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Monday, 24 December 2012

Day 9 - Akaroa continued.

Sunday December 23rd 2012
Weather - Started cool & cloudy but sunny & warm in afternoon

We took a tender boat ashore at approx 10.30am. Was a nice 20 minute ride into a gorgeous little town. There were lots of people there & unfortunately the local cafes & shops were trying to take advantage of visitors. One cafe had a sign up saying "Special for Diamond Princess Passengers - Fish, chips & a beer for $29". Not such a special in my opinion. Could have got the same for $12 in non tourist spots. Someone paid $5 for a local newspaper & local jewellery was probably twice the price it should have been. Consequently we went for a walk, tools lots of photos and headed back to the ship around 1pm.

After dropping our bags off in our stateroom we had lunch at the buffet, then went out on the aft deck to take some more photos. This really is a beautiful little harbour, just not equipped for 3,000 visitors all at once. I guess the locals are trying to cash in before they repair the dock at Littleton, near Christchurch, and the ships once again head there. Not sure when that will be as it is now 2 years since the Earthquake.

We had a little late afternoon nap, then opened a bottle of White Zinfandel wine and sipped it on the balcony whilst watching the last of the ships tenders return passengers before we sailed at about 6.30pm. After taking some more photos, we changed ready for dinner & headed up to look at the duty free jewellery sales on deck 7. Big mistake as I found a beautiful pearl necklace & earrings I had to have. Maybe they can be for Christmas from Santa :)

Off to The Savoy dining room again and we were seated with a wonderful group of people. 1 couple from the UK, another from the US & 2 couples from Aust (including us). It was Italian night so we worked our way through 4 courses of Italian specialities, with lots of wine flowing. Then we all had a glass of Lemon-cello with our sorbet. We ended up being almost the last group to leave around 10.30pm. Lots of cultural comparisons took place & jokes exchanged. For the first time we decided to forgo any further entertainment and headed back to our stateroom. Quite enough alcohol for one day!

Tomorrow we dock around 7am in Wellington so I want to have this ready to upload when we go ashore.

Goodnight all!





















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