Dispatch from Nelson, Friday April 29

If you’d like to check your maps, Nelson is on the northern coast of the south island of New Zealand, just west of Picton, where we landed by ferry from the north island yesterday.
Speaking of yesterday, it was not particularly exciting—just one of those traveling days. We took our rather sad leave from Kopua Southern Star Monastery just after breakfast. The monks there were so kind, welcoming, and, at the same time, committed to their life of prayer and hospitality. Both Nikko, the Guest Master, and Brian the Abbot bid us a warm farewell. Now that we will be “on the road’ again we will certainly miss the feeling of having a community to call home, if even for a week.
Today was the very first overcast and rainy day of our whole trip so far, but still, the New Zealand landscape takes on a different charm with monstrous clouds and foggy valleys. We drove down to Wellington, turned in our rented car, and boarded a large ferry bound for Picton on the south island. The crossing took about 3 hours, part of which we slept on some very comfortable couches in the lounge. We were warned that the crossing could be quite rough, but the seas tossed up only three or four foot swells today, so the gentle rolling of the ferry put us to sleep instead of making us sick. We also spent some time on deck, of course, especially to watch as we entered the long passage into Marlborough Sound into Picton. The sound is very narrow, and green, tree-covered hill rise straight up from the water’s edge. The only distraction was the smell of diesel from the ships stacks and of a huge truckload of sheep on the deck below.
On landing our rental car company was right next to the dock. The rental cars here tend to be older (the ones we’ve used so far have had at least 80,000 miles). The age sometimes shows. Our last car gradually lost all electrical window controls but one, and smelled, according to Jeanne, like a bordello. Our new one (another Corolla) has just as many miles, but is much cleaner, and has good old crank windows. They are a bit underpowered for the mountains. We tend to go from 100 Km per hour (the speed limit here) down to about 75 on a climb with the accelerator on the floor. But Jeanne thinks that’s just fine.
We headed straight from Picton to Nelson, about an hour and half trip over two very steep and curvy mountain passes, Since it was raining and misty, we couldn’t see much, but it was an exciting drive under the conditions. We were driving down one side of a mountain range around curves as slow as 30 Km per hour in deep dusk and fog when we out of the mist emerged a biker with no headlight. We’ve noticed there is a deep lust for dangerous activities among new Zealanders. One of our guidebooks describes Queensland, to the south, as a town where if you want something to “scare the crap out of you, you’ll find it here.”
We stopped overnight in Nelson because it was dark, and we had seen an interesting “Backpacker” hotel or hostel in our well-thumbed “Lonely Planet” guidebook. A word about “Backpackers.” This particular kind of accommodation seems to be missing in the US, but every little town has one here in New Zealand. They are usually big older homes, sometimes older motels. Most of them, outside the big cities at least, are fairly small having a 12 to 24 beds. The rooms tend to be of two kinds, the dorm style—a big room with bunks or single beds, and single or double rooms, which we always choose (we’re too old for dorming it). In some places there are combination rooms for just about any kind group or relationship you can think of. A few have “en suite” bathrooms, but most involve a walk down the hall, which at my age, rising almost every night for some relief, can be interesting. We’re usually the oldest guests, and the other guests, mostly traveling students, look on us with kindly curiosity, as though their parents just arrived. Backpackers are relatively cheap, about $35 US, and have a kitchen with some sort of breakfast and coffee, or you make your own, which we usually do anyway, since the typical breakfast consists of cocoa puffs and white bread. This morning a French girl spread out four huge chunks of bread and spread them with Nutella (for those of you who have never met this European delight, it’s basically chocolate and hazelnut butter, with more chocolate than nuts). Of course, the Kiwis and Aussies carry their jar of Vegamite or Marmite, which they swear is not only good for you, but just plain good. For our part, we’ve discovered a thick yogurt drink with honey that tastes wonderful on a bowl of granola, plus a boiled egg, which we carry with us in a handy little collapsible cooler.
The “Backpacker” we stayed at last night was fittingly called the Palace, an old Victorian house with spectacular woodwork on a hillside. I’m sitting now on a large wrap-around porch overlooking the city and the harbor bay off in the distance. The sun is shining again on the hills surrounding the city and on the bay in the distance, and we’re ready to hit the road again in search of some surprise that will draw us out of the car onto some trail or into some little town. The destination tonight is Westport, on the west coast. We intend this to be the northern starting point of our journey southward along the coast, which we’ve been told is the most scenic part of all, the stuff the “Lord of the Rings is made of. The only problem is that rain is being predicted there for a few more days, which will obscure the mountains and put a damper on our sight-seeing.