Nelson

Accents by the Park, our Nelson backpacker, was situated close to the center of town. So an easy walk down to the main street where there were several shops and restaurants. Friday morning we found a place for breakfast called Yaza. A little hippy-ish, but excellent food. While waiting for our ggs Benedict and pancakes to arrive to arrive, a newspaper headline caught my eye. A major earthquake had just occurred the evening before in Gisborn, just North of Hawke's Bay! Some people reported feeling the aftershocks all the way down in Christchurch, but we didn't feel a thing.

In the afternoon Amy and I decided to have a look around in the World of WearableArt & Collectible Cars Museum. It was a relatively small museum divided into two sections and we could take pictures of the collectible cars, but photos of the wearable art were prohibited. Which was a shame, because Amy and I were both fascinated to see what art people came up with to wear. There were "dresses" or pieces made out of anything from spoons,to paper to tampons! There was even a bizarre bra section with one of my favorite displays called the "Bee" Cup.

Nelson supposedly is one of the sunniest locations in the South Island, but the whole two days we were there it was cloudy with just a tinge of coldness in the air. But we decided to have a picnic lunch on the beach anyway. Our lunch consisted of kiwifruit-very appropriate, peanut butter and honey sandwiches and chippies!

After lunch we sped off in our Imprezza to Happy Valley Adventures for some quad-biking and the Skyline, a 3 km-long ride, 150 meters above the native forest. Just as we were strapping into our Skyline ride the sun came out and we got a beautiful view of the valley and ocean. After our thrilling ride over the valley we quad-biked up the mountain where there was some hot tea and biscuits waiting for us as we watched the sun set.