The little cottage that couldn't quite.

Yesterday was our final day of long driving. Since I had sprained my ankle the night before trying to prove a flexibility point (which I clearly did not prove) I was glad for the clutch to keep my ankle moving. We had the continental breakfast at the hotel, packed the car, and headed to the post office to send our postcards before driving out of the city. We stopped at a gas station to fill up, and the attendant refused to let me pump the gas myself, though he seemed to leave everyone else alone. I wonder if Americans have trouble figuring out their pumps. (I do keep forgetting that you start by pumping here, and then go inside to pay afterwards. I'm surprised more people don't just steal gas.) With a long drive ahead of us, we were eager to get out of the city.

A few hours later, we stopped at a famous restaurant/market (the name of which, of course, I can't remember). The owners live in a castle on the grounds, and there are several shops along with the market. We really enjoyed the meal and the break from the road. I had a ginger ale called Gingerella which came in a beautiful bottle. Kiwis are very serious about their ginger ale and ginger beer. I've probably had more here than over the last year at home.

We explored a couple of the shops before getting back on the road. As we neared Christchurch, Katie and I realized that 1) our cottage did not have internet (how did I miss that at booking?) and 2) it was further than we thought. It was about 50 km past Christchurch, so we decided to get in and quickly get settled before heading back out for dinner. As we passed the city and neared our accommodations, we hit various pockets of traffic and construction, which significantly delayed our arrival to our cottage. I was speeding to make up time, which led to us fishtailing on a gravel road in Loburn. Fun!

Finally, we got to the cottage. We figured out how to open the gate, and drove between high trees into a clearing pretty far from the street where we met our hosts. They showed us to the cottage and greeted us with a bottle of wine (yay honeymoon!) before quickly squashing any hopes of us making it back to Christchurch for dinner. When I asked if there was a better way to drive back to Christchurch instead of taking the construction zone-ridden way we came, they just said we shouldn't go to Christchurch. However, they suggested a popular restaurant 10 minutes away in Rangiora called Capone's. Once we were settled, we drove out to Capone's, stopping outside the library to grab some time on their WiFi before going to dinner. Satisfied that things in California were getting along just fine without us, we walked over to Capone's, a high-end Italian restaurant. In the end, we were very grateful for our hosts' recommendation. The service was good, the food was great, and the setting was intimate. Their garlic bread had cream cheese stuffed inside. INSIDE.

After dinner we decided to rearrange the items in our bags in preparation for our Jetstar flight today, since we were expecting something akin to Ryanair in terms of service and weight limits. We started closing the window shades, when we realized that the windows over the kitchen sink - the ones that look directly over the bed - had no shades! We then started to notice other little things that were missing, like a drying rack for our dishes or a floor towel for outside the shower. I imagine the cottage is a converted shed or something of that nature, and they've never actually slept in it so they don't know what it feels like or what it's missing. Between the distance from the city, the random things lacking in the cottage, and the kindness yet semi-unhelpfulness of our hosts, I dubbed yesterday's stay "the little cottage that couldn't quite". We actually really enjoyed staying there, but we did laugh at the little bits.

We finished the night watching Angels & Demons, staring at the cows outside our window (oh yeah, they had cows and horses and we're pretty sure they're tree farmers), and sipping some wine. If there's one thing about New Zealand that we've loved, it's the wine. That and seeing all the sheep around.