Yesterday is HERE


Saturday 17 March . How not to do St Patricks Day

I will be honest, today turned out pretty crappy and I have been putting off writing it up.

When we got back I did wonder whether to even write this trip/day at all (or ever go away again, drama queen ? moi? Never ! )

But after a couple of months I have decided to man up and move on - or even woman up, if such a thing exists.

Sigh, these things happen - we are all human. But my God, if you have a blessed plan then sometimes you really should stick to it.
Safe to say I am never doing St Patricks Day in Dunedin again.

Ever.
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Ever.


Ah well, here we go ...

As we had now emptied one of the cases of the food we had brought with us, I set about packing the shopping from yesterday.

I wasn’t sure if there would be enough room and it was now going to cost £80 if we wanted to add an extra case - so any more shopping needed to be a real bargain to justify that cost !

We had all agreed last night the plan for today was to go to Dunedin around lunchtime and leave early before it got too busy. .

See that, we ALL agreed to leave early. As in, LEAVE EARLY.

Our hosts had some things to do that morning so we took ourselves across the road to get breakfast at Kekes

We couldn't decide between the breakfast and lunch menus



I went for loaded home fries and apple cinnamon stuffed toast



it was absolutely delicious

Andy went for a cheeseburger





We got an Uber to Dunedin for 1245 ready to enjoy the St Patricks Day festival



It was packed out



We started in the Stirling Wine bar which was still quiet



And that was ok for a while -


But after a couple of hours of sitting in the smoking section in the shade on a glorious day. I was getting a bit fed up It wasn’t quite what I had imagined doing and I will admit to starting with the Judy Moody’s. It just wasn’t my idea of a fun day out.


There was a temporary change of scene mooching around the shops



but then it was back to the same spot at the bar and that’s when it went downhill.

The agreed plan of going back early had gone out the window and there was now no plan for dinner

Everywhere had huge lines, the toilets were just getting bleurgh and the current best bet was shepherds pie from a stall that had a queue a mile long



Have to say, childish strop moment, I didn’t come all the way to Florida to blimmin queue for a Shepherds Pie .

When asked what I wanted to do, I kinda put my foot down and said I wanted to get away from all the crowds, go back and eat somewhere nicer LIKE WE HAD AGREED . We had one night left after tonight and this just wasn't turning into a fab end to the holiday.

I know that did put Andy in a spot as the others now wanted to stay and I wanted to go. But I had been asked, so I gave my opinion that this just wasn't going to cut it for the rest of the day.



It was probably around 6 now and that didn’t feel like it was going to be such a bad idea

But it was.

We agreed to split - they would stay and we would go back.

Andy and I set off along the coast road thinking it would be quieter to pick up an Uber but we couldn’t find any wifi so there was now some moaning about having to activate the roaming on the phone.

Then there was moaning that that there were no Ubers available .

I went into several buildings that looked like apartment blocks and hotels hoping there might be a reception who could help us get a cab but no such luck.

It was a 3 mile walk along the coast to Clearwater and to be honest, I would have carried on but things were definitely not going well so after a spat about what a brilliant idea this was (not), we turned around and headed back to the centre of town.

It was just rammed everywhere and were both in a really bad mood by now.

I even asked some of the local police for ideas on where we could pick up a cab as Andy appeared to have lost all capability of doing anything other than reminding me it was my terrible idea to leave.

We reached the far end of the town and I tried to call a cab but as I was doing so we just had the worst row - it was so loud we ended up screaming at each other - partly to be heard and partly because we were just both so hacked off.

I would quite happily have gone off on my own - except being completely sober I did realise that was a very bad idea as I had no way to get home.

Anyhow, for a few minutes , we were THAT couple hollering at each other and in that moment I just had enough of it all, being stuck in a stupid town with no taxi rank, with a party of people that just wanted to drink themselves stupid, with no plans for dinner and no clue how to get home.

It really was getting ugly people.
Not happy campers !

It had been over two hours now since we tried to leave so we walked ( stomped in my case) all the way back through the town to catch up with the others in a marina bar which was heaving and an hours wait for food.

The evening continued to go from bad to worse and by now I had decided I never wanted to come here again.


