My views do not necessarily reflect the views of my employer.
Napier was so hard to get to! The first time we went, it was cancelled because of weather. It was a shuttle port, so it took longer to get off the ship, and we had to go back earlier to make sure to catch the shuttle, and on top of that, we often had drills. One day I was off in Napier, but but by the time the drill was over, there wasn’t enough time to go out before I would have to come back again. So I sat out on deck 11 forward, looking out at the rows of logs in the shipyard, talking to my mom on the phone.
Before I got my contract on the Golden Princess, my mom had planned a trip to New Zealand. She would be hanging out for a couple of months, but only two days lined up where we would be in the same place at the same time (although she did have to plan a road trip in order to meet me in Tauranga, which I’ll tell you about later). So the day my mom was in town, I told everyone I was meeting my mom so I could get as much time as possible off the ship. We had another drill in the morning that really felt like it lasted forever, then I handed off my radio, slipped out and headed for the shuttle. My mom and Ron Voyage (her honey) told me to ask the shuttle driver to drop me off at the gate. The lady on the pier said that wasn’t allowed, but when I got on the shuttle, the bus driver winked at me. At the gate, she drove around the corner and dropped me off. So much drama! My mom didn’t have a New Zealand SIM card, so I didn’t have a way to message an update. It turns out that the town was only about 5 minutes away, so we would have found each other eventually, but we didn’t have time to waste! We only had a couple of hours before I had to catch the shuttle back!
We drove through the little Art Deco town on the way to Antoinette’s house. I’d heard so much about Antoinette, but I hadn’t met her. She and her late husband had met my mom and Ron Voyage on a ship years ago and they all hit it off. They cruised together, meeting up in various places around the world, and my mom and Ron had come to stay at Antoinette’s house in Napier several times. My mom loves this house and she was excited to show it to me. After the tour (practically every room looked out over the ocean) we went for a walk that looped by a place where we could see the ship.
When we got back my mom made me lunch. I was so tired of the mass produced ship food, that the homemade spaghetti with vegetables tasted better than it had ever tasted. Antoinette opened a bottle of wine that she had been saving for a special occasion and we sipped as we looked out at crashing waves. It was like getting to go home for a couple of hours on the other side of the world.
The next time I had a day off in Napier, my mom and Ron were on the Sea Princess, but Antoinette was still in town. They had finally moved the drill to another port, so I was able to get off the ship much earlier. I skipped the drama of a secret drop off and took the shuttle all the way into town.
Napier was setting up for a special holiday– the Art Deco Festival to celebrate the time period that inspired the design of the town. Antoinette dressed appropriately.
There happened to be a Maori ceremony at 9am. As we sipped our flat whites (the only way to drink coffee in New Zealand) I told Antoinette that we had a Maori Ambassador who would come on board from Melbourne to Port Chalmers (the first 3 days at sea). He did a lot of presentations about Maori culture for the guests, but I hadn’t seen any of them because I was always entertaining in another venue (or napping — I had so much to do it was hard to be aware of what other people were doing without me). I’d even missed his presentation for the crew because I had been covering the activities, and thus missed the Maori festival on the ship because they needed someone to do carpet bowls, and I’d only gotten a peek of the haka.
The teenage boys assembled in front of the dome and did a couple of hakas. Then the white men approached from the other side in ceremony– representing how the white people had come to a land inhabited by natives. We couldn’t really hear anything, so we stayed long enough to get the idea and then slip away. I loved getting that little taste.
We walked out to the beach on the way back to Antoinette’s car. We set off and drove through the countryside where we visited a couple of wineries (you know how much I love wineries). At the first stop we had the place all to ourselves, and got into a great conversation with the girl who worked there. I saw the flavored vinegar for sale on the shelf that my mom had gifted me. I bought a bottle for Lauren’s going away dinner that week, and Antoinette stocked up her wine cabinet. The second stop was in an old church. The man who poured the wine there was such a character.
On the way back to the ship we had a little extra time so we stopped and ran some errands in town that Antoinette hadn’t had time to do before. We had such a great day that we planned to get together again on my next New Zealand run. The schedule wasn’t out yet, but I would do my best to be off in Napier. The Corona Virus ended up ruining those plans, so I will just have to treasure the days we were able to spend together.