Thursday evening we had our Thanksgiving meal in good company with many of our friends. Turkey is pretty expensive here in New Zealand so it was good to have a great meal at a pretty good price. Although it couldn’t really be heard above the noise Ben played a little piano prompted by the bribe of a pitcher of beer. He also spent some time with Sandra from Larabeck (who played the fiddle up in Big Mama’s in Tonga) who taught him a few tricks on the piano as well as agreeing to spend some more time with him Friday morning.
Friday morning we removed the dodger. We’ve engaged a local to make new cockpit seat cushions, a new table cover and to restitch our dodger which is beginning to fray in a few places. I left this with Helen while I took the shuttle bus to Paihia to raise a bank cheque to pay for the car due into Opua that evening.
Sorting the check out and looking for (but not finding) a drill bit I needed to complete the A/C work on the boat took just a few minutes. I then had two and a half hours to wait for the bus back. The Jacksters, who had also ridden the bus, were planning to hike back to Opua along the ridge. I asked if they didn’t mind my joining them and all was fine. The walk was pleasant and invigourating with lots of hills to climb and some great views of the bay.
We were back in Opua before the bus. As our connector for our propane on the boat failed a couple of days ago I have ordered a new one. I checked for this but it hadn’t arrived. We’re ok for now as I switched in the one from the BBQ. After this I set up our insurance for the car – NZ$600 for a year fully comp for both drivers. Including roadside service and car rental should we breakdown. Not bad.
The day was almost done. After about an hour on the boat the car had arrived. It looked nice and a quick test drive confirmed the sale. We’re now mobile. Although nine years old the car has only $36,500km on the clock so we’re hoping it will be quite reliable. The downside is that all the manuals are in Japanese. Right now I can’t be sure we have exactly the car we thought we were getting. There are some impressive video/audio electronics on board – again all in Japanese – including a touch screen pop out video display (probably Japanese navigation) and a mini-disk player which we’ll never be able to use.
To celebrate our new mobility we drove to Paihia for a rib meal. The food was ok and in huge proportions. I couldn’t finish mine. A trip to the supermarket completed the day.
Today we’re off to Kerikeri for some sightseeing and walking. Monday we’re planning to drive down to Whangarei to visit a few stores there and help plan what we’ll do for the next few weeks.
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