Finally, an Uber became available and after a pretty excruciating ride home we got back about 10. I could have kissed the amazing Uber driver David for getting us back but that would have been completely inappropriate folks ! He is my hero - David - love ya dude .

I went straight to bed, completely fizzing while the others ate the Chinese from yesterday.

Always find the positive, I say to people - so here it is

There was a nice sunset ...



And the holiday Forecast for tomorrow - A Chilly start with a slow thaw !

Oh Amanda I feel for you! Jim and I have been 'that' couple many times . Do I need to remind you of our humongous family row that happened last year? . If it's any consolation I'm with you on this one, that didn't look like fun. I hate crowds of overly drunk people, I would have just wanted to go and find somewhere quiet for food too!
On a positive note, Keke's - drool! Dunedin looks like a charming town, without all the people
I really hope your last day is better!

Was wondering if you would post this Amanda, sounds awful for you. It would be my idea of hell too, people drinking just for the sake of it and getting louder and louder, totally have my sympathies, much better to have a couple of drinks then go for a nice civilised meal.

At least you've written it down now and it's out of the way, onwards and upwards! Thank you for sharing it.

Angela x

Well done for posting this.not All our holidays are sweetness and light and we have all had variations on the day where everything went t##ts up 😖

Oh Amanda - not a good day for you. Not my idea of fun either

I hope the last day was better.

Oh bless you. I would have behaved exactly the same as you for what it's worth. My DH is never the first to leave a party whereas I am usually a show your face and leave kind of girl so I have been in your poisition so often.

We are definitely opposites and most of the time it works just fine. However when we put the moody teens in the mix on holiday to ramp up the general tensons there is usually at least one spat a day and always one spectacularly childish row per trip. Last time ours was in Captiva. Here we were in an island paradise at a lovely resort and DH was storming off back to our room with me yelling lots of 'compliments' after him. We had a rather refined multicultural audienice and we both got Gold for team GB in the Toddler Tantrum event that day. Sometimes frustration just takes over all sensibilities 😤. (Simply, there was nothing to do but relax and he was bored out of his head after 24 hours - he hated the place but I thought it was gorgeous!). Awful at the time but you just have to move on. No beach stay this trip though.

Anyway, St P was half a day out of your lovely trip so it will hopefully have rebalanced in your memory outweighed by all the great days you had. Hoping the last day truly makes up for it and you get that relaxing dinner with a mighty fine cocktail xxx😡😣

Oh dear these things happen , sounds like a situation to rub anyone up the wrong way. I hope things were better when you slept on it.

I had assumed the gap between posting was because you were busy with your new job, or perhaps more excitingly planning a new trip for us to drool over. What a shame this day didn't quite work out (bit of an understatement there).

As others have said we all have these spats ... DH and myself had a gritted teeth and particularly mean argument in the Wave restaurant at the Contemporary. We were arguing about the kids (who were sitting at the table with us, so it must have been spectacularly horrid for them). There was another row in a pizza restaurant while on holiday last year. I'm not sure why ours always tend to be in a restaurant, perhaps it's the end of the day and we're all a bit tired from the day and we end up picking a fight?

Anyway, I hope you are able to remember the rest of the trip with fondness.

Ah you make me feel better and yes I do remember your humongous row It all started so well. I mean I like a cocktail or two but this was taking the mickey and not the mouse

Ah bless you. Yep. It’s done now. We live to plan a better day I know it’s hardly a drama in the scheme of things but not our finest holiday moment

Ha ha, thank you. Perfect summary there !

Yes it was better thank you. I just hate “wasted days” especially on short trips

You try so hard to have perfect days but these moments just sneak up on you don’t they ! At the time it’s all drama and then later it’s like what was that all about. Although I must confess this one simmered for a bit room 101 for this one though I think

Thank you x Yes we made the best out of our remaining time . And we won’t repeat this again !

Ah bless you, I am busy but loving it
I didn’t want to be all drama about this when hey, we are lucky enough to get away at all, but OMG this day totally grated on me for weeks afterwards Every time I wrote it I got all cross again and deleted it

Food features in our rows too. If I don’t know when I am eating I do get quite snippy And this day I wasn’t drinking so wasn’t quite getting the party spirit either. Crikey what an old curmudgeon :

But then I was asked what I wanted to do ...

Lol, best not go there again