Christmas Day

So, now you’ve been introduced to Desolina. I wasn’t going to write much about us as this blog is mainly intended to keep our family and friends up to date on our travels, but for any readers who might have wandered across this blog by chance I’ll do a very brief intro.

David and I are two Brits living in New Zealand. We met 6 years ago in Manchester and married a few months ago. Even back then, in our university days flatting in Manchester there was talk from David of boats and pipe dreams of sailing the Mediterranean, the Caribbean or even a circumnavigation. I didn’t take it too seriously back then. We lived about as far away from the coast as you can get in the British Isles and had little to none sailing experience or knowledge. All of this changed after moving to Wellington. This was the first opportunity we had to do regular sailing and it all snowballed from there.

So, back to the present trip. It’s Christmas day. We’re sat on a mooring in Kumutoto Bay with glorious weather and a gin and tonic in hand. Jealous yet? I’m sure not every day will be like this, but for the first few days at least we mean to kick back and enjoy ourselves. Life the past couple of days has been idyllic and basically revolves around baking, reading and taking the kayak out for a paddle round whatever bay we find ourselves in. The tranquility is interspersed here and there by the sound of the drill on stainless steel as David tries to drill another hole to mount the solar panels.

I still find having Christmas in summer a little odd and have to make an effort to recreate some of the familiarity of a traditional British Christmas. This year that includes my very first homemade Christmas cake (i.e. made by me and not my Mum or Gran), and a roast chicken dinner (eaten late in the evening as it’s hard to feel like a roast dinner in 20 something degrees).

Not much else to report for now. Still waiting for the Queen Charlotte dolphins to pop in and say hello….