Vanuatu

We've actually been home for ages, but we seem to have been incredibly busy, so only getting round to posting some holiday snaps now!

We had a wonderful holiday. Vanuatu is gorgeous and the people are gorgeous. And even though we love Rarotonga so much, I think we will go back to Vanuatu ( or more specifically, Efate) at some stage.

Anyway, here's a whole load of holiday photos!

 In some vague order...

 This is where we were staying, it was lovely. The staff were the most amazing people but if we went back we maybe wouldn't stay there again. Not that they did a single thing wrong, it was perfect, but it was quite far out of town along a very, very rutted track. We like exploring when we go somewhere, and this was just a bit too in the back of beyond.  If you were looking for a holiday where you stayed in the resort, chilled, ate amazingly well and could totally relax, then this is the place for you. I honestly don't think you could get anywhere better.

 They also had all sorts of things laid on so that you really didn't have to go anywhere if you didn't want to.

But, as I said, we love to explore! So we hired a car and went all over the island! This is a place called Eton Beach, with the most lovely blue water. It's quite strange, though as a freshwater stream comes into the salt water bay so the water all mixes in a decidedly odd way! Very cool.

 These children were just having such a brilliant time, I couldn't stop smiling.

As we drove round the island of Efate, we realised that even though it only takes about 3 hours to go right the way around, the scenery is very different on different coasts. Like, on the South East corner it was all palm trees, as far as the eye could see.

We discovered an amazing cafe along the coast. It's owned by an Australian guy who loves fishing, so every morning he goes out for a fish, then brings his catch home and serves up whatever he's caught. It was probably our favourite place to eat. 

and as an added bonus you could snorkel right off their deck.

 Lloyd had his favourite meal of the trip here. A whole grilled Poulet ( we would call it snapper!) This was after he'd eaten it all!! Every time we went I had the tuna sashimi. Best I've ever had. The tuna would have been about 2 hours out of the water. Amazing!

Our other favourite place was Hideaway Island. We got a wee boat over most days. We just chilled on the beach and snorkelled for hours! This was perhaps the best snorkelling I have ever done. We saw more fish than we've ever seen and so many different kinds. I lost count of the amount of hours we spent in the water.

The only thing, when the sun came out it was brutal! and it came out a lot! We think we're used to strong sun in New Zealand, but here, it honestly felt like it was scorching your skin off!! I spent a lot of the time in the shade!! Reading my trusty kindle.

Every day, when we went snorkelling there was this huge ball of fish that hung around at the edge of a drop off. I have no idea how deep the drop off went, but it was blue as far as the eye could see! I was hanging over it to take these photos of Lloyd and much as I adore the water, I was constantly thinking "what's down there!!"

Anyway, we were determined to get a pic of this! When we duck dived down into the ball of fish they would all part! Then we'd regroup them - by acting like sheep dogs to get them back into the ball, then we'd duck dive into them again! It was great fun! 

Here's Lloyd heading down towards the 'ball'

and they all part for him!

Then he has to come up to breathe!!

There was also an underwater post box here. You could buy waterproof post cards, then dive down to post them. ( and yes, our friends did get them!) 


Another favourite place was the market. This was just a food market, mostly fruit and veg.
It was open 24 hours a day except Sunday. And it was huge.

Most of the locals eat here, but I'm really fussy! and bones in food freak me out! Lloyd is the total opposite of me and was desperate to eat here. He had 'stew' and got this totally gigantic plate of meat in gravy, vegetables, fresh salad and cassava. Just as well it was huge cos I took one teeny taste and he had to share it with me. It was LOVELY! ( and no bones!)

 

In Vanautu three languages are commonly spoken, English, French and Pidgin. We loved pidgin! 

There's a lot of French influence, because for a long time the French and the British jointly 'ruled' it. In the 1980's it became independent. But a lot of french things remain - like yummy croissants!

Now, as long term readers, or anyone that knows me in the real world knows, I don't drink. Well, I very very seldom drink. I don't have a problem with it at all, I just don't really like the taste of alcohol. But I do like the odd cocktail. On our second to last night Lloyd and I had a cocktail each. It was lovely, but I only had about 3 sips and felt a smidge... what's the word?   Plastered! Yep, I'm a very cheap date.

So, that's all from Vanuatu. We had a completely brilliant holiday!

I came home to  a greenhouse full of triffids!!!  But more on that later.

We've battened down the hatches today, as a huge sub-tropical low is pretty much on top of us right now, so it's peeing down. High winds and gales are expected later. Oh joy!

We're home!

