It was a relief to sleep later, because truth be told, the “bedroom” in
our new motorhome is not as spacious as that in the old. In fact, if this were our
first experience sleeping in a Luton bed (over-the-cab to the uninitiated) I
would not have elected to buy this motorhome. I suffer from mild claustrophobia
and one of the earlier imperative considerations for a motorhome was
no-cave-like bedroom and no coffin like bathrooms. But buying a caravan or a
motorhome is all about compromise and I have lived long enough in this kind of
situation to know what I can or can’t cope with.
Anyway …. We set off back up to UCC’s yard at Islington at a very
civilised hour after phoning our son-in-law to wish him a happy 44th
birthday. That number alone is scary; it ages us rather, even if he is a little
older than our daughter!
After listening to our concerns, Ross soon sorted out our problems, most
arising from poor final quality control checks. Our inability to swivel the
front cab seats arose from the fact the bolts were too tight. The beads of
condensation on the outside of the fridge arose from the fact that the
artificial outer was plastic and simply needed an insertion of a scrap of foam
by the handle. The fact that we couldn’t get the television to function in the
front lounge area was all about the wrong splitter having been installed when
we requested the dual operation facility, and our half-hearted concern about
the power input, which turned out to be the most important fault of all, arose
from the fact that the fuse installed had not accounted for the fact we had had
a second solar panel installed. Ross quickly diagnosed the problems and
remedied all.
It was almost midday by the time we drove up to the Hornby mega-centre
and shopped, yet again, at the Mitre 10, this time for car seat covers. We
lunched there in the car park and then set off south, which had been our plan
some weeks ago when I thought we would be in Christchurch only long enough to
catch up with my nieces and check out Cathedral Square. Little did I know that
my husband would succumb to his window shopping desires and carry through with
the impulsive purchase of this wonderful new motor home. However …. I do hold on to the thought, in
scant hope to rationalise our craziness, that many leave the genuine intention
to upgrade or modernise until too late, and one dies, or they become too old to
enjoy the fruits of their labour. The way we are going, there is little chance
of that!!!
As we came south, we were detoured off the main south highway and
realised that a fatal accident that had apparently occurred was at the corner
we had used so often over the past few weeks, a difficult and busy merging into
the north bound traffic for Christchurch. Thank goodness it was not us; no
doubt we will learn the details of the horror in tomorrow’s Press.
We carried on south across the flat South Canterbury Plains, featureless
kilometres south of Christchurch and much less from Hornby.
We crossed the Rakaia River on New Zealand’s longest road bridge
approximately 1.75 kilometres long. The rail bridge that runs parallel also has
that same claim to fame as the longest rail bridge. The river is one of the
largest braided rivers in New Zealand, with a mean flow of 203 cubic metres per
second and a mean annual seven-day flow of 87 cubic metres per second. It rises
in the Southern Alps and travels for 150 kilometres to the sea.
We also crossed the Selwyn River to the north of this, which appeared
quite dry and the Asburton not much more. This latter divides the town of the
same name in two, once Ashburton and Tinwald to the south, but now all the one.
Chertsey lies about half way between the Rakaia River crossing and
Ashburton, once upon a time a vibrant rural settlement. I remembered that my
great grandmother Florence Mangham was born here in 1879. These days it has a
population of about 1920, and strikes the passer-by as a has-been sort of place.
When the Rakaia Bridge opened in 1873, the first European settlor took
up land, followed by the second three years later in 1876. The township was
surveyed and officially named Chertsey in 1877 (named Chertsey after a town in
Surrey, England which was Mr Brown’s hometown (the first settlors) and the
birthplace of his wife). It was also the year that saw the opening of the
Blacksmith Shop and the Chertsey Post Office. The following year the General
Store was opened and the first ploughing match. In 1879, the year of Florence’s
birth, the Chertsey School opened and the first Anglican Church year. Two years
later the Pudding Hill water race intake was built and the Domain board formed. That was the year my great great grandmother
Emma gave birth to and lost her third child. She suspect the state of the
irrigation system was not foremost in her mind. By the next year, when she gave
birth to her fourth, they had moved to Methven, further up the road.
Ashburton is sometimes regarded as a satellite town of Christchurch, a
fact that I suspect those in the town abhor. This rural centre has a population
of 19,500 with an additional 12,400 living in the wider community. After
Christchurch and Timaru, it is the third largest urban area in the Canterbury
Region. More latterly the town has been in the news for less than favourable
reasons; one of the many clients of Social Welfare, this one carrying grudges
and great weight upon his shoulders, decided to take matters into his own hands,
murdering two government officers and seriously wounding a third. We were
simply glad that our daughter was no longer working in this capacity, albeit in
a location far away but perhaps just as vulnerable to such lunatics.
Further south, we were intrigued to pass the construction of a large
factory, soon identified as Synlait,
and we registered that this was the Chinese owned milk producer. Competition is
good, we are all for it, but we could not help but remark in a most
disrespectful manner that the name of this company suggested synthetic milk,
and we remembered the melamine scandal some years ago. Yes, there is little
politically correct about us, and we bear no shame about that.
We were happy to find this quaint little spot for NZMCA campers, the
“office” an old fridge containing visitors book and magazines and books for
swap, and the faithful “iron maiden’ near the gate ready to receive our
offerings of $3 per person per night. It is true that the highway and rail are
not too far away, but the birds settling into their trees for the evening are
far noisier. The wind has dropped and the sun is still shining.
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