Top 10 camping - Kaikoura

When taking the van to the garage, he told us he could fit the new alternator the following morning but advised us in the mean time not to drive far as the battery could fail on us at any time, instead he suggested the campsite across the road, that way if it wouldn't start he'd come across. This was a top of the range campsite called 'Top 10' (same as the 'BIG4' in Australia). We hadn't stayed on one of these 5* sites but it was a great excuse to so we booked in straight away. A winter offer they had at the moment was that when you booked on you got a free spa session (half an hour in a private outdoor hot tub). It was really cold outside but the water was toasty, in fact we ended up spending most of the time sitting on the edge of it with only our feet dangling in to try to cool off a bit. This was really wonderful to be this warm and looking up at the snow capped mountains.
As with most campsites, this one had a communal kitchen so we got to work on preparing a huge winter stew that would see us through a good few days. Whilst in the kitchen we met a lovely English couple, Jon and Lois, who had just come from Canada where they had got their snowboarding instructors qualifications and were here to work on the Kaikoura ski resort but with the snow being very late this year they were still waiting for the call to say they could start. We also met an Aussie retired couple who were leaving for home the next day. It turned out we had been pretty close to where they lived on our trip and we spent much time talking about Australia. They left us a big bag of food that they hadn't used on their holiday and gave us their details and insisted we visit them if we come back to Australia. They have offered us both their farm house at the bottom of their garden and a shack in Tasmania. Typical lovely Aussies!
Jon and Lois, had over heard much of our conversation and said they thought they were one step off asking to adopt us. We told them that it just seemed to be the Australian way.
We spent the evening in the 'TV Room' watching films on the movie channel, on a huge flat screen TV, but not before John insisted we watch the 'US Open', which I actually quite enjoyed.
The next day we seemed to adopt a cat. Whilst the van was getting fixed, we were homeless so we hung around the campsite during the morning. I was sitting on a wooden step in the sun writing a few blogs when a little cat kept trying to sit on my lap. I'm not normally a cat person but this one was so cute. The campsite clearner saw we took a liking to it and asked if we wanted it as she was a stray but had hung around the campsite since it was a kitten. If we had lived here we'd have adopted it in a second but unfortunately I'm not sure I'd get through customs with her in my bag.
Leaving the campsite we found out that they had another winter deal on; stay 2 night and get a third free! We decided we would return to the basic site for 5 nights (whilst the surf was good)and then return for the 3 night deal.