It feels like ages since I wrote anything. We've done so much! Our trip back to the Uk was totally excellent. Lloyd had a lovely time with his family and friends, then he headed up to Scotland to spend a bit of time with my lot.

Mum and dad had a brilliant golden wedding celebration. The weather was so hot. The uk was having the best heatwave ever.

I'll just post a whole load of pics! (In no order) they're a sort of overview of everything..

 North East coast of Scotland, near a small fishing village called Gourdon. My school friend and her hubby own an amazing restaurant there, right on the front. Best fish and chips. It's called Hornblowers - so anyone, if you're ever up the east coast you have to go!!

Aberdeen - and the whole of the uk were having the best summer ever. Aberdeen even reached 28 degrees while we were there. very unusual. The beach actually had people on it!! Here's Lloyd and I doing a selfie. Lloyd even went in for a paddle.

 Mum and Dad's Golden wedding anniversary party went very well. This is them cutting their cake. It was lovely to see my brother, cousins and Uncle and aunty. Don't get to see any of them much so it was brilliant.

 There were barley ( I think) fields all up the coast. They looked incredible. I was so glad to get some pics of them before they were all harvested.

 And yes, I did drag my skates over. I had asked the lovely folk at Granite City Rollers if I could go and train with them and they were so incredibly welcoming. The training was so hard. I thought I was going to pass out at one point! I also NSO'd for them (non skating official) and I learned to score which was ace.

I made some vanilla, gold themed cupcakes for mum and dad - not for the party, but there were a lot of people round at the house at various times, so they went down a treat.

 My uncle had this huge banner made! Mum and dad loved it!!

 Clouds - yep I took about 100 photos of clouds when we were flying. We did a LOT of flying. It takes a long, long time to get to the north of Scotland from New Zealand. An awful long time.

 Ah jet lag is a wonderful thing. I took this photo of Aberdeen beach at 4am. It doesn't get completely dark up in Aberdeen in mid summer. I had jet lag for almost the whole trip. I even went to Tesco at 3.30am!! that was interesting and definitely a good time to go shopping if you want to avoid the crowds!

 One of the many lunches! This is my Mum, my Dad and Lloyd!

Aberdeen is right on the coast, there are millions of these...everywhere!

 Lloyd really did go in for a wee dip at the beach. He's very brave!

 lovely North Sea

 More amazing barley fields. It got a bit stormy sometimes in the late afternoon. I think because it was so hot and humid during the day, there were some spectacular thunder and lightning storms at night. 

 

On our last night in Scotland we went to Jamie Oliver's Italian restaurant. It was fab. Really great food and a very cool atmosphere. We'd heard mixed reviews, but we really wanted to go. And we weren't disappointed at all. It was so, so good.

  Next stop - Langkawi. We had 2 nights and sort of three days here. We had hoped to get a bit of sun, but in actual fact it rained and thunder and lightninged the whole time we were there. But we didn't mind at all. We slept a lot, and used room service! We went for a walk as well. It does mean that we seem to have escaped jet lag on the way home...I think.

 There were 2 of these right outside our window, for ages, eating the berries on the palm. It's a Hornbill of some sort.

Then it was time to fly home. We got home last night. It was so good to see the dogs and get loads of cuddles. As I type this, Lulah is lying on the sofa behind me, resting her head on my back. She's lovely and warm.

So, we had an amazing time away. It's lovely to be home as well, though.

Off on my holidays!

Lloyd and I are heading off on holiday on Saturday, we'll be back in a little over three weeks. I'm going to be in Scotland the whole time and Lloyd will be over the border and up with me!
It's my mum and dad's Golden Wedding anniversary and Lloyd hasn't been back for almost 7 years!! So it'll be lovely to see everyone.
I'm super excited!!
Just working my way through many, many lists to get everything organised before we leave the farm in the capable hands of a trusty house-sitter.

See you all when we get back!

We'll be going here - which is Balmedie beach - cos Lloyd proposed to me there.

This photo belongs to Royally Morphed Pythons

The Longest Summer

It's been a while since I last wrote anything, this is most likely due to the fact that summer is just going on and on and on and Lloyd and I are making the most of it.

Since I last posted, we've been to Waiheke Island for a wee holiday, I've been diving at the Poor Knights marine reserve, we've sauced and passata-d and gardened, done more pottery and yesterday we went over to the Hokianga for HokiFest. I've done all of this while dosed up to the eyeballs on painkillers. I've done something to my shoulder and am presently seeing a chiropractor and a voodoo lady! ok she's not a voodoo lady - she does cranial something or other and is a genius. After 2 weeks I think it might be on the mend. Which is great, because making do with only a few meagre hours of sleep, before being woken up with the pain is really beginning to get me down!

