Picton
Trip Start
May 07, 2008
1
57
90
Trip End
Jan 06, 2009
Picton,
South Island,
New Zealand
Tuesday, October 21, 2008
Well, we arrived at Picton via the side of a mountain!! The winding, snaky road leads from Queen Charlotte Sound to the picturesque harbour of Picton.
Queen Charlotte Sound is much like Milford Sound: stupefyingly stunning. Ha! There's a new adjective I can use for New Zealand. Just look at the photos - it's tranquil, scenic, beautiful.
Our last destination on the South Island was Picton. This is where you get the ferries to and from Wellington. Wellington was to be our first destination for the North Island. Another interesting fact is that Katherine Mansfield lived here after arriving from Australia - Picton is referred to in her book "The Voyage"
Queen Charlotte Sound
. So after exhausting ourselves with "WOW" and "Oh God!" on the mountainous and scenically silencing drive, we slowly arrived in Picton. (David: Via Havelock, which claims to be the green lipped mussel capital of the world. There's even a giant mussel sitting on a restaurant roof to prove it.) Picton is a lovely place full of little bobbing boats next to big scary freight liners in the harbour. We went straight to a Lonely Planet recommendation - a detached 1920's B & B. A man answered the door who resembled a sailor - a young Captain Birdseye, which was appropriate since the B & B was heaving with sailing memorabilia from a vintage copper diving helmet hung on the wall to impressive knotted rope strung around the coat stand to photos galore of small fishing boats and yachts. It was definitely a 'lived-in' home. Not one single sq metre was devoid of books/articles/photos or antiques. It was great.
The owner was Captain Birdseye who was very scatty yet energetic and extremely friendly. When asked "do you have any vacancies at all?", he was very umm and err with frantic eye contact and a wry smile beneath whiskers, until he explained that him and his wife were in fact going away for the week in about ten minutes, so no they didn't have any vacancies
Same Sound different view!
. But...oh! hold on.....we could stay in one of the cottages..yes! they had a cottage out back! And so he led us through the house, into the back garden and there sat two very small one storey cottages surrounded by shrubs and wild flowers. We asked if he had internet access and this brought on another stilted sentence construction finally concluding with "well, we'll be away so could you turn the lights out in the house after you've finished....?". He was going to allow us to use his personal computer (which was the only way to access the internet) in his house for the week-end!! We didn't like this idea..he had only just met us, we could be axe murderers!!!! (David: Not to be pedantic here, but if he was away and we WERE axe murderers then locked up in his house would probably have been a bit safer for him... but we could have been International Sailing Memorabilia Thieves.) We said we didn't need the internet after all but thank you anyway. (David: Except we did, I used the computer quickly to check our ferry booking made that morning on the phone. Where I luckily discovered that we'd been booked on to the ferry going FROM Wellington and not TO Wellington!)Then his wife turned up! His wife looked like a farmer's wife with her wellies and wax jacket on. She was just as scatty and very distressed that they had only about 5mins before they had to rush off for the week and her husband had let out one of the cottages
Picton Harbour seen from the mountainous road
! She panicked: did her husband give us the right cottage as there is another couple staying in the cottage next door to us. Yes he had. Oh! Do we have milk in the little fridge? No we don't. So she instantly fetched a small milk jug for us but one carton of milk in the fridge was now cottage cheese. "Oh bother!" so she put this carton back in the fridge (why not throw it out??!) and got the other carton out..this was also cottage cheese! So she put that one back too!???! When they return, these 2 cartons will no longer be cottage cheese. They will be stilton!They were both really lovely people though and another addition to their family was the dog. The dog's name was Lord Farquar or something equally funny. He was one of those cross breeds - a labradoodle type but he was so chilled and laid back, gorgeous. He was called Lord because he is prone to lording it over the cats and other dogs, making sure everyone knows who's boss!!
So, the mad owners legged it soon after we arrived. David's very painful sinus/hayfever arrived (David: I've had this every day since arriving in NZ. Between 10am and 6pm. I suspect the infection I had in China did a bit of damage to my sinuses... which is a lesson: Don't get spat on in India.) so he went to lie down for a couple of hours with some drugs inside him and I sat on the small veranda outside our cottage with a cuppa
Bridge from harbour to mountainous forest walk
. About an hour later a car pulled up and I guessed it was the other guests next to us. The Sailor and the farmer's wife told us this couple were really lovely and friendly so we were looking forward to meeting them. No sooner had the car pulled up then out got the wife. I looked up and smiled in anticipation. Nothing. Not even a look my way as she passed. She was the image of Barbara Woodhouse with her beefeater red twinset on, pearls and kilt. Hmmm, ok. Next, came the husband. I, again, looked up and prepared my smile in anticipation. Nothing. Hmmm, ok. The husband was a short, stout, rotund gentleman - he looked a bit like Ronnie Corbett in that sitcom called Sorry. Except that husband had white hair instead of brown. And he also wasn't short. Not much like Ronnie Corbett after all...in fact...!?
