Ngarua Caves

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This morning the four of us headed over to Takaka Hill to visit the Ngarua Caves. Robin and Sandra haven’t visited the caves since they’ve been back in NZ so they were interested to see if much has changed since they visited about 30 years ago when their kids were young.

We had a bit of a hold up on the way as there is a section of road that is still restricted to a single lane following damage caused by Cyclone Gita in February. The area is controlled by a traffic light system that allows the uphill and downhill traffic through alternately. Immediately after the cyclone hit the road was closed for about four days so tourists were stranded in the Golden Bay area with their hire cars until the road reopened.

We arrived at the caves in glorious sunshine and were treated to magnificent views out over Golden Bay. It seemed a shame to head off into the caves where it was only 11°C! Our tour guide was Ben who had an interesting delivery style. He spoke very slowly (even for a New Zealander!) and had quite an odd tone/cadence to his talking voice. Towards the end of the tour he told us that he is the great-grandson of the man who discovered the cave system so maybe he was channeling his ancestor? Anyhow, he was very knowledgeable about the caves and I think he had a genuine interest and passion for the caves even if his tour guide style was rather droll.

After the pitch blackness of the caves - demonstrated to us when Ben turned the lights out! - the sunshine seemed even brighter and warmer than when we arrived. We have had some fantastic autumn weather while we have been here.

As we headed back to Nelson we stopped at The Smoking Barrel Cafe and Restaurant in Motueka to see the donuts that have become a social media sensation. The chef creates dozens of intriguingly flavoured donuts each day and people apparently come from far and wide to sample them thanks to their TripAdvisor fame. Robin and Sandra shared a banoffee (banana/toffee) donut and Bernie and I opted for the raspberry and vanilla custard. Very decadent!

Our next stop was at the Jester House Cafe at Tasman for some lunch. Yes, I know, we just ate donuts, but it was only half!! The cafe‘s grounds are a little bit Alice in Wonderland with an oversized chess board and a forest of strange wooden animals amongst other oddities. They also have a creek filled with tame eels that you can feed and a huge shoe in the back yard that you can book for a romantic getaway? Presumably they have evicted the old woman and all of her children??!

After lunch we continued on to Mapua where we couldn’t resist the real fruit ice creams. At least I only had soup for lunch AND I ordered my ice cream kiddie-sized. Someone else had a burger for lunch AND polished off a full-sized ice cream! What a calorific day it’s been.

Back home in Richmond Bernie and I volunteered to take Nelson for a walk to try to deal with some of the excess kilojoules. I think we took Nelson a little bit further than his little legs are used to as he was flagging by the time we reached home. We’re accustomed to walking a Golden Retriever so not sure if we should have made more allowances for a Cavalier with his shorter legs??!

Out to the club for dinner tonight. The weekly draw had jackpoted to $2,000 and had to go off tonight. Members have to be there to claim the prize though so Robin and Sandra had to be there just in case one of their numbers was drawn. In fact, half of Richmond was there hoping their number would be drawn and the club was packed to the rafters. Despite the kilojoules already consumed today we ate dinner at the club. Bernie had the beef schnitzel with gravy and I managed to tackle an open steak sandwich sooooo ... only one slice of bread!

I’m on fire at Jo with another win tonight, now equal with Bernie on two wins a piece. In the all important challenge, Robin and Sandra won to go one ahead in the Bolivia Ashes. Hmmn, we HAVE to win tomorrow night to even things up and that will force us to play another game as a decider! We can’t leave with the ashes drawn, we have to play until we have a result!

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