Elsie Types!

Lkhwgsssssssssssssss65 t1 WV HTBMGR EZ              GBNW NhgvVBL.P.L,;/.#]P’;[/.;N C F bbBBB76V 

Elsie Cruises!

Today we moved from Marahau in Abel Tasman National Park to Te Mahia Bay on Kenepuru Sound. The house at Te Mahia was fabulous, absolute waterfront with a stunning vista of the malborough sounds. There were four heavy wooden sun loungers on the deck and Elsie started properly cruising along the length of these when we arrived. She's cruising!

Cruising on the Interislander

Today we headed to the south island on the ferry. We set sail at 8.30am then headed up to the café to feed Elsie. Elsie waved to a lot of random strangers as she ate her weetbix (such a Kiwi!). Joel and I were impressed to find that the ferry had ‘nursery rooms’ available for use by families with small children. These were cabins containing proper wooden cots (with clean sheets), an ensuite bathroom, and a couple of arm chairs for mum and dad. Great! We were so happy to be able to put Elsie down for a proper morning nap (rather than in the pushchair – which may or may not have worked). Elsie wasn’t so keen to go to sleep – the excitement of the ferry must have got to her. Thus, we put her down and crept out of the cabin to wait outside until she settled. Closing the door behind us we noticed the sign that said “do not close this door” and realized that the door was locked – with Elsie inside and both of us in the corridor. Uh Oh. A quick dash to the ? Perser? Later and we had our own swipe card for use in the door. Probably reserved for the use of dopey parents like us. Crisis averted, Joel finally settled Elsie who went on to have a lovely nap for the remainder of the cruise. We pulled into picton at lunchtime and set off for Marahau.

The Road Trip Continues: Wellington

Today we drove to Wellington from Napier. We had an awesome trip, Elsie was an absolute gem! Sleeping well and playing happily in the carseat. We made it to Masterton for an uneventful lunch then continued to Wellington, stopping in Waipawa the heart of ‘lamb country’ to visit a local butcher selling ‘NZ’s award winning sausages’. The butcher, Murray Stehpens, took his art quite seriously and kindly supplied me with some free sausages after it transpired that I had purchased almost every sausage except for the award winning ones! We stayed in Wellington for the night with Sarah, Wayne and their boys, Lachlan and Anders. Sarah cooked a delicious lamb shank, served as it should be, unctuous, tasty and falling off the bone. A few wines, a great nights sleep (thanks for giving up your bed guys!), and we were up and off on a boat.

The Road trip continues: Napier

On our way out of Gisborne we stopped to catch up with Simon and Fleur. We met their lovely son, Harry. Unfortunately Olivia was away at day care. Harry and Elsie made quite the pair standing up at the coffee table (more pulling up for Elsie) in their matching merino tops. Too cute!

After lunch we headed down to Napier to stay with my Aunty Lenie. It wasn’t a great drive, the weather was terrible, the wiper blade was noisy and weird, and Elsie Bear just didn’t want to be in the car. Much of the journey was accompanied by a chorus of baby crying.

It was a relief to finally arrive at Aunty Lenie’s place – set beautifully in the grounds of a vineyard. Unformtunately Aunty Lenie needed to  head straight out for her Election Day Volunteers training – but she left a tasty dinner in the oven and my cousin Carolyn (Lenie’s daughter) and her husband Jeff kindly came over to eat dinner with us and keep us company. It was great to spend some time with Carolyn and Jeff who Joel and I hadn’t seen for two years.

The next morning it was up, at em and on with the road trip.

The road trip begins – leg 1: Gisborne

25 Hurahura - Gisborne

The sleep out

The freshly painted fence

France and Elsie enjoying the back lawn

Matt - post surf

The ladies relax (I'm still working on my tan..)

