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radio silence, again
Tomorrow we head out on another trek, this one five days on the Heaphy Track, so I'll be offline for a while.
From Anakiwa we caught a ride to Havelock on the mail van, which was actually kind of cool. Adam runs a company which contracts with NZ Post to do the rural route between Picton and Havelock; he carries mail, packages, and occasionally passengers like us. He was happy to chitchat with us as he ran his route, and even detoured off to an overlook so we could get a great view of Havelock and its harbor. Interestingly, although in the US mail vehicles have opposite-drive (i.e., most cars are left-hand drive but post vans are right-hand drive) in NZ the vans are the same, which means that Adam had to dart across the road periodically to get to the mailboxes. He said there has been some discussion about making mail vans left-hand drive - and he'd like that, as it would be far safer for him - but that nothing has been done as of yet. In NZ one needs a special license to operate an opposite-drive vehicle, so it's a hassle for him to do it on his own unless the postal service sanctions it.
Havelock turned out to be not only the Greenshell Mussel (tm) Capital of NZ, but also the Physics Capital of NZ, as both Ernest Rutherford (who should be a familiar name, as he won the Nobel Prize) and William Pickering (who might not be a familar name, but he was president of JPL for a time and involved in spaceflight stuff) are claimed more-or-less as hometown boys, according to a monument in the tiny downtown. This amused me so much I needed to phone my parents to tell them, as my father's a physicist. And after talking to them, we did indeed eat mussels (very very good). We also strolled through the marina and looked at boats, a habit of ours ever since our sailboat days.
From Havelock we caught a bus to Nelson, which is a laid-back California kind of town with more American accents than we've heard total since coming to NZ. Our hostel was right on Trafalgar Square, at the head of the little downtown - a really nice place called Accents on the Park, run by a guy named Royce who seemed to have more energy than six ordinary people. There was even a bar and restaurant in the basement; we cooked our own dinner in the adjacent kitchen, then brought it into the bar where we got beer to go with it. Then for dessert, they had an awesome chocolate cake, with whipped cream and ice cream, for only $NZ 5 - that's about $2.75, a great deal, and tasty to boot.
In Nelson we did chores: laundry, grocery shopping, and arranging things for the next few days. Then, this morning we caught a bus for the Kiwi Kayaks base in Abel Tasman National Park for a half day of sea kayaking up to a beach called Watering Cove, followed by a hike through the park back to the base in the afternoon. Our kayak guide was a fellow from Scotland named Holly. Lots of fun, but it started raining lightly and we hiked back in the rain.
Ok, running out of time, will post this now!
ETA: Abel Tasman photos
From Anakiwa we caught a ride to Havelock on the mail van, which was actually kind of cool. Adam runs a company which contracts with NZ Post to do the rural route between Picton and Havelock; he carries mail, packages, and occasionally passengers like us. He was happy to chitchat with us as he ran his route, and even detoured off to an overlook so we could get a great view of Havelock and its harbor. Interestingly, although in the US mail vehicles have opposite-drive (i.e., most cars are left-hand drive but post vans are right-hand drive) in NZ the vans are the same, which means that Adam had to dart across the road periodically to get to the mailboxes. He said there has been some discussion about making mail vans left-hand drive - and he'd like that, as it would be far safer for him - but that nothing has been done as of yet. In NZ one needs a special license to operate an opposite-drive vehicle, so it's a hassle for him to do it on his own unless the postal service sanctions it.
Havelock turned out to be not only the Greenshell Mussel (tm) Capital of NZ, but also the Physics Capital of NZ, as both Ernest Rutherford (who should be a familiar name, as he won the Nobel Prize) and William Pickering (who might not be a familar name, but he was president of JPL for a time and involved in spaceflight stuff) are claimed more-or-less as hometown boys, according to a monument in the tiny downtown. This amused me so much I needed to phone my parents to tell them, as my father's a physicist. And after talking to them, we did indeed eat mussels (very very good). We also strolled through the marina and looked at boats, a habit of ours ever since our sailboat days.
From Havelock we caught a bus to Nelson, which is a laid-back California kind of town with more American accents than we've heard total since coming to NZ. Our hostel was right on Trafalgar Square, at the head of the little downtown - a really nice place called Accents on the Park, run by a guy named Royce who seemed to have more energy than six ordinary people. There was even a bar and restaurant in the basement; we cooked our own dinner in the adjacent kitchen, then brought it into the bar where we got beer to go with it. Then for dessert, they had an awesome chocolate cake, with whipped cream and ice cream, for only $NZ 5 - that's about $2.75, a great deal, and tasty to boot.
In Nelson we did chores: laundry, grocery shopping, and arranging things for the next few days. Then, this morning we caught a bus for the Kiwi Kayaks base in Abel Tasman National Park for a half day of sea kayaking up to a beach called Watering Cove, followed by a hike through the park back to the base in the afternoon. Our kayak guide was a fellow from Scotland named Holly. Lots of fun, but it started raining lightly and we hiked back in the rain.
Ok, running out of time, will post this now!
ETA: Abel Tasman photos