Wilderness Lodge Lake Moeraki Hokitika

... larger outlets.

I have to say the west coast scenery is beautiful and I particularly enjoyed my trip to see the Pancake Rocks at Punakaiki – they are unique and I was glad to have taken the minor detour and put up with the hairpin bends to get there

Well folks that’s me for now just over a week in South Island, the weather is glorious and my fettle is good – next stop Franz Josef Glacier

PS: also by popular demand a photo of the cardie!

... at all. Being the chickens that we are (Martijn isn't the only one that dislikes bridges that sway when you walk across them), we wanted to first SEE the bridge and THEN determine whether we were going to cross it. So we gave this a total miss and drove onwards. Oh, and the fact that the place was filled with sandflies didn't help either... We were having a relaxing day, but those little pests made us RUN for the car ;) The reason we ...

... and, of course, more seals. You can go whale watching from there and are virtually guaranteed to see them as they have a resident pod. There are also pods of dolphins - each of which has between 100 and a 1000 dolphins. That must be some sight and will be another visit in the NZ autumn, when you also see the migrating whales. One of the highlights for Lyn was seeing lots of Pohutakawa trees (NZ own ...

... and a sharp sense of humour. He lives in Christchurch with his girlfriend, Fen. We spent the evening catching up over a couple of bottles of Monteiths black and the winter ale (which they aren't even brewing any more). The next few days involved some restaurant trips, me meeting up wth people I had known from the Stray bus as they arrived into town a few buses back, including Bagginz, my first driver. On the Saturday we went out - about 12 of us ...

... outlet ...) just so we had a picture of where we were, but it was phooey so we went back to the hostel. It was a bit miserable really and the other people in our dorm were very noisy when they got in late and drunk ... We don't like being in dorms, but we need to do it a few times so we can save some money to do nice things! Anyway, we got out own back because mummy set her alarm for 6.30 and we certainly didn't try to be quiet when we got up!

... at. Our room was fantastic - big enough to be able to actually live in - two bedrooms - a huge big lounge, eating area etc and a kitchen. We also had our own spa bath! After a rest, we made our way to the supermarket and bought rations. It was lovely to sit in our motel and look out the huge panoramic windows towards the snow capped peaks. Out to sea, dark clouds gathered.

... as the English Army sent them to the wrong beach and they got blown up. Not good. In Westport we went to a small art gallery and met an artist from London who has been living here for years. We talked to him for ages and checked out a lot of his art work. He had a really cute dog! He had some really good work. After we left Westport we drove through Punakaiki and stopped to watch the sunset at Pancake ...