Nelson was the start of our journey down on the East Coast. Westport is an interesting place. It felt a bit like a ghost town. It reminded me very much of Quorn in Australia only bigger. It rained a bit which didn't help endear the place to me. I went for a run as there wasn't much else to do in our afternoon off. It was a good run but the rain left me with a horrible dry cough which lasted 10 days! In the evening we had a 'bus bonding' 3 legged race. Due to numbers I had to be in a four legged team, nevertheless we still won. Jaegerbombs were the prize! I'm getting quite good at these now! Then we played 3 legged pool, hillarious, especially after the jaegerbombs. This turned out to be one of the best evenings.

Following day we continued down the East Coast to Lake Mahinapua, on the way we went through Greymouth. Greymouth has lost 7 people to the mining accident and this day they were having a memorial. Usually we would have stopped here but for obvious reasons we continued through. We just had one night at Lake Mahinapua. We stayed at the God awful Lake Mahinapua Hotel (pronounced maa-he-naa-poo-a) affectionally known as the Poo Bar! Hmm.... it smelt horrible. The beds in the dorms sagged so much they were more like hammocks, the bar ceiling was clad in 100's of baseball caps and the entire place felt like it needed a good airing and spring clean. Our host was the delightful Les. An old guy with long grey hair and very long beard. He is featured in the Kiwi Experience magazine, and when we met him he was still wearing the same clothes!! As there was not a lot to do here, the hotel is in the middle of nowhere, we had a fancy dress party... carrier bags being the theme. It's a pity we had a good night the night before as you really need to have a few drinks at the poo bar to be able to make the most of it. Anyway, nearly everyone did get into the spirit of things and had a go at dressing up. There was a good incentive, the winner got a Canyon swing at Queenstown.

The next day, which couldn't come quick enough for a few of us, we headed on down to Franz Joseph. The east coast is very much like the outback of Australia, all a bit bizaare. We stopped off at a very weird cafe, which specialises in making pies out of road kill, possums mainly. They also are very involved in deer stalking, with a helicopter. We paid $2 and watched a quite disturbing video on how they hunt deer, jumping out to the helicopter and literally wresltling the animals to the ground, then tying them up by the feet and hauling them by high up in the sky by the chopper and relocating them at their farm. sometimes dangling 2 or 3 deer at the same time.

There are 2 types of possums in New Zealand, round ones and flat ones!