Dinner with Stew was lovely. We went to an Indian restaurant and had pakoras to start, then a nice white fish cooked Tandoori style, followed by rogan josh, shahi paneer, and basmati for three people. The pakoras were nothing like those you would get in Vancouver or Victoria. They were bits of potato covered in flour batter and deep fried. Still, they filled the spot and they were served with a tasty sauce.
We were all tired after dinner so Stew dropped us off at the motel and departed for home, a bach on a surf beach. Mom and I fell into bed and slept like logs. (Well, Mom woke up a couple of times and enjoyed listening to the waves crashing onto the beach.)
This morning we woke early and were in town at 8:45am, expecting the Internet café to open at 9am. No luck – it didn’t open until 10am. So, we went to McD’s for breakfast, where Mom enjoyed a good feed of waffles. We walked around Gladstone Steet (the main drag) for a bit until the Internet café opened, then got down to business at the computer.
On the way to Gisborne Mom had the radical idea of delaying our departure by a week so we could enjoy the South Island. We contacted our travel agent in Victoria, who quickly replied and explained that we had to call Singapore Airlines ourselves to change our tickets. So, after I finished updating my blog we walked down the street to a pay phone and I called Singapore Airlines.
The woman who answered at Singapore Airlines was quite helpful, and explained that because of the school holidays most of the flights were booked. We could get a later flight from Auckland to Singapore and from Singapore to Incheon, but the leg from Incheon to Vancouver was completely booked. We then inquired about upgrading to business class, but she explained that she would have to contact the Vancouver office for pricing. We agreed to call again on Monday for more information.
We departed Gisborne around noon, and optimistically expected to arrive in Napier around 2pm. Unfortunately, I didn’t count on the twistiness of the roads or the hills. I also forgot to fill up the car with petrol, and was a bit taken aback when the dashboard lit up with a wee gas pump to indicate that the car was dangerously low on petrol. I stopped at the next town to inquire about the availability of petrol and the lady at the café counter gave me a look of great disappointment. There was nothing until Napier. We were turning out the door with the idea of asking a local farmer if he had any petrol stores when she said that the next town, Tutira, had a pump but they charged an exorbitant amount per liter.
That was fine, I said. We drove on for another 20 minutes. Tutira consisted of a dairy with a petrol pump. That was all we needed to be happy! I put $10 into the car, just enough to get us to Napier. We left immediately because they didn’t have a public washroom and I dearly needed to relieve myself.
We stopped at a BP station on the outskirts of Napier to fill up on reasonably-priced petrol (a measly $1.56/liter) and a much-needed bathroom stop! I checked the map before we left the BP station and decided to take highway 50 into town. It took us through the port and the industrial area of town but was extremely easy to drive. We found the Napier information site with no problems, booked our hostel, and bought a map so we could go on a self-guided tour of Napier’s world-famous Art Deco buildings.
We spent about 2 hours walking around Napier admiring the buildings, then decided to stop for dinner. We found ourselves at Jo Miguel’s Tapas Restaurant. The staff were decidedly un-Spanish but the food was excellent. They even brought over the guest book for us to sign! I looked through and found several visitors from Ottawa and Toronto, the odd person from BC, a hardy soul from the Northwest Territories, and one lone Newfoundlander.
Tonight we’re staying at the Napier YHA. It’s perhaps the best YHA we’ve stayed at so far, although both of us are afraid of falling down the stairs on the way to the bathroom. Let’s just say that it’s a relief to stay here after the disaster at Rotorua.
Tomorrow morning we fly to Christchurch on the South Island. We’ll leave Sunday to take the train over the Southern Alps and through Arthur’s Pass to Greymouth. We’re not sure what we’ll do from there. We have to call Singapore Airlines to find out if we can catch that flight home on the 26th. If not, we’ll probably rent a car and drive north to Nelson and Picton, and visit Stew’s Mom in Blenheim before heading over to Wellington on the ferry.
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