Jenni and Coral celebrate the good life

Elsie taking in the Gisborne cafe scene

The three rivers

Francine and Jenni assemble the new chook house

On Thursday November 3^rd we headed over to Gisborne for a week. This marked the start of our one-month road trip, our holiday within a holiday.  It was really exciting packing up, miraculously managing to squeeze everything into the car (including mountain bike, pushchair, portacot, highchair, body board, all our bags, and some essential kitchen items for bread making) and hitting the road.  I had decided that this was to be our “summer holiday”. With an itinerary including Gisborne, Abel Tasman and Malborough I was convinced that we would see some sunshine along the way and Gisborne certainly complied.  The weather was amazing! Blazing sun and highs of 28C Joel, Elsie and I didn’t know what had hit us.

We were in Gisborne to visit Francine and Matt who like us have also just returned to New Zealand, albeit permanently, after a good decade away in Europe. A few years ago Francine and Matt bought their dream house in Gisborne and have been letting it out until this year, their big homecoming.

They had returned to New Zealand to find the house required a little more work than anticipated due largely to the high number of sunshine hours creating a Jurassic garden that required taming. Sticky fingered tenants had also helped themselves to anything that wasn’t permanently attached to the property. Yep, security lights had been taken, a garden gate, all manner of period door handles (for the brass presumably), a bench, and an irreplaceable vintage porcelain sink.

Francine and Matt opted to stay with Matt’s mum, Coral while they attacked the property weeding, waterblasting, and painting before they finally unpacked their container load of goodies and moved themselves in. That was until Joel , Elsie, Jenni and I all decided to come and stay.

After a communication failure on my part Joel and I left Auckland a day earlier than France and Matt expected. So, we arrived at around 7pm to find an exhausted looking Francine and Matt. They had spent a very busy day rummaging through boxes to find, beds and linen and towels and all those things that you need to make a house work and had decorated two beautiful guest rooms for us. On top of everything else the oven wasn’t working so Francine had to schlep over to Coral’s in order to slow cook the leg of mutton for dinner then drive back to Hurahura once cooked.  However, we made it, every one arrived, the food was fab and we all sat around the kitchen table to celebrate France and Matt’s first night in Hurahura. Matt smoked a cigar, Joel drank far too much, Francine looked slightly overwhelmed, and we all ranted well into the night.

This marked the beginning of what turned out to be a truly wonderful week in Gisborne. The sun shone, we went to the beach, we barbequed, there were lots of visitors to Hurahura, the fence got painted (and so did we a little bit), we had lunches and family dinners, chicken coops were constructed, Elsie slept BEAUTIFULLY (perhaps it was the perpetually blaring stereo?), there were paddling pools, the salad greens from the garden seemed to grow a foot overnight (and tasted superb), Green lipped mussels were cooked over an open fire on corrugated iron, Joel Elsie and I applied a lot of sunscreen and we completed the week having fallen into the rhythm of a happy sun drenched family.

Hurahura really is a special place. It is easy in New Zealand to go on and on about the size of the houses and Hurahura is no exception it truly is a beautiful home - but it was the garden that stole my heart. Mature laden citrus trees, winding paths, ancient apple trees, lavender, climbing roses, an arch (!), the greenhouse, flat lawn, fishpond (with sitting budha), curved driveways, splindly cosmos and giant spikey natives. The next door neighbor is Anzac Park – a reserve with the XXXXX river flowing along it’s border – complete with rowing club and neighbourhood Sea Scouts. So you could literally drag your boat/kayak/row boat out the back gate and 50m down to the boat ramp.

It really did make me pause and think about the merits of living in a city with next to no outdoor space.

I was pretty impressed with Gisborne itself. I liked the layout of the town, it’s always nice to be riverside but with a beach as well the locals are quite spoilt. Speaking of which the locals are very friendly! Strikingly so. The economy seems to be booming, we ate well, and there is a buzz to the place – a provincial pride that was absent in many smaller New Zealand cities a decade or so ago. Pity it takes so bloody long to drive there!