Chilling

When our car died six years ago, aged 20, we scrapped it. Since then, I hire a car the very few times I need one and always go for the most basic. So it's been fun driving my brother's and finding out about the clever sorts of things they can do now, like tell you how many kilometres there are left in the tank.

When I left Rotorua this morning I knew I could reach Taupo easily and was bound to find petrol/gas on the way. As I drove onto the new Taupo by-pass without having found any I saw a sign saying 'Next gas 130km'. What! I guess I take for granted that I live in the most crowded part of a densely populated country and I suddenly realised how sparsely populated New Zealand is. The clever car said I had 126km left, so I turned round and headed into town. Which was fine but why, when I found a petrol/gas station, did I find three all together?

I've now reached Napier which, after it was destroyed in an earthquake in 1931, was rebuilt art deco style. It oozes relaxation. Tomorrow happens to be the bginning of an art deco weekend and this evening I kept coming across vintage cars and women in delightful frocks.

I was quite pleased to find this as I've found it much, much harder to take pictures of people since I left Myanmar.