Canterbury's Eastern Bay residents have been left reeling after this week's storm, which caused widespread damage to their properties.
Many in the area are now facing Christmas isolated on their land, with no way out.
With the sun out for the first time in over a week, it's all hands on deck to fly in crucial supplies for those most in need.
"We've got bread and milk and fresh fruit and vegetables for the different families that are isolated," one volunteer says.
The Akaroa Bays Lions Club is coordinating the efforts with locals on the ground.
"We're just helping out trying to get some food parcels to the families that are stranded," Akaroa Lions Club member Charl Chaney says.
They've been left stranded and isolated after parts of Banks Peninsula was hit with five times the month's average rain in one day, washing away roads and turning others into raging rivers.
"Up to 400ml of rain that is falling on the Eastern Bays here and there's just slips and carnage everywhere," Chaney says.
It's isolated many of the rural families who live here who are just taking it one day at a time.
"We just got down the road from our house and I was just blown away - just our road had gone, there were huge slips and I just it felt really overwhelming - like I felt like we couldn't even get out a few hundred metres from the house and then you get down to the sheep yards and it's just flat fences, no fences," farmer Harriet Chapman says.
The damage is expected to take many months to repair.
"It's been a really tough couple of years for everyone and now you just look ahead to next year and you're already feeling tired, it's not like there's any relief now," Chapman says.
"The uncertainty is probably the thing at the moment, just uncertain when power's going to get back on, I've been told it's going to be Monday afternoon, Tuesday," Gough's Bay farmer George Masefield adds.
But with Christmas just a week away, they're planning to take a day off the cleanup to come together.
"Christmas is on hold at this stage," Masefield says.
"All things going well we're going to have motorbike access out for everyone by the end of next week which is yeah Christmas Eve, it could be a good Christmas present."
And if that doesn't happen it'll certainly be a Christmas full of peace for these families.
