Extraordinary day
Sunday, February 10th, 2008Yesterday was an extraordinary day. 10am saw us collecting a forgotten film from NgAang, our Takaka subject. By 10.30am we were all naked (I kept my pants on for the record!) in NgAng’s hot tub sipping on fresh organic berry smoothies discussing the impending end of the world in true Takaka style. On exiting NgAng’s we noticed the tyre on the caravan was literally falling apart and wouldn’t make it over Takaka’s steep, winding hill. So at 12.43pm we started to seek for someone to replace the tyre. Pretty much everything closes at 12pm on a Sat. Luckily, after getting a ridiculous call out quote, we found a guy shutting up shop who very kindly reopened to fix our problem.
The caravan huffed and puffed it’s way over the hill while we discussed selling up in Auckland and joining the hippies in their land of love. Pulling into Nelson at a petrol station a passerby alerted us to a flat tyre. The other tyre on the caravan had a puncture, how very odd to travel 7 weeks and then two in one day. So even harder was our task to find a tyre man at 4.37pm. After kind gestures and phone calls a man agreed to meet us at his mechanics garage. “He will probably charge you like a wounded bull” was our helping hands closing words. But no, the kind garage owner changed the tyre and sent us on our way with a spare wheel for a mere $70. 
The sun set in Cable Bay over us enjoying a fine celebratory meal in Cable Bay’s unique cafe. We toasted the midway point of our adventure, 22 subjects under our belt and an overwhelming feeling of wellbeing and happiness
