It's A Mission At The Mission!

The Mission Winery Summer picnic concert is a world famous (in Hawkes Bay). A well attended, annual outdoor concert in Napier. This year rocking Rod Stewart is playing for the second time to around 25 000 of us.

The ritual is simple, get a group of friends together, pack a picnic, toss a coin who is the designated driver and get to the concert in plenty of time to grap a good spot on the grass and proceed to eat wonderful food, drink lovely Hawkes Bay wine and socialise with other picnickers around you. Things look picturesque at 5 pm when the supporting acts are playing. By 10 pm when the actual concert is over things are a little less attractive. Picture slippery sloping grass, too much wine and beer consumed, trying to pack everything up and rummage over bottles, tarps, and other rubbish in the dark and finding your way out with the other 25 000 patrons doing the same thing. The ambulance staff are always kept busy with strained ankles and the other injuries that occur when people mass and drink too much alcohol. Don’t get me wrong it is a fun night and one we go to most years.

Not my cheese.

That Sushi looks nice!

First problem is I am full of a cold and the last thing I feel like to baking and preparing home grown food for a self-sufficient picnic. I wonder what woman did in the olden days when they were sick and didn’t feel like killing and plucking that chicken for dinner or digging potatoes or baking bread and cooking stews over a fire. They could'nt just go to bed after having baked beans on toast, like we do?

I scramble some home grown food together and make sure it is carefully packed with the food bought from the gourmet food store. You guessed right, Chris is not playing the game tonight.

At the concert while my friends and people around us are enjoying pate, fresh buns, ham and all manner of gourmet bought food, I am nibbling on home baked bread, homemade fresh feta, basil leaves  and tomato. Not bad, but not great!

When you are not feeling well and people around you are enjoying wine and beautiful food, living off the land kind of sucks. Very proud of myself though as I didn’t slip up and make a grap for some fresh white bread and pate’ or the bacon and egg pie sitting next to me. Won’t lie and say I didn’t want to though. Sometimes living off the land gives you "missing out feelings".