Once in a {few} thousand nights

On Saturday we got away. By we, I mean Mark and I, for the first time without the kids to have some time just 'us'.  It was pretty special, as this was a night that had been seven years in the making!

It was only made possible because of the extreme generosity of our good friends Jackie and Heidi who not only shouted us the night away (our birthday present), but also came and looked after the kids so it could actually happen. How blessed to have friends like these!

We headed off about 2.30pm over the Rimutaka Hill, and our first stop at Martinborough for a wine tasting or two at Palliser Wines. We got there quite late and there was only fifteen minutes till the wine cellar was officially closed. But that didn't stop our host (a lovely lady but holy moly could she talk!) chatting to us for the next half an hour as we pretty much went through tasting their entire wine selection and bought a bottle of Palliser Reisling to take on with us.

Enjoyed seeing the canvases of all the different years of Toast Martinborough hanging in the Palliser Wines hallway too.

After the country drive back along countless straight roads where we enjoyed the fact that over the hill Wellington looked stormy whilst we were bathed in sunshine, we arrived at The White Swan in Greytown just before 5pm, and settled into The George - our suite for the night. The boutique hotel has about 10 different themed suites, and ours was very English - ooh aah. We felt we could have been in a swanky hotel in central London, were it not for the obvious rustic country town we could still see outside the window.

With an hour to kill till dinner, we sat down and did something that we could never do at home at 5pm, watch an adults movie (the latest James Bond movie - Skyfall) and eat gourmet chocolates from Bohemein - ha ha!

We stopped the movie at 6pm so we could head down for our 3-course meal that was included in the night away, entrees of chicken liver pate and crostini for Mark, scallops for me. We both chose the twice-baked pork belly for mains, and then Mark ate the cappucino mousse while I had a pecan tart.

I know it'll sound a bit unpatriotic as the All Blacks v France first test match was on in the bar in the hotel, but we headed back up to the room to watch the rest of Skyfall whilst enjoying the special bottle of Johanneshof dessert wine that I'd been given for Mothers Day.

I remember lying in bed at 10pm and saying to Mark that I doubted I'd ever get to sleep as the noise from the people outside the bar downstairs and the odd car zooming up and down the main street was pretty loud, and Mark agreed, so much so that he decided to stay up and watch the British Lions game against Queensland. I on the other hand, fell fast asleep and the next thing I knew it was 7am - this is unheard of!

No 5.30am wake up calls from Mylo to 'come and wipe my bottom'. No middle of the night little people creeping up the stairs to tell us 'my covers have fallen off the bed and you need to fix them'. Bliss.

We lay in bed, dozing and surfing our phones (the 21st century version of lying in bed reading the newspaper - ha ha !) before finally getting out of bed at 9am.

After a walk up and down the main street searching for a good breakfast venue, we chose the Main Street Deli. In hindsight, not the best choice of the bunch as Mark's mocha and corn fritters were pretty average, although the carrot cake I had was delish, but hey it couldn't mar what had been a lovely night away.

On our way back to the car we found The Lolly Jar - a traditional lolly shop where you can choose from a massive array of jars laid out on tables, so we enjoyed walking up and down the rows finding treats for the boys and Jackie and Heidi buying them a little bag of treats each.

We drove back over the hill to grey skies and drizzle but to reports of how awesome the boys had been for Jackie and Heidi who hadn't heard a peep out of them until 6.30am. I'm sure the fact they got the new Skylanders Giants game to play on, a new Where's Wally book, and some new felt pens for drawing (that's what they are usually found doing between 5.30-6.30am these days!) helped make it an amazing experience for them too.

Grateful for great friends and for the opportunity to have some rare and uninterrupted couple time! With any luck it won't have to be another seven years before we get the opportunity to do it again!


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