Here comes the Rain Again
- Dec 22, 2024
- 3 min read
Saturday 21 December
Welcome to sunny Nelson, they said, the sunniest place in New Zealand according to NIWA! Well, today did NOT live up to this reputation!
It wasn't actually raining when I popped to the communal area for a pee and a tea first thing, and the campsite looked quite festive with the Christmas characters popping up around the site. The people in the cabin by the kitchen had such jolly colourful washing on the line it almost looked like bunting!
Wet and gloomy from the get go - a trip into town to do chores, shopping and catch a movie became the plan. I bought an Australian Woman's Weekly "Christmas Made Easy" booklet at an op shop in Mt Maunganui a few weeks back, so we selected our menu and made a shop now/shop later list. We also had an ongoing issue with one of the gas hoses for the Weber which simply didn't fit and nobody seemed to have a solution (not Snowy River, not the internet hive mind, not Weber, and not any of the gas fitters we had contacted).
After visiting a Weber specialist in Richmond we were directed to Reece's where a lovely guy helped us out with a No.8 Wire solution of cutting the end off our dodgy hose, adding a section of smaller hose and attaching the appropriate fitting on the new slimline hose... he sold us all the bits and gave us the number of a gas fitter who promptly booked us in for Monday - yay, problem nearly solved.
Pak'n'save was crowded as - almost like UK levels of pre-Christmas shopping - but we filled our trolley with reckless disregard for the size of our caravan fridge and threw in a bottle of Christmas bubbly for good measure! Shortly after the selfie above was taken, the slippery white lines in the car park and my jandals conspired to kill me (as comedian Urzila Carlson will warn you) - but luckily I came away with a bloodied toe and no broken bones as I managed to stop my impending fall.
in the heart of Nelson, we were lured in by the delicious aroma from a Karaage chicken foodtruck so stopped by for a cheeky lunch - where we met Billy, a most enchanting Border Terrorist/poodle cross puppy who would have been quite happy to come home with us!
Escaping from the next downpour, we took refuge at the State cinema and booked tickets for “Wicked”, which was, well, wicked! I resisted the urge to IMDB each actor as they came on screen and we were soon carried away in the old school Hollywood musical razzmatazz of the whole production.
Heading home, we passed the Botanical Reserve which proudly boast that it is the centre of New Zealand. There was a walk up to the monument marking this geographical spot on top of the hill, but we decided to give it a miss this time due to threatening rain clouds and my bleeding toe from Paknsave, as well as the fact that the centre is not strictly correct any more as tectonic plates have shifted it by several metres since it was officially mapped!
However the Reserve's other claim to fame cannot be denied - it is the site of the first Rugby game ever played in NZ. It turns out, with a bit of practice, we got quite good at this game!
Back home at the Cable Bay campsite Louis managed to BBQ the sausages between rain showers in a rare patch of evening sunshine, while I decided to have a go at baking mince pies because it’s Christmas! They were not bad, especially when topped with a blast of squirty cream.
Whilst baking the pies in the camp kitchen I also discovered the reason behind Cable Bay's unusual name - it turns out that almost 150 years ago, the Trans-Tasman telecommunication cable from Sydney to New Zealand made land here, and in 2001 Telecom's interisland fibre optic table joined Hokio Beach (Levin) in the North Island to Cable Bay in the South Island. Quite an historic spot!
We fell asleep being buffeted about in Banjo as an outrageous storm howled through the Bay - it was almost as wild as windy Wellington! That’s enough thanks… sunshine time now!
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