We woke to rain so had to reconsider our plans for the day. We often have the TV on in the morning to try and figure out the weather. While watching we saw the news about the Christchurch earthquake so we changed our plans for the day again.

We drove to Nuala and Tony’s so we could check our emails . At that stage the only email we had had about the earthquake had come from Gerald and Helen, Raewyn’s friends who looked after us in Norfolk. They had rung Raewyn and found her OK so that was our main concern sorted. They were concerned about Nelson having heard the centre was NW of Christchurch but we were able to email them to say that Nelson is a long way from Christchurch.

After a cuppa with Tony and Nuala we decided to go into the city to the internet café to read a bit more and also get any extra emails that may have come through. We had time to get an Irish sim card for the phone which should solve out phone problems and had lunch in the town.

In the afternoon we drove to Dunmore East, a town that we had kept hearing about that is about 10km from here. Unfortunately the weather was not great as the fog got thicker and thicker. We found there were a few caches there and the upside of the weather was the beaches were not busy . The first cache was at a rocky cliff area where there was a few groups fishing. One man was leaving as we arrived and said the fish were not biting but the others looked set for a while. John came face to face with a large rat when he finally found the cache.

While we were there we kept hearing a fog horn. When we arrived at a nearby park we could just make out a large boat anchored off shore. It was only a few hundred metres away but could only just be made out in the fog. There were 2 beaches near the park although access to one was cut off by the sea.

We also discovered a third beach which had red sand. There was a huge car park here but only three cars in it. As we left a couple of people did arrive in wetsuits for a swim. The beach seemed odd in that there were life buoys on each side. I wondered if these were also fishing spots and slippery in high seas.

We called in to the one pub left in our area for a drink and some eggs (the pub also has a small shop) . There had been a pub that burned down just over the road from this one and also another which was closer to our place here but went broke. Nuala said the receivers had moved in and shut this second one down, When we said that the pub left must do really well she said that was not the case. It appears people here like 2 or 3 pubs in a small area so they can move from one to the other depending on what is going on and which customers are in. One pub doesn’t offer this.

Our last stop was at a small beach close to the house here. This is a popular angling spot but dangerous for swimming as the currents are strong and the tide rises quickly. Swimming was not tempting today however.

We again cooked tea here. After over 100 days travelling we are appreciating having a kitchen to use but I am sure the novelty will wear off. The fog was still thick at 8pm when John went out to feed the fox, although the optimist in me thought it was a bit lighter.

We were finally able to spot the fox in the gloom at about 9pm. It appeared to be moving reasonably freely and was attempting to drag the large caste-iron feeding bowl off to it’s lair. Tony has lost 3 or 4 bowls so far but was hoping this heavy bowl would defeat it. I think however that it will soon be added to the wily fox’s collection.