As it was getting chilly now, I retreated inside and overheard the following commotion that was absolutely hysterical. I had to stifle my laughter with my hand while I secretly listened. The husband had a very Oxford English type accent and had been 'instructed' by wife to reverse into the parking space that was in between the small boat and their cottage. But he had to get past our car which was parked to the side of our cottage (David: Not in the way though)
The Sound seen through wild flowers
. The wife, who spoke EXACTLY like Mrs Bouquet from Keeping Up Appearances was guiding him in. Use the accents in your head, it's funnier. Mrs Bouquet began her drill: "No! No! I said here! Here! Go that way! No! that way, dear, that way!!"
Husband's window wound down and out popped a head, "I can't go that way, there's a bloody boat in the damn way Woman!"
"Just swing it round, dear! Come on!" Bouquet was in control!
Husband followed orders and a slam of the brakes ensued.
"I can't go any further! The bloody boat...."
"Come on! Come on!" Bouquet was getting exasperated now with hands on hip.
"Come on where?! Look, just tell me what you want me to do!"
"Use your initiative, man! For goodness sakes!"
"Just tell me what you want me to do!"
"Oh do come on, man!" Bouquet was at the end of her tether.
This went on for some time..until suddenly a loud bush-scraping-on-metal sound was heard and a slam of the brakes
Our ferry to Wellington
. "Oh be careful! The bush! The bush!"
"Just tell me what you want me to do!"
"Use your initiative, dear! Swing it round!"
And so it continued....for quite some time. I think it must have taken him at least 20mins to reverse into a space the size of China. As a consequence, David and I have adopted "Just tell me what you want me to do!!" in a BBC accent and use it to full comical effect when we are bossing each other around. Or in fact when I am bossing David around. Ahem....
When David woke up, we went for a walk before dinner. This started at the harbour leading into a hilly trek into forest which overlooked the harbour and all the boats coming and going. It was fantastic. We found a nice little café/restaurant in the town which was occupied mostly by a large all-female group gossiping over copious bottles of Sauvignon Blanc. Suddenly, in walked our neighbours: the quarrelling couple. Bouquet obviously wasn't happy with the loud boisterous atmosphere in the main part of the restaurant so the waitress specially opened up the other half of the restaurant which was dark, cold and closed up. I suppose if you don't ask....
When we returned to the cottage later that night, as we walked up the drive we came across Ronnie Corbett husband carrying a very large and bulging suitcase which was obviously very heavy. Great, we thought, we can introduce ourselves at last.
"Who's There?!!" he shouted over his shoulder. His glasses slipping down his sweaty nose.
"Hi! We're your neighbours" we smiled away.
"Oh Right! Well, I've lost my bloody cheque book!" and he started to waddle into the cottage panting with the weight of the suitcase.
"Oh dear! Well...I hope you find it soon..." I shouted out to now the moths and mosquitos.
Nothing like a bit of neighbourly friendliness........
Then we heard slams, bangs and shouting. Evidently the cheque book was not found and Bouquet was laying into him. He was obviously trying to justify or rectify but her voice was booming above his and reverberating against the walls. Poor man. I felt very sorry for him indeed.
The next morning, David and I got woken up at 6am with more slams, bangs and china and cutlery crashing about in the sink next door! Then, car doors slammed, then "Just tell me what you want me to do!" shouts and then lots of "Use your initiative Man!" booming into our cottage. Flaming hell. Later that morning, we packed up and left the cottage for our ferry and I bumped into the husband outside.
"Morning there!" I cheerily boomed out to him in the rain.
"Well, our ferry has been bloody cancelled!" he whinged over his shoulder to me.
I soon learnt that he was on the same ferry as us but he told me that it was postponed because of the weather. Hmmm..right.
Down at the ferry port, the boat had in fact not been postponed. It was right on schedule. What we suspected had happened was that they had got their times mixed up and had gone down to the ferry port at 7:30am instead of 9:30am!! That explains the crashing and banging of china at dawn then!! Sigh!!
Our ferry was a 3-hour journey with sky tv, bars and cafes. Bog standard really. (David: Except they ran it like an airline, with checking in and dropping your bags off etc.) The weather was absolutely horrendous though so it was a bit rocky in places. And of course, there were our neighbours with their suitable attire for 'sailing' on: plimsolls, sailing caps and floor length macs. They weren't sailing the boat themselves, they were just passengers on a ferry! Bless 'em.
Finally, we got to Windy Wellington. We soon experienced why Wellington was called Windy Wellington. It was unbelievable.
Love, us xxx
