From Oamaru to Timaru & dinner with the Tomkinsons

Wednesday 17 December

Still rather disappointing weather for summer - but we got out for a walk along the northern end of Kakanui Beach before any further rain fell. We followed in the footprints of a family of Canada geese for a while, they were taking their goslings for a dip - though TBF it looked like they were trying to drown them!!! See separate video on our FB page.

From the sandy shore you could see the damage to Beach Road as it collapsed into the sea - no wonder it had to be closed. These dips were once inland landfill sites, but as the cliffs were eroded by the waves, the landfill sites crumbled making the road impassible except on foot or by bike.

It was pretty breezy and cold as you can see from our Billy Connolly style "Windswept and interesting" beach selfie!

After our walk, Louis whizzed into town for a swim while I luxuriated in the Old Bones shower and washed my hair - gotta make the most of powered sites and fab facilities!

By now the clouds had mostly cleared and we were under a huge patch of stunning clear blue skies. Packed up, chatted with our neighbours and Buddy the dog, then hit the road… before realising we’d left our chocks behind 😯

Turned out Nicky & Dick (and Buddy) were just behind us and kindly offered to drive me back to pick them up - who knows how far we’d have had to go before finding a place to turn around with Banjo? What lovely kind people 🥰 That's them in the white SUV disappearing past us after the rescue!

Back on the road we trekked north for an hour or so and settled on a windy afternoon at Phar Lap Raceway POP once again. Stopping for fuel in Washdyke I was intrigued by the livestock truck parked up there - the back door was broken so I peeked in to see how the sheep or cattle inside were contained for travel - fascinating combo of walls, fences, doors and ramps that all fold in and out of place.

We finished off the scones for tea - Louis doing it the Cornish way while I stick with the Devon cream first model!

Abby & Jez were house hunting but we caught up with them for drinks at their motel then dinner at Saikou (Asian fusion restaurant) where we ordered one of each on the small plates menu (except the tofu 🤮) plus some sides and proceeded to stuff ourselves silly, then I rounded it off with yuzu lemon meringue cheesecake - no wonder I could hardly sleep all night!

Sad to see that the lovely Christmas tree that we posed in front of the previous visit to Timaru had gone - some numpty had set fire to it at 5am one morning… the council wouldn’t find another one but the residents and local businesses had rallied to put up a tall fir tree which just needed decorating. 🌲