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Met up with Sarah (from home) and Olly for a day in Greymouth, went walking and let them cook us a complex meal (thanks S & O) !!! Drove up the West Coast in beautiful sunshine again, took a detour to Blackball to visit the Salami shop (NZ sausages are only good when not bought from the supermarket, we have now visited a number of gourmet sausage shops!) were impressed by Punakaiki and the pancake rocks (they rock) and blowholes, wandered over the longest swingbridge, got a go on the flying fox for child price...and then....decided to stay in Murchison. The middle of nowhere. And at around 6pm, Murchison decided to show us what its got and produced a 10 second long rumbling loud shakey earthquake. Wow. Bought a huge bag of kiwifruit for $2.
 
The last couple of days have also been brilliant...have been right up to the North of the South Island, staying in Takaka at a great hostel with free bread, free spa pool and some lovely people.  Barefoor backpackers if you ever stop by. Ran around the caves at Wharakiki beach, found a proper chocolate shop, collected shells on the beach and then stopped for mussels and garlic bread at the Mussel Inn on the way back to our temporary home. Met a boy who owns legwarmers. Worryingly, I have contracted some kind of lurgey in the form of red circles on my back. Been told to keep an eye on them, luckily I can twist my double jointed top half round and can see them myself so don't have to keep showing my back to complete strangers.
 
Back to the North Island on Wednesday...daylight ferry this time so might get to see some of the coastline rather than falling straight to sleep and then spending an uncomfortable night in the drivers seat of Jeremy. Thought the earthquake had made his only real asset pack up, the cd player wouldn't work! Luckily Liz is an expert at coaxing some sound out of it...would be nice if more than one speaker worked though! Actually, I think my car would have been pretty flash back in 1985...electric windows, sunroof, some special gadgets (function unknown), cruise control etc. It looks a little sad now, little bits of rust keep falling on Liz as we drive along, but he has mainly done his duty now. And he may well be the nicest car I will ever own. 
  
Got a new email address.   
 

posted by Katie @ 7/22/2004 02:24:00 am