A wee slice of New Zealand – Part 1

Gallery

This gallery contains 9 photos.

Over the last few days I have had the chance to travel down the east coast of the South Island from Picton to Christchurch. Along the way I called into Blenheim in the heart of the Marlborough wine region and … Continue reading

A philosophical issue – toscanakiwi or not toscanakiwi?

One thing we are struggling with at present is our distance from Tuscany. The whole reason for this blog was to let friends and family know about our time in Italy which is now over – for this year at least.  As our stories are no longer about Italy should we change the name of the blog? Should we broaden the name to cover, well, our travels in general? Should we continue the blog at all?

Everytime we have thought about this it has made our collective heads hurt.

But, after much thinking we have arrived at a decision. Although we are back home in New Zealand, our hearts remain in Italy, in the sun, enjoying “la dolce far niente”.

We are still, and will always be, kiwis in Toscana.

One of the treats of being home

After the initial shock of moving back to New Zealand there are some things to look forward to that relate to being home. One of these was the chance to ‘unbox’ my cars.

For those of you who don’t know, I like old Porsches and have accumulated a few over the years. On Wednesday I went to the rented garage where two have spent the last year to check on them. Good news! They were both there (a relief) and seemed in good condition (a bonus). In the next week I’ll get a friendly mechanic around and we’ll start them up.

For a petrolhead like me this is bliss.

Freedom!

A few days ago the girls completed their quarantine in Levin and were released with a clean bill of health. We are currently staying with friends and the girls have settled in quickly.