Golden Oldies in Golden Bay (Sep. 24 – 27)

Terminology note: during our visit at Chris and Martin’s, Martin off-handedly referred to Linda and Don as our “oldies”, and for better or worse the term caught on with Becky and I. L&D haven’t seemed to mind much, so that’s good, but we enjoy it so much that we’d probably use it either way, we might just be more circumspect in our usage. With that in mind…

From the Sounds we took the oldies to Nelson, which is generally sunny, but wasn’t exactly cooperating for our day there. While in Nelson, we didn’t seem to get heaps of input on activities for the day, and so we took it pretty easy after our long hike the day before. I did take the opportunity to highjack our trip for a little while for a beer-related activity, diverting us to Founder’s Park for a mug at the brewery in the afternoon. I’ll cop to that being a danger of traveling with me. Otherwise, we took it easy in Nelson, enjoying the free-but-glacially slow internet at our hostel and playing cards.

Hot "tubs" by the stream at the Innlet

On the next day we headed out to Golden Bay, the hippie-rific rural beach area north of Nelson. You may recall our earlier visit to Golden Bay, where we stayed at a really cruisey Buddhist-inspired hostel, Shambhala. Unfortunately Shambhala was still closed for the low season this time, but Golden Bay seems to have good hostels all over the place, and we found one, The Innlet, and had it to ourselves for two nights. That’s the beauty of traveling in off-peak seasons here, and it’s tough to beat.

Hardhats are required for the tour at Ngarua Cave

Though the weather didn’t cooperate much of the time in Golden Bay, we were able to make the best of it, stopping at Ngarua Caves, a cool limestone cave formation with a tour guide who was a dead ringer for Albert Finney. We also stopped at a farm zoo/eel attraction that was highly recommended by Chris and one of Becky’s convention center workmates. It was surprisingly fun to feed eels pieces of raw meat, but Becky really got a kick out of feeding a little pig that followed us around the park – he looked so much like her sister’s dog that she began to call him Mickey as well. We also got out on Wharariki Beach that day and were able to find seal pups there again, but had to hurry and wade back to the beach before the tide got too high that afternoon.

Feeding the eels mince (otherwise known as ground beef) at the farm

Andrew suspiciously eyes the llama, who we called "Snarfy"

Becky makes friends with Mickey's swine doppelganger downunder

The next day we took a guided tour out on the Farewell Spit, Golden Bay’s unique sand formation that stretches towards the North Island. The Spit is basically a long sandbar extending from the tip of the South Island, and is formed from sand that is washed down rivers on the country’s West coast and subsequently carried by the strong northward current along the coast. It finally makes its way to the Spit, where it accumulates in a largely straight line, now about 24km in length. The Spit is a strongly protected environmental area, and the only way to get to the end is on a guided tour. Becky seemed to regret not taking the tour last time we were in GB, so I suspect we went there because of her as much as Linda or Don, but it was really good so no complaints by anyone.

The amazing upclose view of the gannet colony at Farewell Spit

Much like our tour on the North Island’s 90-Mile Beach, the Spit tour was an interesting drive down a dune-filled beach to a scenic lighthouse. Luckily, our tour this time was much smaller (only 6 of us), and our tour guide, an enthusiastic German, Kersten, was heaps better than our Cape Reinga driver, who prattled on for over an hour on the gory details of the local fishing competition. The highlight of a tour of the Spit is the gannet colony at the end, which is the only known one in the world not perched on a cliff. The gannets are a beautiful and colorful bird, and being able to get really close to a huge group of them was worth the ride and cost.

The Farewell Spit lighthouse

Of course no visit to GB is complete without a pilgrimage to the Mussel Inn, home to NZ’s most out-of-the-way, and some might say best, brewpubs. We can heartily recommend the mussel chowder with a Captain Cooker manuka beer to wash it down. We were fortunate to arrive when we did, as it had only re-opened for the spring the week before, having been closed for about six weeks in the winter. Driving around to various attractions we found out that to be the case for more than a few places, so good timing Linda and Don!

On our next and last day in GB we went out sea kayaking in the northern part of the Abel Tasman National Park. We’d been to Abel Tasman our last time in GB, where we did a hike and sail excursion, but again Becky seemed to regret not doing the kayaking. Since Linda is a keen kayaker back home she was keen to kayak in NZ, though she wasn’t so sure of doing it in the sea as compared to a placid lake. In the end it turned out to be a great kayak though, with sunny weather and generally calm seas around Tata Beach, where we put in. We got a few hours to paddle around rocky islands containing shag colonies, and saw a few seals to boot. The shags are another cool bird to see, but you definitely don’t want to get too close to them, as they seem to be more than happy to poop on you. Judging from the stench around the island, it’s not something you want to wear.

Andrew avoiding the shags while kayaking in Abel Tasman National Park

Alas, after 4 days our time at GB was up, but despite the bad weather on several days, this visit only cemented its status as one of our favorite places in NZ. You stay cruisey, Golden Bay.

