Wow, we've been travelling a lot over the last few days and reliable computers have been scarce. Our last day in Nelson was spent on the beach with SPF 15. Apparently the hole in the ozone layer is above Australia and New Zealand so even if the sun doesn't feel very hot, it's super intense! Beate and I got sooooooo much sun! I guess that's why it was so hard to find SPF 15--almost everything is above 30! We are definitely tan now though!
We left the next day which was Thursday morning on a bus to Greymouth. Greymouth has a population of about 10,000 people and other than Monteith's Brewery, there really isn't anything there. We did the brewery tour the first night and we were able to taste 7 beers and pour our own! Then they took us to a BBQ which was included in the price and we were given a free pint of Monteith's! I'm not joking when I say ALL of the beers were fantastic! We wrote in the guest book "Better than Mac's!" It was really fun and definitely well worth the $25.
We stayed at the Global Village Backpackers in Greymouth which ended up being the best backpackers yet! They even had matching dishes! The kitchen had 4 stoves and 3 fridges and they had a big screen TV with tons of movies to watch as well as bikes that you could just take for a ride. When we were checking in Beate signed us in and said, "Dennis is here!" He had signed it right before us and we couldn't believe that he was staying at the same place! We didn't run into him until later that night, but he was totally surprised too!
Friday in Greymouth we just decided to hang out and do laundry and go to the supermarket. The weather in the morning wasn't all that great and it was nice to have a relaxing day. We made friends with a Dutch girl and then met up with her later at the Irish Bar in town for a few drinks. We met a lot of people in Greymouth and since we left, we've seen them all again in Franz Josef or now in Queenstown.
Saturday morning we left and went to Franz Josef which is a super tiny town about 2/3rds of the way down the West Coast on the South Island. It's famous for it's glacier. We stayed at a place called "Chateau Franz" for the night and as we checked in they gave us a free shot voucher and then proceeded to tell us that if we showed our key at the same bar we would get even more free drinks/drink specials all night! So that day we took a shuttle up to the glacier and did some small walks around the area and took pictures of it. We didn't go up onto the glacier (not super interested...I've been on one before), but we at least got to see it even if we were completely freezing and soaking wet by the time we got back. That night we met back up with Dennis and went to the Blue Ice Bar (I think that's what it was called) and had some pizza. Within a half an hour or so every other backpacker in town showed up for the drink specials too! It was fun to chat with everyone. I even met a guy from Couer D'Alene! (Idaho for all you AZ folks)
So we left Franz Josef this morning at 8am and took the bus to Queenstown. We didn't arrive here until about 4:15pm because of all of the stops we made! Every single hour we stopped! We're staying at a place called "The Resort Lodge" which is a bit grundgy but, whatever. We've decided to stay five nights so we can really see and do everything! It's totally a resort town and seems like a blast! We've done some exploring and found that there are a ton of people in town and a bunch of great looking cafes and shops as well as a number of outdoor activities we can do! I'm super excited to check it out!
I'll try and get the rest of the pictures up as soon as I can. For some reason we're having trouble finding internet cafe's that have computers with USB ports. I'll try and update more often!
-Lisa
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