Cape View Motel Napier

... off and a note on my windhield saying I needed to contact the council to be let out. I flagged down a police officer who gave me the number and some attitude and played phone tag with the Napier City Council. Eventually, they sent a fella to unlock the gate for me. He got dropped off by his wife bcause, as we slurred to me, he had been drinking and was properly "******." I was freed and found a nice quiet parking lot to sleep ...

... Blend - 80% Merlot, 15% Cabernet Sauvignon, 5% Cabernet Franc, 18 months oak. Intense colour, big plumy fruit, some spice and liquorice. Creamy texture, firm tannins and more plums.

2000 Boundary Bordeaux Blend - 85% Merlot, 10% Cabernet Sauvignon, 5% Cabernet Franc, 18 months oak. Orange rim, much brighter. Blood, leather, sprouts then later dark chocolate. Good clean palette with more cooked fruits ...

... machen wir mal einen Tag frei ..denn ich moechte mal wieder in die Stadt und etwas mehr Zivilisation um mich herum haben... und mal aus den dreckigen Arbeitsklamotten heraus kommen ,-)
Also mal sehen, wie lange ich mich dem Farmleben noch widmen werde...es ist auf jeden Fall eine tolle Erfahrung... zumindest auf bestimmte Zeit!!!

Und bald werdet ihr mich auch in Deutschland wieder sehen...im Sommer....soviel sei verraten!!!

Ich gruesse euch von Herzen!
Bis bald, eure EVA

... haha..... I was teaming up with one of the guys one of the day, his name is Steve, a divorced, granddad to 12 at 53 years old but look like just a person entering 40s to me. Very well maintain and muscular, hoped that I could be like that when I am at his time. Anyway he is now looking for a Asian wife who could cooked, we were suggesting a few countries for him....haha.....Anyway if you are interested or know anyone ...

... we bought a bottle of the Mission Estate reserve C******nay (NZ$19.99 compared to the NZ$25 price tag at the vineyard). On getting back to the hotel, we had a lazy afternoon watching a film ("Forget Sarah Marshall" with RusselBrand) and a spa bath. It was raining outside by this time. We also opted to stay in in the evening for cheese and biscuits and the bottle of C******nay.

... one's imagination to become overactive. In hindsight, it probably didn't help that we also toured the nearby Buried Village of Te Wairoa, New Zealand's own Pompeii. Given our state of nervousness, we did what any rational family would do...we went luging down the nearby mountain. [How's that for a nice segue into New Zealand's obsession with extreme activities?] For those of you who aren't experts on obscure Olympic sports, luging is basically ...

... s a beautiful stretch of beach running along Napier with black sand. We also visited the Mission Winery, which is the oldest winery in New Zealand. It was built by some French monks who arrived to New Zealand in around 1850. One of the first things they did was to plant some grapevines so that they could have some booze in the new country. We ended up with a fine bottle of C******nay, so thank you monks. The next morning we went to Te Mata lookout point ...

We spent the long Easter weekend in Napier. It's our 4th visit there since August, and it's just such a lovely, relaxing spot on the East coast, with great weather (normally) and lots of wineries to visit. We drove up on Good Friday and arrived around lunchtime. It's a 4hr drive from Wellington, but it was a glorious day and not much traffic so we were in good spirits. We stayed at Aqua Lodge, a backpackers right next to the cricket ground, Maclean Park. We were going to ...

... tourists. We reckoned that we had seen and smelled enough of the town so drove on. At around 8pm we came upon a caravan park with cabins right on the edge of a lake and it was so far from anywhere that they had a vacant cabin. Phew. Reminded us of our caravan travels in Oz. Drove north to Tauranga in the Bay of Plenty. It is a holiday area on the coast and we found a motel with a 1 bed apartment close to town so stayed 3 nights. Did a tramp around the local hill ...

... wandering around downtown in a light rain doing a bit of geocaching. We had a very yummy dinner at Thai Chef. They put us in a corner booth so it took ages for them to notice us and take our order but after that the service was excellent. We had prawn cakes, tom kha soup, alcoholic noodles, and sweet basil fish. We enjoyed the fireworks show put on at midnight on the beach. You can see some of it in the video clips. Happy New Year!.