June 20, 2017 - Hokitika and Greymouth

I’m awake at 3:45, which is eight hours of sleep!  I have time to stretch and shower and finish yesterday’s post before Marilyn wakes up.  We’re watching the news.  Sort of wish we didn’t know what was going on; the only good thing is we don’t have to watch footage featuring the Great Pumpkin.  There is a discussion on the TV about the sports reporter never wearing a suit.  Mostly they seem to agree that it makes him more believable!

There’s TV ad for men’s underwear, which protects the “twigs and berries”.  Breakfast is the lovely smokey cheese on toast! WE clean up the kitchen, grab our bags and head out of town.  We stop for gas and the attendant gives us directions to a lake in which we should be able to see Mount Cook.  As we’re driving, though, we decide the mist is not going to allow that, so we settle for a shot that we’ve been searching for, for days. We want sheep in the foreground and the glorious mountains as the backdrop.

Lots of mist today!

Sometimes the driving conditions are like a white out in the snow!

Mission accomplished we’re on the road again.  We do get to see Mount Cook along the way and it’s glorious raising it’s snowy head above everything else!

This little guy was trying to make a break for it!

We find our way to the West Coast Tree Top Walk which is a raised walkway through the trees (as you might expect) and includes a tower with a spiral staircase that rises about thirty feet in the air.  It allows us to see to the Tasman Sea and overlooks the oldest plants to be found in New Zealand, lush, amazing fern trees.

Along the walk we encounter a birder who tells us that he’s just returned from a trip to south Georgia, off the Faulklands, where has up close and personal with several hundred thousand king penguins!!  Interestingly enough, he says he thinks Trump hasn’t been given much of a chance yet!

We spend a frustrating few moments trying to capture the illusive fantail, who flits and flutters in unpredictable ways, while catching insects from the air.

We’re burning daylight and still have to get to Hokitika for shopping!  It is the jade-carving capital of New Zealand.  It’s called greenstone here and is a variety of jade called nephrite.  The first shop we go into is pretty commercial but the ladies are very friendly and we wind up knowing way too much about their kids and where they live!  We’ve promised ourselves not to buy at the first place we see, so we walk down the street and discover a hidden gem!  This little unassuming shop is filled with hand-carved jade, bone, and wood.  Each piece has been made by either the father, sister, or cousin of the Maori woman who is minding the store.  The pieces are all gorgeous and lower priced than the retailer down the street!  We find almost everything we’re looking forward and only have to return to the first place for something that was sold out of “our” store.  It’s winter and the carvers aren’t producing much during the off season.

Shopping accomplished we find a place for, well, it’s too late for lunch and, according to the bartender, too early for dinner.  They have bar snacks and that can work!  It’s called Stumpers and had been recommended to us.  Our basket includes chicken tenders, pork wontons, samosas, spring rolls, onion rings, wedges, and fries.  We each order a salad and split the snacks.  And I finally have a New Zealand beer!  It’s a Speight’s Summit lager.

We just have time to walk the couple of blocks to the beach and catch the sunset!  We meet some Brits who have come to New Zealand for the rugby matches!  One of them was trying to photo bomb us!  They are three couples who have been gone from the UK for six weeks!

We also get interviewed by some college kids, who are doing a study of tourism on the West Coast.  All good fun!

Caroline is the proprietor of the best shop in Hokitika!

It’s not too far to our next stop and we set off in the sunset’s afterglow.  We’re heading for the Brunnerton Lodge and Backpackers.  It should be easy to find.  It’s not.  The description and address make it appear that it will be right off the main road.  In fact it is actually more than eight kilometers off the main road!  It turns out to be in an old pub, and after two phone calls the owner turns on the pub sign, which is really just a small beer sign, and we gratefully pull into the dark parking area.

John is an earnest and funny man;  he just doesn’t quite have it all together yet.  He has kindly upgraded us to an ensuite and we have a ton of room;  but it’s quite cold when we arrive.  But the beds have electric blankets and that’s quite cozy, once they get cranking.  The bigger problem is that there isn’t enough toilet paper;  and by the time we realize we need to ask for towels it is late and cold and we don’t care any more! 

While we’re settling in John tells us that he had planned to run the pub and lodge together but the locals were all drunks who didn’t want other people in their “local”, didn’t want to pay full price, and expected him to work seventeen hours a day!  He gave up the pub.  It appears that he has a son about eight and a daughter about five who live here with him.  I hope he has another source of income!!