English Red Roses on Tour
Our Red Rose tourists began their epic journey to New Zealand ahead of England's first pool clash against Argentina and will now follow the knockout stages, hoping that England will make it to the bitter end!
Margaret Gibson, tour manager for our Red Rose Tour, talks below about the group's first three weeks in New Zealand.
"After a long flight over from the UK everyone was very happy to be welcomed at Auckland airport by Gareth 'Cooch' Chilcott and to have him join us on the final leg to Dunedin. Our three visits to Dunedin are now over and, as I write, we are heading to Auckland for the final showdown against the Scots.
"Dunedin was a lovely little town and everybody enjoyed it but when we left I think everyone was hoping we were heading to some warmer weather up north. The stadium was extremely impressive – the performance of the England team less so – especially against Georgia. Thank goodness they put on a better show against Romania. Of the four sweepstakes we had to guess the scores (one for the New Zealand v France game), two of them were won by the only non-English member of the group, Chris Plat!
"We were all good tourists and most people did all the sights you could possibly do. One of our party even raced a 20 year old Argentinean half way up the world's steepest street - the 20 year old came off far worse than our older Red Rose man.
"We had a great day out to the Otago peninsula and to the Moeraki boulders with a very memorable lunch at Fleur's Place, a great fish restaurant in a gorgeous setting that is highly rated by Rick Stein, in fact he apparently said that if he had to choose just one place to visit in New Zealand it would be Fleur’s Place.
"In between our first two Dunedin games we enjoyed a fantastic trip up to Blenheim – one of the quietest towns we have been to. We tried to do a pub crawl one night and had to abandon it – all the pubs were closing due to lack of customers! Whilst here, our fabulous day out in the vineyards of Marlborough made for some very memorable wine tasting and lunch at Wither Hills. One of the vineyards had installed some rugby posts and you could win a bottle of wine if you kicked the ball over the posts – two of our party tried but with no luck.
"The one thing that everyone is commenting on is that wherever you go in New Zealand, from big pubs in the cities to tiny little cafes in rural villages, everyone has embraced Rugby World Cup 2011 so enthusiastically. They all have the flags flying and are all so friendly and welcoming and they just can't wait to start talking rugby with us – it's great.
"The ferry crossing from Picton to Wellington was a highlight of the trip, especially being in the VIP lounge. Cooch spent most of the trip asleep and we all have the photos to prove it. We really enjoyed our visit to Wellington – the sights, the shops, the pubs and the restaurants were just wonderful.
"Queenstown was where we spent the time between the second and third Dunedin games. We travelled by coach there and back using slightly different routes each time. Being the adventure capital of New Zealand, the group were instructed to participate in at least one adrenalin producing activity and show me the photos to prove it. On the coach back from Queenstown, Cooch handed out some awards, one for the most adventurous – a bungee jump by John Willcox, one for the second most adventurous – hang gliding by Phil Buksh, one to the person who drank the most happy hour cocktails – Geoff Page – one for the slowest person on the luge down from the gondola – Mike Wood. Apparently he was overtaken by a ten year old child wearing a ‘My Little Pony’ t-shirt! As proof of her adrenaline producing activity Pat Silk showed me a photo of herself going down the slide in the kiddies playground – not really acceptable.
"Finally we left Dunedin for the last time and headed north to the Bay of Islands, what a beautiful spot. We stayed over in Paihia but all got the ferry over to Russell and had a drink in the lovely old Duke of Marlborough Hotel. Again everyone got involved in all the activities – lots of walking, sailing, and day trips – I managed to convince seven people to come sailing with me but forgot that it was a BYO boat (with my reputation for wine drinking I cant believe I could forget that!) so we had a ‘dry’ sail. Needless to say we got off the boat and sped to the nearest bar and got stuck into the local wine.
"It was good to meet up with some of the other Gullivers groups in the hotel (the Welsh Red Dragons and the Scottish Thistles) and on one grey evening we got together and had a fun pub quiz with Cooch as quizmaster. It was a battle of the ‘Three Nations’ which was finally won by a Welsh team closely followed by one of the Red Rose English teams. An inquest was demanded but fortunately all the answer sheets had been destroyed immediately after the quiz and the result had to be accepted by all parties.
"Despite the fact that we didn’t have the greatest weather, we all loved the Bay of Islands just as much as we have enjoyed all the other parts of this stunningly beautiful country.
Now for Auckland and the big game against our 'Auld' rivals!"
For more on our RWC 2011 tours, listen to Cooch's phlogs, visit our Facebook page to see photos and please visit our website again for more news and updates.