The weather report stated calming seas, so we booked. Time to embark upon sailing the Cook Straight on the ferry. Known to be one of the roughest pieces of water to cross, and with it previously having been 9 metre swells, we were a little apprehensive of possibilities.
Luckily the weatherman got it right this time. It was truely 'smooth sailing'. We were treated with rainbows and deep, moody coloured landscape.
Both suffering from humdinger, (that's bus speak for 'severe'), headcolds I took the liberty of adding a cabin to our booking. What a dang good idea that was! Highly recommend that one as a trick to throw in your toolbox. Two beds, window with a view, a shower, toilet - priceless. I got to wander the decks clearing the congested sinuses while the kids lounged happily in the cabin and hubby rested.
We disembarked in Picton without event and drove off toward Blenheim. As the night fell we traced our way to Blenheim watching our temperature guage soar - what the? We were pretty tired by this point and not able to find a suitable spot to pull over to examine the situation safely. Then, just to make matters worse I managed to add in a little graze of the passenger wing mirror on Blenheim's ridiculously narrow bridge, (gulp). We made it to our park up and decided to deal with the issues in the morning.
When I checked the oil and water in the moring all seemed well. Added a little to each and shut the locker door on the side of the bus, which then proceeded to fall straight off into Hamish's hands. Bother. Appeared that rusted framing may have been a little worse than we had realised. Seeking some advice we called into Ritchies Bus Depot who bought Deluxe Coaches from where our Bus originated. They were well amused to see the ole bus once again. We even spoke with the mechanic who fitted the engine in its overhaul when it was bought into NZ. Having been provided the bad news; the only panel beater he thought worthy of doing the whole job was in his 70's and unavailable anyway, (agh!), we decided to try another panel beaters for some patch up work in order to get us back on the road to head for Motueka.
While waiting we cruised the streets of Blenheim, scouted out another housebus for a family looking at going on the road (exciting!) and found a sterling Airfix model shop, the older boys area of interest at present. Then we enjoyed the shelter of the library before heading back to the bus and hitting the road.
The temperature guage decided to zoom up but I decided it was fibbing and carried on. Sure enough it settled again. Mechanics, need your advice please.
We arrived in Motueka after dark and settled into our park up with anticipation of discovering the landscape in the morning.
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