Happy Birthday Charlie!

Thanks to everyone who called or texted birthday messages today – it was great to hear from you all. Our plan today was to go out for a nice relaxed birthday lunch in Kaikoura, and last night we Googled restaurant options and settled on one with a great-looking seafood menu. Once we got to Kaikoura, we parked at one end of the main street, and walked along to our restaurant which was at the far end of it. To find…
It was CLOSED!! As were ALL of the other 9 restaurants and bars in the main street, except for the fish and chip shop, so our lovely leisurely lunch turned into blue cod and chips back in the motorhome!! Albeit with a glass of wine / beer.
We headed back up the road to the north of the town for our overnight stop: a DOC campsite in the Puhi Puhi Valley, up 6km of narrow winding gravel road. But what a gorgeous spot, surrounded by bush, and we had the whole place to ourselves. After the fish and chips we decided on a ‘light’ birthday dinner – a hot smoked salmon platter with a baguette and all the accompaniments, and of course a lovely bottle of bubbly from the No. One estate in Blenheim.
We had bought a very interesting bottle of barrel-aged gin at a distillery in Takaka (forgot to tell you about the rainy afternoon we spent tasting at a couple of distilleries with Joanne and Simon!) Charlie had been saving it for a special occasion, and… well… this was obviously it!Read more