The West Coast is the Best Host!

Another day, another dream in Ol' Royale.  This weekend: The west coast towards New Zealand's biggest Wild Foods Festival located in Hokitika.  For this trip the body count amounted to four, but quickly jumped to six after picking up a couple of kiwi hitchhikers who, coincidentally, were students from our university heading to, you guessed it, Hokitika.  They had a sparkle in their eyes and a few cases of beer, so we let them in.  We were in good company heading west, as it seemed the whole of New Zealand was heading in that particular direction.  Those who didn't quite make it were also in good company, as I couldn't count on both hands how many stranded, broken down cars couldn't quite handle the slopes and turns of the mountain roads.  The cars behind us seemed to snake around the curves behind us like an army of ants toward a food source - Ol' Royale slowing the hungry heathens back on the two-lane highway, or, leading the way as we prefer to put it. 

We spent the night in a campsite with just about everyone we know thus far so it seemed.  We boiled our brats in some beer and washed them down with the rest next to our makeshift parking lot fire.  A few of us decided to rest under the stars for the night, and after some incessant 'moo-ing' on my part we were soon the object of unbroken attention for the neighboring cows and bulls.  It's a bit disturbing, looking back, how easily we were able to catch any shut-eye with ten wide-eyed 1100 lb. beasts staring at us. 

After last week's shenanigans, and Ryan still a hand short, we decided to take it easy this weekend and head up the coast rather than hang around what would be more appropriately called "Wild Drunks Festival".  So we did, we took the relaxing drive north up to Punakaiki where there are some really fascinating 'blowholes' at high tide and limestone formations.  For those geologists out there, the picture above is of Punakaiki's 'Pancake Rocks', which is a single band of Oligocene limestone roughly 50 meters thick.  This layering of limestone is separated by softer, thin, mud-rich layers.  Because the mud-rich layer is weaker, it erodes more quickly due to wind, rain, and salt spray which gives the limestone this 'pancake' formation.  This type of layering is called Stylobedding and is still debated among experts, although it is agreed that it is a secondary feature caused by compaction.  (Would be great destination on a Winter Term trip, Dr. Mills!) In any case, cool rocks, great scenery!

We continued north and took a small, unmapped road to the ocean, and stumbled upon a large, seemingly private beach.  After moping around on the rocks for a bit and picking out a couple of cool book-stops, we decided to camp on the bank that overlooked this secluded and indescribably beautiful beach that seemed to extend forever into the ocean mist.  The pictures capture what we did there, and some of the beauty;  I pranced around in my underwear for a while, took numerous pictures of boys just being boys, built a fire and found some old tires up near the farm for seating, heated up some ravioli for dinner, and let the night consume us until we couldn't keep our eyes open any longer.  The white noise of the surf sang us to sleep like a lullaby to exhausted children, and we awoke to the sunrise.  We fried up some taters and eggs next to the water, constantly having to move further up-shore to escape the rising tide, cleaned up our mess, went for a quick dip and hit the road toward Christchurch.  

We picked up another couple of hitchhikers along the way, and luckily our worldly German knew how to speak French because this loving Swiss couple couldn't speak a lick of English.  Like any good ride home, stops were many and close between, including another beach stop in Westport and a short waterfall hike in some random park.  We pulled in at sunset.  

They say that the study abroad experience is what YOU make of it, but NZ is really doing its part to take some of the weight off of my shoulders...