Golden Bay, Greymouth, glaciers, and great big blobs of bird poo on my head. That makes 5 times now: birds 3, bats 2, Shane 0 - we were sat outside, enjoying a well deserved cup of coffee. The ironic thing is that Tony had offered me his seat due to the direction of the sun and my lack of a hat. He likened it to Pearl Harbour and a series of cluster bombs, and was very considerate in the way he didn't quite actually lose his coffee through his nose.
We recover from our trekking by spending a couple of nights in Pohara in Golden Bay. We found a lovely, homely little hostel - i love the feel of the place. It's pure chill, wine, beer, great food, and huge long beaches. Both of us would be happy to stay longer.
Our second stop is Greymouth, an 'historic' gold mining town - there's gold in them 'ere 'ills, or at least there was. Now there's a few tourists, a few sights like a gallery, a few walks, and of course Monteiths brewery and tour. We did the tour and it was actually very interesting and totally devoid of the hygiene measures of other tours I've been on. The last part is getting to taste their selection of 7 beers and then pouring our own pints until we quietly get told we'd better leave soon. There happened to be a leaving party on at the same time and so 'senior management' told us to stay and poured us another - what a great tour!
Greymouth isn't a bad place, but it lacks things to do. Its beaches aren't quite as accessible as other towns and it has hostel rooms from hell. well not that bad, but they "really oppressed Tony". Even with all the free beer, free pool and great Thai food, both of us were happy to leave.
Our next stop is somewhere I've been really looking forward to - Franz Joseph glacier and Fox Glacier. I'd planned to take a helicopter flight, but when it came to the crunch, or the chink of coins i decided the weather wasn't good enough and i couldn't justify the cost. We instead spent a couple of days hiking in the area, trying to decide which glacier we liked best and enjoying the serenity and views of the area.
The driving has simply been amazing, I love the fact that all the bridges, creeks, rivers etc are named. Trumper hollow, fanny creek, little trickle creek, windy point creek, lost at rugby creek, sore losers creek...
