Ross and Wyn Davies Travel Blog

Finally ….. we’re starting to catch up with ourselves – and this blog. To those of you who haven’t given up checking, I’ve just uploaded some posts catching up from early February to last week. And I’ve even had a play with a couple of photos and found it’s not as hard as I was thinking….. More soon….

Tuesday 9 March we pulled up at Bella Vista Blenheim; motels owned and operated by Wendy and John – my sister and brother-in-law. The plan was for us to spend a few days working with them learning the ropes and then for them to head off for a few days and leave us to run the place. I’d managed the family motels in Dunedin for 18 months about 30 years ago but this was a new challenge for us both. Things are computerised these days, and there’s a lot to learn with everything. Our hope was that they’d want us back for spells in future and that we can find work relieving for other motels. It’d be a change from packing fruit. Continue reading →

Friday 5 March was the start of our next adventure. We were off north to have a go at relief motel managing. The day was getting on by the time we left Dunedin at it was 5pm by the time we stopped at Oamaru at the Whitestone Cafe. We were pleased to find them open. It was good to be on the road again although it was going to take a while to readjust – it’d been a while. We stopped for the night at Ealing, just north of the Rangitata River. There is a nice parkover just over the railway line so away from most of the SH1 traffic noise. There were milk tankers rumbling past, and a few other motorhomes, but it seemed like the wilderness. Continue reading →

Thursday 25^th February was the day for moving on from the orchard. We’d been parked up there for a couple of months and it seemed strange to be packing things up and getting Suzi ship-shape for heading off. The A-frame had to be reassembled and the car hitched up. And we had to remember all the things we needed to remember before hitting the road. There were tanks to empty and tanks to fill and then we had to find the truck fuel stop in Alexandra. We bought our final coffee at the Tin Goose in Alexandra at 12.30pm and finally headed out of town. By Roxburgh we remembered we were hungry and we remembered the great bakery at the Jimmy’s Pie shop so we stopped there and remembered a couple of pies and a couple of bits of slice. Continue reading →

Monday 22 February was our last week of working at the packhouse. My day started a bit late by the time I dropped Andrew off to catch the bus back to Dunedin. There was still lots of fruit to be packed and Wednesday was to be our last day. Some others were leaving later in the week so there was a bit of a break-up mood for some of us. Tuesday night we baked a cake for morning tea on Wednesday. We remembered to take a camera to work to get some photos. Continue reading →

Our last weekend in the area worked out to be a busy one. My son Andrew came up in the bus on the Friday afternoon – having a break before university started. Friends of Wyn’s called round on Saturday morning and later in the day the three of us joined them for an explore of the Manuhiakea River at Galloway. Sue was keen on some gold panning and we walked up the river a bit looking for a suitable spot. The river wasn’t cold and it was a hot afternoon so the water was the place to be. It was a good evening for a BBQ back at the orchard. Continue reading →

Wyn’s birthday is on Valentine’s Day which fell on a Sunday this year which was our day off anyway. The day started with valentine thoughts and then moved on to birthday presents. The morning soon went and it was time to head to Bannockburn and the Mt Difficulty vineyard for lunch. Continue reading →

Oh dear! I really have gotten behind with all this blog stuff haven’t I. At least I’m going to have to be briefer now as we reconstruct our last few weeks.

We left you back at the orchard in early February as another week came to an end – hot and windy as normal. Now on with the story … Continue reading →

Monday 1 February did indeed seem like Monday; one day off passes very quickly. It was another fine and hot day. We’d start the day warmly dressed; on Monday I even had my beanie on for a start. Then it got warmed and warmer until by the afternoon it was just hot. By 5pm the temperature was into the low 30s. Wyn came up with the idea of a BBQ tea by Lake Dunstan so we did a quick pack up into the car and drove up to the lake by the dam on the far side from Clyde. A number of others had the same idea. We found some shade to park in and were soon in the water. It was calm and not cold. Continue reading →

Sunday 31 January was our day off. Working six days a week is a bit weird. Saturday feels like a Friday. Sunday seems like a Saturday. Then Monday still feels like Monday and you are left feeling you’ve missed a day somewhere. Saturday had been windy – fine but windy. We’d left the windows open for some ventilation and found when we got back that there was fine dust on most of the surfaces inside. After a late breakfast on Sunday I made a start on wiping the dust off. This soon evolved into a general spring clean; albeit in late January. Wyn started on the bathroom and we worked our way through Suzi. Continue reading →

Friday 29^th January was the start of a great run of fine warm weather. It was 12 degrees early on, a sunny clear calm morning. Wyn had a perfect day at Wanaka, with a birthday party in the middle of the day including a water slide. Later they went swimming in Lake Wanaka; not a quick dip but a prolonged swim. It was that sort of day. The maximum for the country was 32 degrees at Alexandra, but Wanaka wasn’t far behind. I had a hot day at work. At lunch time I had a call from Michael – Telecom had finally got their XT network going; what a disaster for confidence. Wyn decided to stay on at Wanaka – it had been a hot and tiring day. Continue reading →

Crikey, this work thing is relentless. We’re now working at least 8 hours a day, and generally 6 days a week. We’re making up for lost time some would say. Maybe this is binge working – there’s probably a programme we could do? [Am I old-fashioned insisting on ‘programme’ having 2 m’s and an ‘e’ on the end? Someone has to hold the line somewhere on the Americanisation of our language – and that’s Americanisation with an ‘s’ and not a ‘z’ I hasten to note…]

So after our Sunday off we were up at 6.40am on Monday 25^th January to get ready for another day of work. Continue reading →

Sunday is supposed to be a day of rest and luckily it was a day off for us on the 24th. We were up early anyway; Laura had to be at her bus by 9am. She was all packed up and ready to go and we made it with plenty of time. It was a cold morning, making the previous afternoon all the more precious. Her Mum was on the bus when it arrived; returning to Dunedin as well. We said goodbye and then she was gone. We retired to the cafe across the road for a coffee before heading back home to Suzi. Wyn made some muffins; blueberry and apricot. I did a bit of tidying up. It rained through the morning but then started to clear and it turned out a nice day. Continue reading →

The week from Monday 18^th was a week of work – full days of 8 or more hours. Monday was mail day – always fun to get a few weeks mail in one hit. Tuesday was warm and humid – it was 16 degrees outside when we got up before 7am. Wednesday was the same, with a bit of rain. That evening we went out for tea with Laura to celebrate her exam results – her first year of NCEA. It was a lovely evening and we had the Fat Badger place to ourselves – sitting outside to enjoy the weather. Continue reading →

Friday 8^th January was another day of work, cherries and plums. It was a cool day and we were dressed in jeans when we went into Alexandra to pick up my daughter off the bus from Dunedin. She was staying with us for a couple of weeks.

Wyn worked on the Saturday but I took the day off. Laura and I went in to the Saturday market and later I caught up with some washing. In the evening Laura and I ended up watching a film on TV called ‘The Story of the Weeping Camel’. It was the story of a camel that failed to bond with its colt so it wasn’t feeding it. Continue reading →