So, we left you last week a bit achey after our snowboarding experience. We spent the next couple of days chilling out inQueenstown - climbed a big hill, ( not Cecil Peak, which our friend Cecil climbed when he was there!) and crucially we went to see the Simpson's movie. This was very funny, esp from a tiny cinema eating sweets bought from the British Candy Shop! Queenstown is very beautiful but choc full of tourists, our hostel was full of those too cool for school types whose popularity was gauged on who spoke the loudest or had their laptop music on first! The last night we were there they were baking pastry penises... that should say it all!

So our next stop was Fox Glacier where we stayed in a nice hostel with big screen, so were able to catch our fave show - What About Brian? - It rained, rained and rained some more.... and when it cleared up Evan went on a half day hike up Fox Glacier. I didn't... as i've done thath before and never before have my hands been so cold... so I did a little walk and a drive instead...

Evan will undoubtedly tell you about the glacier, and there are lots of photos of him looking like Shackleton in the snow.

After Fox Glacier, we headed up north for a night in Hokitika where we stayed at Birdsong hostel, this was very chilled and we searched for jade on the beach, and ended up with some jade and lots of greenish pebbles... hmmm

Next stop Nelson for one night only - weather gorgeous and tour of the Op Shops and health food stories, then on Wednesday morning we arrived at the Reiter household in the Motueka Valley. The Reiter's in residence at the moment are Ulrike, Oliver (12) and Anita (9) where Bernd and Christine (16) are back in Germany for the winter/summer. They live in an amazing house which they built themselves, it it powered by solar panels, and by 12 watt batteries. We eat a lovely lunch from the vege patch with homebaked bread every day, Evan has been hacking up gorse and I have been working with Oliver on his piano practice, and his schoolwork. We have also been playin LOTS of dice games! The weather has been lovely til today, so no scrattling at ticklepenny corner for Evan, instead lots of cracking of the hazelnut harvest and some cleaning. Oliver also interviewed us about our journey for his school project. We're having a lovely time here and Oliver is helping me write this blog - very helpful with the maps!

see you all later....