, we turned a corner and someone dropped a whole pile of huge snow-covered mountains in front of the car. It was pretty unexpected to see them with so much snow this late in the year – we knew there would be mountains, but I guess we hadn’t really thought about how big they actually were.
The Golfing Guide to Christchurch
Disaster movies always have a bunch of cities being destroyed, but then once the aliens/asteroid/sharknado have been dealt with, the hero is reunited with their family and the credits roll. You never see the aftermath when the city has to be rebuilt. Well, we’re in Christchuch, and we’re seeing it now. And obviously the best way to see that is through mini-golf.
We are at one with the ocean.
Sim explaining to a waiter why we enjoyed the salmon dishes at dinner so much, completely disregarding the queasiness we both experienced less than 12 hours earlier after being on the Pacific Ocean for 5 minutes.
Akaroa
We came to Akaroa on a recommendation from Kari and Niall, so I was like, BETTER BE WORTH IT. But to start at the beginning, yesterday morning we bid farewell to the North Island and flew in to Christchurch. For reasons clear to Sim, who developed our itinerary, it made more sense to go straight to Akaroa for a night, then return to Christchurch for a stay there.
North to South
Wellington ✈ Christchurch 🚘 Akaroa