October 24, 2023 We arrived home today to find the garden largely as it was when we left. Cuttings have survived. The troughs were filled with water, so clearly there’d been rain, but not enough, or not sitting long enough, for the roots to rot. I’m happy. The passion fruit vine, though, has clearly been … More Garden survival
October 23, 2023 I won’t say we saved the best till last, because that’s not true. But L did have a little surprise for the final stage of our Top of the South road trip. We had a leisurely start to the day, with a coffee and croissant at Flo & Co. Kaikoura was looking … More Scenic last leg
October 22, 2023 Notwithstanding that I’ve been a bit lax on the blogging these past few days, I’m not referring here to catching up with postings, but rather to catching up with family and friends. First of all, it was a couple nof days in Timary, refreshng our memories of places from back in the … More Catching up
October 10, 2023 J told me I need to up my game. She said my writing goes from fringe to lunatic and she says I need to go in the other direction from fringe. She said a bit of fringe is fine; however as this is a travel blog, would I please do some travel … More On the road
18 October, 2023 I wish I hadn’t written about the head-landing seagull. J read it and now I can’t look at her. Every time I do she laughs like a drain. Guffaws even. Women do not have any idea how threatening men find guffawing women. And she has taken to calling me Perch. I just … More Perch?
17 October 2017 Yesterday we had some navigation woes. I’d forgotten how inept we can be. The first mishap wasn’t, strickly speaking, navigational. Rather it was just plain duh (you can provide your own appropriate adjectives). All went smoothly for the bulk of the journey from Kaikoura , with a couple of stops along the … More Navigation 101: Fail
October 15, 2023 Lost one, won one . . . and that doesn’t include the Silver Ferns v the Diamonds in the second game of the Constellation Cup series — which at time of writing has not yet been played. But yay for the ABs, that’s all I can say. That game this morning – … More One lost, one won
October 15, 2023 I am about to write about seagulls, but it will have to wait a few moments while I do some further stuff about Flak Too (the speedboat). I have been trying to figure out the name and I have come to the following conclusion. It has to do with rooster tails. These … More Syd’s here … somewhere
October 14, 2023 We completed our circuit of the top of the South today – it started with Picton to Blenheim via Highway 6 to Nelson, where we stayed a few days and ventured over the Takaka Hill to Wharariki; then continued today, back along Highway 60 through St Arnauds and the Wairau Valley. There … More Full circle
October 13, 2023 A city day today, although it involved a decent amount of walking, and not all of it on urban pavements – our chosen destination for the day was a walk up the Centre of New Zealand. Just to be clear, this is the name of a hill in central Nelson, not a … More City walking
October 13, 2023 Amazing day yesterday. A long day. Breakfast in Motueka, over the Takaka Hill and an ice cream at Collingwood. On to Puponga and Wharariki to see the rock made famous to the world by Google but to us by L’s Mum, who grew up in the area. Her dad, L’s Pop, was … More Blowing away the cobwebs
October 12, 2023 Well, here we are, at the pointy end of the electoral cycle. The debates include boot camps, penalising beneficiaries for their reluctance to work, and claims that poverty will be solved by tax relief for the squeezed middle. In addition, at least one political party is advocating reform of gun laws that … More Wharariki
October 12, 2023 We boarded the Strait Feronia soon after lunch on Tuesday. Both the Tangaroa and the Ikaroa (NIWA ships) were just along the wharf, and it gave me a buzz to see them. Both are ships I have been to sea on. However, these are yesteryear memories. Cook Strait ferry trips never … More On the ferry again
October 11, 2023 We’re in Nelson, bunking down in backpackers’ accommodation. Takes us back a bit. As does Nelson itself, as L revisited places of his boyhood. The house where he grew up in the Wood is now gone, but two doors along the house of his grandparents still stands, in mint condition, architecturally unchanged. … More Going back in time
11 October 2023 So, yesterday was F day. You can choose whatever word you like for that to describe your day, but for us it stands for ‘farewell’ — we’re off overseas for a fortnight. Well, that’s a bit of an exaggeration, I know. We were off over Cook Strait for a couple of weeks … More Off overseas
9 October, 2023 We’re off tomorrow for a fortnight of slow travel in the South Island. The idea originally was to ride the trains, Picton to Christchurch, Christchurch to Greymouth, with buses filling in the bits at the ends. But for various reasons, it all got too complicated (and expensive) so we decided on a … More Slow travel
Off Highway One 