26/2 - From Kaikoura we drove to Nelson (right at the top of the South island and the central point of NZ), via Picton, the ferry port. At the hostel we treated ourselves to the backpackers special...a roast dinner! We also treated ourselves to a load of red wine that wasn't on any special but decided we had saved money on dinner so it was ok. Eating a roast after 2 months away was heaven (but don't worry Mum's.. it doesn't rival yours).
The next day we chose (yes, chose) to do a hike through Abel Tasman National park, which was absolutely stunning. To get to it you have to take a boat to a bay and on the way we were lucky enough to have the parks only dolphin swim along with us. We did the walk pretty quickly (shocking behaviour...all the Inca trail training clearly paid off?!), so took an early boat back and headed to the pub to rewarwd oursevles. Lucklily we met 2 girls with had a very similar idea - Emily and Gee. the mutual love of the pub sparked a beautiful friendship and we've travelled the whole of NZ with them.

28/2 From Nelson, our bus took us down the west coast of the South Island which is a really pretty drive. However by this time we had met more people (Hello Joel, Hello Kat!), so spent more time chatting than taking in the scenery. The drive also involved games to get to know each other. these included the bus driver swapping over everyone's tickets so we had to clamber around the bus and over the seats looking for the owner as the bus was moving, and the 'pretzel game' which concisted of us passing a pretzel from person to person via a matchstick in our mouths. this all equated to serious bonding (and probably some heavy telling off by the police if they drove by).
Our first stop along the coast was Westport: a pretty ugly town with nothing to do whatsoever. So, to counteract this we had a massive 3 legged bar crawl. We decided to go 'for one or two' but somwhow ended up at a club at 2am in the morning confused as to how it had happened and accosting locals for free pizza. When we say club, we actually mean a place that looks like someone's lounge, a bar stuck in it and a 'dj' who was some girl with a laptop playing Beyonce on repeat. Good stuff. i became a speedy 3 legged person and won a race, sophie decided her latest life plan was to be a dancer for beyonce, gee became in charge of european relations by improving communications with the belgian population and emily helped carry a drunk danish girl out of the club. Britain has never looked better.

29/2 - Time to leave Westport (thank god, the locals hated us all) and head to lake Mahinapua, further down the west coast. We soon fell out with our driver who sent us off on a 'short' walk round the cliffs. An hour later we were still staggering about on some cliff top, cursing our driver who told us it would help us feel better. It did not. The Kiwi experience seems to like these walks, which seem a convenient way of making sure no-one throws up on the bus. We're not such fans. The scenery is lovely though!
After surviving the stroll/killer hike, we got back on the bus to Greymouth where we got fancy dress costumes for the 'Poo Party' at a pub along the coast, run by the legendary Les. At 83, he is NZ's oldest publican. he also cooks an awesome steak dinner and venison stew and serves very cheap wine. Our costumes were stylish dressed made out of bin liners (trying to save money...), deugned by fashion student Joel. Along with some glow worms, a garden, a chocolate bar and a Kinder play centre (there really was no theme), our room headed to the bar for happy hour prices. Around 100 people our age + very cheap drink + a small pub = absolute carnage. Our dresses held up pretty well for a while, but at one point I was greeted with miss hoyle staggering over to me with 2 jugs of snakebite 'it's dead cheap siany, dead cheap', wearing half a dress, denim shorts and a cowboy hot. 5 minutes later, Emily came over, lifting her chocolate dress off, declaring she was going for a nap. gee was alseep in a corridor in her sleeping bag (her glow worm costume). I spent half the night on the floor (all my flip flops fault). I'm not quite sure what happened.
At around 3 another compulsory walk was thrown upon us. This time it was in the pitch black (by this we mean absolutely no light, not even a torch, only a small light that my phone provided), and involved walking to a Lake. We had no light and no idea what was going on...we never did fine the lake ( the next day we drove past it and were about 10m away...you live and you learn). My flip flops decided to break completely during this midnight jaunt, sending me to the ground with Sophie landing on top of me. We were rescued by a boy called Tarquin who was applying to bristol to do History but seemed pretty scared when he learnt that not only had we done that course, we had actually managed to graduate from it. I think he was really starting to question his choice when he had to pull soph out of a ditch she had fallen into.
Eventually we got back to the pub, only to realise we had forgotten to rent the duvets needed for the cold rooms. Error. Turns out you can't rent them at 3am in the morning so we had put up with the 'warmth' of our sleeping bag liners. Unfortunately we were hardly warmed up by freezing cold showers the next morning. You really do live and learn....
SJ x