woke up to an email from my dad saying that my beloved sassy (my car, for those of you that don't know) was going to need $800-900 dollars worth of work and parts to fix the leaking roof. prior to my trip i had dealt with keeping a steady supply of towels and a very large bucket in the front passenger seat for about 2 months, trying to wait out when i could actually bring it into the shop. my car perpetually had about 1-2cm of water in the passenger side floor, and i wouldn't let anyone ride in it unless it was a sunny day and they had to sit on plastic. as much as i loved this car, there was no way it was worth putting that much money into it.so i had asked for the alternative solutions. and the answer was fine by me. for a mere fraction of that cost, they could just disconnect the sun roof (not a big deal, b/c i rarely used it as i tend to live in cold, non-sunny climates) and put a sealant around it. leak problem solved! and no sign of mold, which was my main worry. and the car would be drivable again. YAY!
down and up.
so we headed off to the grocery store to pick up some things and stopped at the mechanic across the street to check on steph's car. it had a new WOF sticker - good news! - but it came at a cost. a very big cost, it turns out. it was going to cost steph $1000 nzd (about $500 usd) to pass inspection. so much more than any of us could have anticipated. steph was completely shocked, i'm not sure she even could speak at that point. my worry was that they guy was ripping her off, but when we researched what individual parts cost and then looked at his receipt, it turns out he wasn't. he actually didn't seem to charge her for one of the repairs (clean the headlight). but still. talk about sticker shock. theresa & i did the shopping while steph tried to gather herself. her main worry was that meg would no longer want to buy it from her, since that significantly raised the price tag.
and down we go again.
back at the hostel, picked up the car and packed it while steph tried to contact meg. huge relief - meg still wanted the car, despite the increase in cost. and she was in blenheim, and would give steph a $500 nzd deposit today. total score! steph was pretty much elated, and really couldn't ask for anything more.
up up up.
hung out in the town center with meg at a cafe, and bought the paintings we originally eyed a few days prior. eventually we had to get going, since it was getting late and we had quite a bit of driving ahead of us. stopped at whither hills winery to pick up a wine for me - the spicy white. i was already starting to think what i could pair it with. and off to the west coast we went.
arrived in the tiny town of westport early enough for theresa & steph to pick up their packets for the 1/2 marathon, and then hit the road to visit the pancake rocks and blowholes. i do not make this up. that is what they are called. we were running very low on gas, but steph was pretty convinced there would be a petrol station in punakaiki. unfortunately there wasn't. though there was an info center, cafe, pub and post office. we asked the info center where the nearest station was - and it was basically westport. the info people sent us to a cafe that sometimes has emergency petrol and while they did, the cafe wasn't about to give us any. they insisted that we would be fine - "just go slow and take it easy on the turns" was their exact advice. great.so we walked around the rocks which were interesting, didn't see any blowholes. too bad. ha. then we made the nervous ride back to westport, hoping that the "empty" light wouldn't come one. i wasn't convinced it would, it was only 30ks away and the indicator floated quite a lot, but i'm not sure theresa was so thrilled with the possibility of running out of gas. we did make it back, thankfully, and filled up the tank as soon as we got there. funny, there was a sign facing the opposite direction saying "last petrol station for 100ks" or something like that. too bad it wasn't facing the other way too so we could have seen it on the way OUT of town. oh well. found our way to a cafe to grab a bite to eat (theresa & steph needed some pasta), before finding our way to phyllis's house.
phyllis was an older westport resident who opens her house every year to help with the accommodation shortage during the marathon. she proudly told us she was the first one to do so, and soon recruited her friends to do the same. so instead of staying in the "no vacancy" hotels, we got to experience first hand how a kiwi lives. and she was funny, telling us various stories about her life and the town and the history of the marathon. she kept going on about how crowded the town will be tomorrow and how you can barely get around. wow, i thought, this will be a site to see! anyway, chatted a bit, then headed out to find a cafe and get some tea. finally, the thriving metropolis of westport was getting sleepy, and so were we, so off to bed.
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