A parcel addressed to "Kay and Philip, on a farm, situated up a long drive with cows, opposite Cust pub or thereabouts" has reached its intended recipient, despite the couple actually living about 15 minutes' drive from the pub.
Rather than returning the unusually labelled package to its sender, the Postie delivered it to a service station in the North Canterbury village of Cust, which has a population of 450.
Hoping to find its rightful owner staff at the service station uploaded a photo of the package to its Facebook page. The post was shared 2000 times and was spotted by a friend of Kay Worthington who knew straight away it was meant for her and tagged her.
Worthington, who lives on a farm in nearby Fernside with her husband, Philip, told the Herald she rang the Cust Service Centre after she saw the Facebook post on Wednesday morning.
"It wasn't a parcel I was expecting at all and I had no idea when I rang them who it was from or what was in it."
The sender, Irene Meekings, who is in her late 70s and lives in a rest home in Christchurch, had written her name on the back.
"Once the lady at the Cust Service Centre gave me the name I just put two and two together," said Worthington.
Meekings is almost blind and had come to the Worthingtons' home for a meal a couple of times while visiting her daughter-in-law who lives in Cust.
Despite her poor vision, Meekings sews and enjoys making clothes and accessories for people.
She wanted to send Worthington a gift but didn't know her address and so wrote down the directions as she remembered them from the drive to the farm from her daughter-in-law's.
"She just got her distances a bit mixed up because we live in Fernside," Worthington said.
She described Meekings as "a lovely old lady". "She's quite a quirky person."
Inside the parcel, which Philip picked up later on Wednesday, was a peg apron and a tablecloth.
"First of all a bit surprised then chuffed that it had got here and got to us and then a bit of that 'it could only happen in New Zealand' reaction," said Worthington.
She had received phone calls and Facebook messages about what had happened and was surprised by the reaction the Facebook post had received.
"I guess it just reinforces that rural New Zealand is a small place - the two degrees of separation."
Worthington is yet to speak to Meekings, but their friend, Meekings' daughter-in-law, Rachel Macdonald, had talked to her and relayed her response.
"I think the words [she said] were 'Irene's absolutely stoked' it had got to us and a little bit embarrassed to be a hit on the interweb."
