Neil Perry Dinner at Kauri Cliffs

The evening meal at Kauri Cliffs was a special event as top Australian chef Neil Perry and his team were over to cook.  The lodge has a dress policy for dinner which is unusual for NZ but nice to see all the men wearing jackets.





The room was set up with two long tables seating 20 each, so the room was a buzz with people talking.  Neil Perry explained the menu - all Italian cuisine, and the Italian wine matches that had been chosen by one of NZ's top wine distributors.





After a first course of various bruschetta, we were then served a beautiful dish of ham, parmesan and cabbage.







Third course was a seafood chilli risotto, this was cooked al dente, not to our usual taste, but still a very delicious dish with perfectly cooked paua, scallops and squid.




The main course was beautifully cooked lamb served with caponata and roast potatoes on the side.






Dessert was panna cotta with rhubarb, a lovely end to a fantastic dinner.

A Night of Luxury at Kauri Cliffs

We were lucky to be gifted a night at the stunning luxury lodge Kauri Cliffs up in Matauri Bay, Northland.  On arrival at the lodge, we were met by the American billionaire owner, his hotel manager and a valet to take our car and luggage.

We were firstly shown around the lodge, a beautifully decorated building, with lots of lounge rooms to relax in.






The views from the lodge across their world championship quality golf course to the sea were stunning.






We were then taken to our suite - accessed down a path through native bush.  The room was stunning, large walk in wardrobe and bathroom leading through to the bedroom/lounge.



The lounge had a gas fire to keep us warm and french doors out to the balcony and views over the golf course to the sea.






The lodge has several walks,so as we are not golfers we spent the afternoon exploring the grounds.  There are three private beaches, this one, Pink Beach is used in summer for BBQ dinners.





There is also a native forest with a kauri tree agd between 700 and 900 years old with a circumference of 9 meters.









The view from the 18th hole back up to the lodge and suites - ours was the fifth cottage down from the lodge.





The following morning we had a lovely sunrise to look out over from our room.

Takapuna Sunrises

As I am currently taking part in the Global Step Challenge of walking 10,000 steps a day, I have been making the most of my work location and walking on the beach each morning before work.  I have been lucky to see some stunning sunrises, here are some examples.

 

The Garden...A Work in Progress Vol 4

Today we ventured to a different nursery just to "look", which turned into us buying a car boot full of plants for the garden.  We also got a couple of ornaments - a ginger cat for the fence and a large ponga log for Charlie to scratch.

Amongst the new plants - canna lillies, nikau palm, flaxes, cabbage trees and horopito, all of which will grow to form our bush area.

The Grove

This afternoon we went into the city for our wedding anniversary. First stop was Brothers Beer, a new craft beer bar/shop in an up and coming new City Works development in the city.




In the evening we went to The Grove restaurant, regularly voted best in the country. We decided to splash out and have the 8 course degustation with matching wines. This was the second course a ballotine of crayfish in a tomato consomme.


The next course was a wagyu tartare and braised cheek, this was probably the favourite dish of the night.





This was one of the two main dishes, venison dish with earl grey ash, and a venison sausage roll. The other being john dory in saffron emulsion.




After the beautiful desserts, we were presented with a special plate by the waitress, which was a very nice touch.






After our 3 hour meal it was a short walk back to the Sky City Grand hotel. The Sky Tower was nicely illuminated on our return.

Brick Bay Sculpture Trail

This morning we travelled north to Snells Beach, to visit the Brick Bay Sculpture Trail.






The trail takes approximately an hour to complete, with various scultpures around the trail, as well as some unusual audio only pieces. Some sculptures like this one had an element of movement.



This brick sculpture of a corkscrew seemed very appropriate for a winery, in its position overlooking the vines.










There were a number of modern pieces around, including this neon sign, which was very strange to find in the middle of the bush.





We ended our trip at the cafe, having a beautiful platter and glass of Brick Bay wine overlooking the man made lake.

Orewa Estuary Walk

Today we finally found time to do the 7.5km circular estuary walk from our house to Orewa. It was a lovely day, warm and sunny, but with a cooling breeze.





Fortunately for us this coincided with the Hibiscus Coast Arts Fiesta, which was a very small event at the Estuary arts centre in Orewa. There were some really nice stalls, selling a variety of arts and crafts, and we managed to find several things that we liked.

 
After visiting the festival we completed the second half of the walk back home. It's a very popular walking/cycling track and we won't be leaving it as long before doing it again.

During the walk there were great views back over to the Millwater estate, and from this distance you can see all the new development taking place.