Merry Christmas Eve!

A very Happy Christmas Eve to everyone.

With the new technomological advances on this gizmo, I now believe that certain 'select' people get e-mailed the updates of this most excellent Blog (did you know that it has been nominated for a Pulitzer prize?).  For those 'select' amongst you, take it as an extra Christmas present; a stocking filler, if you like.

So what have we been up to?  Ah yes, the 'Grand Tour'.  We have now completed the North Island leg (see earlier posts), where we picked 3 extra passengers.  Kyle, Kieran and Kaitlin the Kingfish; unfortunately there was something odd about them (a bit fishy you might say) so we ate them.

The author & Kaitlin

For the non-fisherpeople amongst you, the Kingfish is a much prized fish, and one that is difficult to catch, hence the reason that I have a rather large grin slapped on my face, and one that got even larger after I hauled the third one aboard!

As you might imagine, they provide rather a lot of eating; it was eaten steaked, filleted, fried, sushied, curried and in many other ways with much given away!

Excellent, 1 more fishing conquest taken care of.


So, that was the Bay of Islands taken care of.  From there, it was a quick hop down to the Coromandel Peninsula, where we were booked into the exclusive bay-side retreat of Ruffins Bay, unfortunately the blurb supplied with the place didn't say that the exclusivity was actually directed at the mould, mosquitoes, cockroaches and any other horrendous thing you might imagine.  It truly was a shame, as the place it was set in was one of the most beautiful we have come across in New Zealand; why the owners kept such a shabby place (advertised as something quite different) in such a beautiful one I will never know.

Any how, they have found themselves moving swiftly up my hit list.  We only stayed the one night, and then moved out; payment witheld.

The most amazing butterfly farm, and a gold mine featured on our south bound trip to Rotorua.  Where we learnt that Cornish men were sent underground to mine the butterflies and turn them into pasties (I might not have been paying attention).  Jocelyn especially enjoyed chasing the butterflies around, but, when the tables were turned she was not so keen!

From there it was to the sulphourous joys of Rotorua where Jocelyn delighted in having a 'tub'.  The rest of us delighted in having wine in a 'tub'.  Most excellent.  Naturally mud features in Rotorua, and Jocelyn perfected the noise that mud now makes, yup, is goes "blooooop"; and when you watch the short clip below she is actually quite accurate!

Whilst sampling the delights of Roto-Vegas, we stayed in a delightful lakeside residence at Lake Tarawera, where the weather was so poor that the trout in the lake were safe from my attempts to lure them in for dinner.  No matter, as even in the rain the place was beautiful.

The final stop on part one of the 'Grand Tour' was in Napier, where again we stayed in a lovely Bach, that was quite literally a stones throw from the sea.  Nestled in the wine making region of the Hawkes Bay we had a most enjoyable time, so enjoyable I actually forget what we did there; but it tasted good.  The one thing i do remember was our trip to the Gannet colony at Cape Kidnappers, where a strong wind on the cliff tops blew away any cobwebs that might have formed from the previous evening; in fact it nearly blew you away entirely!

These quick snaps are ones that I am particularly proud of, suffice to say, there are many, many more.  So, Sir David Attenborough, I know you are a keen follower of my Blog; got a job for me?

So, there we go.  A few more wineries were taken in on our wind back to Palmy, and a most delightful lunch at Craggy Range (Richard & Christine; look forward to that one!) set all but the sober driver up for a good snooze home.

Christmas tomorrow, I hope you all have your shopping done!  Enjoy, and I guess we shall speak to as many of you as possible at some point soon  (Sir David, you can call me)!  Have a lovely day all.