Going for a spin in the Ute & around the dance hall!

Friday 17 July

We left Mountain Views POP in ridiculously warm temperatures and it was almost T-shirt weather for 24 hours… so imagine our surprise when our thermometer read -2*C when we went to bed, and -4.5*C when we woke up to a super frosty morning in Kaiapoi. Our kitchen window was all frosted up, creating a very erratic grid like pattern across the sunrise. Meanwhile - in the kitchen, I found this in my knife section of the cutlery drawer… Russ bought and we hid 4 miniature knives in the Tomkinsons Moho a few months back… eventually they found them all and since then they’ve gradually shown up in Banjo… tit for tat! 🙄🤣

I dressed up warm and soon regretted it. We dropped into Kaiapoi with the ute to get the tyres upgraded (for towing safety & off roading) at KATS with their awesome mural and slightly dodgy logo! Here's Louis checking out the new tyres - swapping the shiny ones that came with the Cannon for slightly gruntier ones, then taking away the oldies to try and sell them… anyone???

By mid-morning the sun had heated us up to about 18*C and I was sweltering as we wandered into town and waited at Paris for the Weekend enjoying a cheese scone on the terrace and making darling puppy friends - Harley the Goldie and Piper the black lab 💛🖤

Passed a few Kaiapoi icons along the way - love how they have preserved the old BNZ (now a Whitcoulls) and always enjoy checking the destinations on the signpost.

Back to Banjo with our new tyres and time to put the not very old ones up for sale on FB marketplace before we set off for VTNZ in Rangiora to swap the regos around. Heading into Rangiora, sadly the map took us down a dirt road and now Louis’ shiny new baby is covered in mud splashes. But at least we got to test the sunroof - had it fully open in the way back!

The VTNZ agent was very helpful with swapping the plates, and we had two forms to fill out to make it happen - ELLAMY goes on the Ute, new random plates were issued for the Pajero, and we gotta hand back the Cannon’s plates when we’ve done the physical swap around.

Early dinner of nachos then we dressed light and headed to the Irish Society Hall in Spreydon for an evening of reels and barn dancing with Theo & G who ran last week’s ceilidh.

Lots of fun, very hot and a bit sweaty and we joined in all the dances including Dashing White Sargeant & Gay Gordon’s (which made me so dizzy I almost fell over from all the spinning!😵‍💫) - great night out, loads of Fitbit steps and a fun call back to my time at St Andrews University back in the 1980s!