My birthday started with breakfast in bed and some pressies, including a parcel from the UK which had a very convoluted journey to the camper van and which involved numerous secret phone calls to DHL, my recruiter (Annie), Annie’s cousin, Annie’s cousin’s secretary, Alex, and of course Julie who it was from. Needless to say, I felt very very spoilt 🙂 I felt even more spoilt when I returned to the van to find it filled with balloons and a cake with candles. I think Alex nearly passed out trying to blow the 10 balloons up in the five minutes I’d been gone! All of that meant that I wasn’t too disappointed when our heli-hike planned for later that day was cancelled because of the rubbish weather. Instead we decided to move on further up the coast to Hokitika. We went on a short walk to a gorge there and for a treat we spent the night at a campsite with a spa and, after a run across the car park (the showers weren’t hot in the spa block) had our first hot shower in several days due to Queenie Simon not having one (we’re not admitting to how long it had been!).
