South Island: Motueka
Some months before we left for New Zealand a fellow dropped
into the Nederland Visitors Center. We got to talking and I learned he was
from New Zealand. I mentioned our upcoming visit. He said that we might visit
him while we were there if everything worked out for us both. We emailed
back and forth and arranged to have dinner with him at his home in Motueka,
west of Nelson and just a short drive from the Abel Tasman National Park
and our second "Great Walk."
The four of us had a delicious and hearty dinner of
grilled venison from a deer he'd recently shot (Judy had greenlipped mussels,
of course). John is a policeman in the area and a sensational host. We swapped
stories, looked at pictures from his US-Canada trip, laughed, and watched
how much beer we had; he is, after all, a cop and drunk driving is an incredibly
serious crime in New Zealand.
We returned to our motel and packed for our three-day
trek on the Abel Tasman Coastal Track in the morning.
