Apologies for the lack of posts lately – we have gib stoppers and painters in our house at the moment so have evacuated to the Marlborough Sounds. We have often wondered what it would be like to live here fulltime and this has been our chance to give it a go – Mum & Dad’s bach is boat access only from Havelock and Aaron has been trialling commuting back into Blenheim to the winery a couple of days a week. The trip takes about an hour and a half from the time you shut the backdoor in town, till you tie up to the end of the jetty here. We are also trying out mobile broadband on our laptop so that we can keep up with e-mails, wine orders etc.
And how has it been so far? Well it goes without saying that we’ve had our share of fiascos – some funny and some not so funny. Our poor little beagle managed to chomp into bait hanging off Finn’s fishing line and put a barbed fish-hook through her lip. It was no easy job for Aaron to have to push the hook right through to remove it. Yooowwwwwouch!
And then there was Aaron’s departure yesterday – it came up really gusty and rainy. He attempted to row out to the boat in the dinghy (really putting his Indevin rowing team skills to the test :-) ) and after a long battle of five metres forward, three metres back, one metre sideways – he made it to our fizz boat on the mooring and waved goodbye victoriously. Five minutes later we hear the sound of the boat returning – alas he is back. We assumed he must have gotten around the point and decided the sea was too rough. However the problem was his memory, or should I say his eyesight! The boat is bobbing about in the small storm with Aaron yelling, “I forgot my car keys!” “Find my car keys!” “Can one of the kids bring down the keys?” After much searching and yelling back and forth, we hear, “Ahhhh, I had them all along” and he takes off – even faster than before!
But fiascos aside it has been pretty cool hanging out here with the kids. The weather has been a bit disappointing but we’ve still done a bit of fishing, hill walking, possum hunting, and lazing in the outdoors hot tub. We’ve coped with the rain by cooking, playing board games and painting rocks ($2 shop fabric paint works a treat :-) ) At times it feels a bit isolated – times like at night when it’s pitch black, stormy outside and you know you have no way out of here. But with modern technology it’s really easy to connect. We have cellphone coverage and the mobile broadband has worked surprisingly well and lets us do plenty (as long as gaming and movies are avoided) - and its free until Feb as part of the plan we’ve signed up to. We’ve also had visitors over the weekend. I can now see why folk that live in the Sounds get excited when the mail-boat arrives with supplies. It was most exciting to see new faces and find new food ;-). We have a week to go and I hope it doesn’t go too fast. If you’re out and about in the Sounds or want to be picked up from Havelock to come out for a visit – then let me know, you are most welcome!
Back at the winery it is almost time to bottle our 2009 wine and Aaron is busy getting another export order off to Aussie. Our sales have picked up there which is encouraging. Our distributor in Australia tells us those he supplies would love to meet the winemaker so it looks like there might be a trip across the Tasman on the cards.