The last three weeks have meandered by with scenic drives galore. Whilst there have been some cold snaps and a few freezing days here and there with driving rain and howling winds, most of the time the weather has been fine albeit chilly. We have a 4WD at the moment and have been happily using it to inspect the scenery from every angle. We headed up the Jubilee Road and down to Little River by the very rarely travelled scenic route. Luckily we took our coffee and lunch because the prices at the Little River Gallery and cafe were almost as earth shattering as the scenery - so about standard as Christchurch goes. Another day we went from one end of the Summit Road to the other - looking down on Akaroa Habour from one side of our Ravvie the ravishing Rav4 and down across the Eastern Bays to the other. We even took a drive down to Le Bons Bay for our lunch.

Our main contributions to the local economy consist of being the victims of highway robbery (AKA buying petrol at $2.25/litre) and groceries (thank heavens for our major stock up at Pak&Save. We take the edge off the petrol purchases by buying in Akaroa of all places - where they take everyone’s grocery coupons for 6 cents off - and double it to 12 cents - they even charge city prices. We have also partaken of divine fish and and chips in Akaroa on a couple of occasions - patronising ‘Murphy’s on the Corner’ - just one block back from the waterfront. Amazing grilled elephant fish and a very short walk indeed to bring our steaming hot bounty down to the multitudes of picnic tables on the waterfront... where, just on the other side of the road, the same meal would be $29/head... vs. $17 for two. Ahhh... the joys of never ever paying retail.

We had a great trip into Christchurch for an overnight stay and took a rather sad walk around the city. All very pretty and a glorious late winter’s day with spring flowers popping up, but it seems to be a city of car parks now - so much that we remember has just disappeared and condemned buildings sit with empty eyes, awaiting their eventual fate. We walked the route of the tourist tram and particularly enjoyed pretty, pastel coloured New Regent Street and even played the tourist - buying some souvenirs of NZ (made in China) for some friends in Ireland and the owner at a forthcoming sit in Paris. We enjoyed dinner at the casino and even found a small pearl in a mussel - that was quite the surprise - thankfully I’m a tentative chewer... otherwise my pearly whites might have been damaged by a white pearl. Dinner was the bargain that kept on giving actually - we had a credit of $30 odd on our players club card and thought - we’ll have the dinner buffet at $40/head and use the credit to subsidise it nicely. We booked early - 5.30 pm - so we wouldn’t be driving the hills too late in the evening. We received our booking confirmation from the restaurant saying there’s a 90 minute dining limit so we had to return the table by 7 pm... or, if we had booked the ‘Early Bird’ deal, then 6.45 pm... qu’est-ce que c’est ‘Early Bird Deal’? Turned out with a bit of not so subtle interrogation that it was only $30 (vs $40 full price). For the sake of 15 minutes we converted to an early bird booking... saved $20 and that meant dinner for two was only $30 after the credit. In the manner of all self-licking icecreams, having paid out our $30... we then had a 10% return of $3... had to go and play the 1 cent slots for another hour or so after dinner - such a fun evening and yet another reminder to never, ever pay retail.

Earlier I mentioned a souvenir gift for our owner in Paris... well that was the big news of the last three weeks. We’ve been looking around for a great sit for Christmas and New Year, somewhere wintery, Christmassy and generally amazing and ‘lo, one evening, just before bed I took a final look at one of our international sites and there it was - 7 weeks in Paris... in the 1st arrondissement, more or less next door to the Louvre, with 1 sweet cat to care for. In the world of housesitting this is essentially a 24 carat gold, D flawless type sit.

We then had the enviable task of neatly filling in exactly 14 night between finishing in Ireland and starting in Paris on Friday 13th December. We had a well developed methodology for the decision - Plan A involved looking at inexpensive countries with great Christmas markets (Poland, Croatia, Romania, Hungary) and fabulous apartments for costa-not-a-lotta - BUT - this would mean flying from Dublin to X to Paris - and it being winter - would mean arriving in Paris on the 12th to ensure we weren’t delayed by bad winds, snow or some airline having a pre-Christmas strike. We checked out the cost of hotels near our Paris housesit - and they started at A$300+++ We considered all the pros and cons including extra taxis if we stayed somewhere less expensive... We gave in and reverted to Plan ‘B’ - good old Brussels, Belgium - beautiful Christmas atmosphere and only 1 hour 22 minutes to Paris on the fast and regular Thalys trains - perfect for a guaranteed arrival on the 13th. Then after days of looking at booking sites and Airbnb... same searches, same parameters, the most perfect apartment popped up in Brussels, 10 minutes walk to the Grand Place and in a good neighbourhood - C’est parfait! C’est magnifique! C’est pas trop cher - and we booked it. That is us, happy little vegemites, all booked out, booked up and not homeless until the end of January 2020 - and who knows what adventures the new year will bring. In the meantime, we’re researching the socks off Paris - so many things we’ve yet to see.

Meanwhile, back on the ranch, the sap was rising, the spring flowers were blooming, the frosts were rarer and a murder spree was let loose upon the household. Almost in unison with the vacuum cleaner breaking (and thorough vacuuming twice a week was vital), we were coming across the remains of birds big and small - we know one was particularly small because the only remains were 2 feet and and a couple of feathers. One was definitely larger as we came upon Jeanie defeathering it all over the dining room carpet. In fact we had to stop stocking the bird feeder on her favourite climbing tree - innocent native birds were being tempted in for a seedy snack, before they were turning into yummy snacks (what a climber!) The carnage was ridiculous - the day before we left one of the girls brought in a baby rabbit, head and pulse thankfully intact, so we retrieved him and he made a run for it. All three of the huntresses have bells on the collars. In the immortal words of the original Jaws movie... they needed bigger bells.

Our final morning dawned after copious amounts of housework and eventually using half a roll of duct tape to cobble the vacuum cleaner together (one can only pick up so many feathers). We were up early at 6 am, though most definitely not bright, and made it over the hills and on to Christchurch Airport by 9 am to meet our travellers returning from Europe. After a hug and a chat we wheeled our luggages through from the international terminal to the domestic, checked in for our flight to Hamilton and both breathed sighs of relief - zoning out for an hour or so. We have a couple of nights booked at a family run B&B in Cambridge (with a jacuzzi!) - the ultimate ‘decompress’ between housesits. Next stop, Lake Karapiro in the Waikato (world famous, in NZ, for rowing. Apparently.)