Sunshine and Laughs in Nelson (Feb. 13-15)

Having been in NZ about a month by now, all we keep hearing from people, whether they’re Kiwis or foreigners, is that we need to get to the South Island, as that’s where all the good stuff, especially scenery, is located. In our experience, we have to say that the North Island has hardly been an ordeal, nor hard on the eyes. However, given that the S. Island is given to colder temperatures than the N. Island is in the coming months, and there are certain things you can do there only in summer and fall, we gotta admit that it makes sense to get there sooner rather than later. Though we’ll be in NZ until December, NZ seems to get a relatively late summer, so this will be the only true summer we’ll get here. Best to live it up while you can.

In that spirit, we took the Interislander ferry from Wellington to Picton. Though the ferry takes you from the N. to S. Island, it’s actually an east to west trip, as Wellington is located a bit north of Picton. That blew our minds, briefly; you are encouraged to look it up as well. In rough weather, the crossing can be among the roughest in the world, but on the day we made the trip, it was “flat as”, and we had a smooth ride. It’s a neat ride, as the ferry approaches Picton through a narrow channel between some of the thousands of islands that make up the Marlborough Sounds region of the S. Island. Unfortunately, Becky had the camera that day, so no pictures. Perhaps on our way back.

After a quick visit to tiny Picton, we were on our way to Nelson, home of our next Couchsurfing host, Andrew, who came recommended to us by our last Couchsurfer, George. Andrew is quite a remarkable guy himself, as he is part Maori, and has had a host of interesting and varied jobs over the past few decades. As the first person we’ve really conversed with who was part Maori, we’ve had some interesting chats with him too. It’s been a really good Couchsurfing experience, meeting someone who comes from a different cultural background.

Our host, Andrew

From our conversations with him, we’ve gathered that he’s been a policeman, carver of Maori artifacts, security consultant, and now works as a student advisor at an institute in Nelson. It’s quite a resume, and he’s a really interesting guy to talk to. You can tell that he’s a really thoughtful person who’s given thought to his beliefs and what he says. There’s a bit of intensity to him too, but he’s a really good-natured guy who’s also generous, as he couldn’t have been nicer in sharing his house with us and allowing us to come and go as we needed. He even offered to let us use his house over the weekend while he was away in Christchurch, but we had already booked a sailing trip in Abel Tasman, or we would’ve probably taken the offer. After a bunch of weeks of travel, it’s really nice to be able to stay at one place for awhile, especially if you can do it without having to stay in a hostel. Thus we dig the Couchsurfing and wwoofing.

The Christchurch Cathedral in Nelson

A funny thing in Nelson has been that we’ve again managed to run into Suzanne, a Danish Couchsurfer who was surfing Matt and Stu’s couch in Whangarei in the Northland at the same time we were several weeks ago. We were also in Paihia at the same time and ran into her there, and apparently she was at the same hostel in Rotorua at about the same time we were there, but we didn’t see her there somehow. We didn’t really plan to run into her all these times, NZ Couchsurfing just isn’t a huge world, I guess. We’ve spent a bunch of time with her, and have gotten on with her quite well, and she took us to her laughing yoga session at a house in Nelson one night.

Enjoying some time at Andrew's with Suzanne

Laughing yoga is an interesting experience. Following the maxim that laughter is the best
medicine and that preventive medicine is better, laughing yoga practitioners basically make themselves laugh in large groups in a variety of exercises. It’s a bit odd, especially at first, but once people get into the swing of it, the ‘fake laughter’ tends to make you actually laugh, and it kind of goes from there. We did it for about a half hour, and as Suzanne would say, it was good fun. Like most yoga, it did make us feel better afterwards, and although I probably wouldn’t do it on a regular basis, it was an interesting experience. According to Suzanne, Denmark has a number of laughing clubs, and that she started one in Greenland for several months when she was there. I couldn’t possibly make this kind of thing up.

As for Nelson, we’ve really liked it here. It’s a good-sized town with a nice downtown area of shops and restaurants, is on the beach, has a good energy, and most importantly, seems to be the small brewery capital of NZ! Seriously, we’ve seen more microbreweries in Nelson than anywhere on the N. Island. Not sure what it is that attracts the microbrew-types here, but there must be something, as we visited several small brewery operations while we’ve been here. One of the original NZ microbreweries, MacCashin’s (now known as Mac’s) started in Nelson, so perhaps that explains it.

Enjoying a beer at Founder's Brewery

Our favorite was Lighthouse Brewery, where Dick, the owner/brewer/one-man show poured us several pints gratis on Friday morning, the day we left Nelson to visit Golden Bay and Farewell Spit. Probably the coolest part of Lighthouse was the small vehicle that Dick equips with kegs for festivals and such, pulling up to his site and dispensing beers from the trunk. Even better, I was able to score a pint glass, so all was right in the world that day. With bellies full of beer, we pulled out of Nelson, bound northward.

The "wee" van at Lighthouse Brewery