Anyway first things first - Waiheke Island.
In all the time we've lived in NZ we've never been, so a few months back we booked a 4 day trip. It was wonderful. It felt like we'd been abroad!  The sun shone the whole time we were there and basically we just explored. Highlights were a picnic on Palm Beach, watching the sun set from Cable Bay Winery,  exploring Stony Batter, Man O War Winery, Oyster Inn Restaurant, eating lovely meals and lying in bed looking at the view.

This is the view from our bedroom window - sunset on the first evening

Couldn't resist! Macarons by the sea - yum!

Picnic on Palm Beach

A fairly standard view around Waiheke! It's all pretty stunning.

Some washed out rocks

There are loads of vineyards on Waiheke - it's pretty famous for its wine.

Our last evening - at one of said vineyards - Cable Bay. Sunset.

We loved it. We'd love to make it a regular, maybe once a year thing.

Next!
The very next morning after we got home I had to get up at 5.30am to meet Simon and Alison and drive down to Tutakaka, where we were meeting a boat to take us out to the Poor Knights Islands. I've done a fair bit of diving here before so I knew how good it was going to be. And it was!
It's positively teeming with fish life there. Lots of sting rays, unfortunately no mantas, we'd been told they were around and had really hoped to see some.
I've said before how much I love diving. It's another world down there.

Two snapper following us around the place - they are incredibly tame.

I can't remember what this is called - but it's super cute!

A moray eel - this was a rather large one!

Simon and Pete having an underwater confab

I'm pretty sure  this is a large scorpion fish - its eye looks odd!

A long tailed sting ray

Alison rolling off the boat - I love this!! For non divers, the way you get off smaller dive boats is to sit on the edge with your legs in the boat and your back facing the water, and simply roll off backwards - it's great fun,

Now we've got pottery - I took some of my bowls and stuff home to glaze so that I can take it back on Tuesday to be fired - it saves time, and means that when I'm there on Tuesday I can make more stuff rather than paint glaze on.
 I also took home my wee buttons! They were just a time filler one evening, but I think they're very sweet so I sewed some onto the back of a white linen tunic I made to take on the Waiheke holiday.

 One of my bowls made on the wheel - ok not totally symmetrical! This has been fired once and has had the glaze painted on - once it's been fired again the glaze should be a glossy cream colour - we shall see!

These are just little hand made bowls - from white clay - again these will be cream with pale blue spots on them - I hope!

finally, my wee buttons

Today Lloyd and I picked the remaining tomatoes - there were actually still a fair amount left after we picked about 8kg - but by this time I am over them totally - we have about 20 litres of passata in the freezer! This'll last us quite some time. Anyway, because of this we took out the tomato plants that were left and fed the nice red tomatoes to the chickens. They were delighted! Then we chopped the basil down that's been in the greenhouse - I left the stalks as I'm fairly certain it will sprout from them. Then we set to work making another HUGE batch of passata - but this time it had a tonne of basil in it - I honestly think it may be the nicest one we've ever made.

You can really tell the difference between the outside tomatoes and the greenhouse ones. The outside ones are less sweet and also a lot more dirty! Greenhouse ones are super sweet and lovely and clean!

 This is the pile of basil - the pic really doesn't show how huge it is. These stems are about 1m long!

HOT CHILLI SAUCE RECIPE

Lloyd also managed to make the first batch of chilli sauce. The greenhouse has been amazing for the chillies. They're like flipping trees in there!  This sauce has a mixture of about 30 habaneros, 50  chilli fire, 50 anaheim, 50 hungarian peppers and 100 ceyenne oh and about  4 bhut jalokias.

Here's what was in the sauce as well as the chillies

200ml dark soy

100ml light soy

200ml cider vinegar

500ml dry sherry

and about 5 teaspoons sugar

brought to the boil and simmered for around half an hour -  turn off and let it stew for about another three hours.

Then blend it with a stick blender, mouli it and bottle it.

The trug with most of the chillies he picked

Lots of lovely greenhouse chillies! There's still about a gazillion more to come

Preparation, preparation, preparation. We also have a wee gas burner outside now. The catch in your throatness of cooking a million chillies really didn't do it for me.

Ready for bottling

Finished and labelled

( not great quality  - but the labels say Rather Hot Chilli Sauce)

This is the tomato sauce I made a couple of weeks ago.

on the left is one large bottle of basil passata to have in the fridge the remaining 100 litres is in the freezer!

So, all in all we've been rather busy. Sometimes I feel totally exhausted and others I feel like I'd could go for ever!!