DETOUR

Everybody who has ever driven anywhere they haven’t driven before knows the certain sensation of insecureness that may overwhelm the driver. To avoid this unpleasant emotion we decided that Miia, who simply cannot trust any driver except herself would do the driving while Lotta who knows how to read a local road map (at least most of the time) would do directing of the driver. Just in case, while we were still in the Franz Josef’s, Miia decided to check the route from the internet and write the directions to our next host in Rangiora to a city we had no map of. And so came the rainy Sunday morning when we started our trusty sidekick and headed towards Rangiora through the misty mountains. 

The weather did not this time favor our trip but it was with a relief we noted that the closer we got to Christchurch the better the weather seem to get. However, our fearless adventurers had miscalculated the amount of diminishing daylight and found themselves in Rangiora just before dusk. As I already mentioned we did not have any map of the city but my astute trust to our fearless driver’s direction I was sure we would get to our next accommodation before dark. And we probably would have without a slight detour we took as my fearless driver started questioning her own mind, sense of direction, google maps and her own HANDWRITTEN directions. The result was somewhat…interesting…

http://youtu.be/d5E8M-Or1Q8

Nevertheless this early evening excitement ended up well as we found the correct  route to Loburn simply by following  Miia’s written instructions. As we arrived to our next host, the Murphy’s, we were welcomed by whole party of people. Our becoming neighbors had decided to come and help Dan, our host, whose wife had left him and their two children for a week to go cooking course in Vietnam to prepare an astounding Sunday barbeque. Even though the house was teeming with children under the age of 13 (very untypical environment for us both) the evening felt very welcoming and for us travellers nice and homey.

  

We learned that Dan and Anne are both owners and at the managing level in the company called Hiking NewZealand, they have two wonderful children Liam and Eva and a German intern also called Eva living with them for few months. They have chicken, five horses, two cows and a dog called Fern. This lovely family welcomed us with open arms to live in a small hut at the edge of their premises, equipped with small fireplace and to help them to prepare their home for the winter to come. 

  

With Love Miia & Lotta