23rd Dec 2010 - a Short Trip to the Centre of New Zealand...
About 8 kms or 5 miles spent cycling around the sights of Nelson.Since Christmas is upon us and shops are often shut and campsites full we're at Nelson (Tahanui Holiday Park) until Boxing Day doing various sites. We particularly like Nelson because it claims to be at the geographical centre of New Zealand and, ah what luck, that centre turns out to be at the top of a very nice hill just a brisk half an hour's walk from the city (there's a cathedral where we will go to Christmas services) centre. Is it credible that the centre should be so conveniently located, not in an offshore ocean trench in the gap between North and South Island, or a bit of fly swarming swamp? Cruel questions indeed. Anyway I visited the centre as a neat place between Cape Reinga and Cape Bluff (where we're headed). A picture of the official (?) centre of NZ is above - a sort of concrete geographical marker thingy.The cathedral is a bit odd looking from the point of view of a Brit because it does not look finished and has a tower that's a bit like a fire station practice tower. Inside is much better since there's superb colourful stained glass and a lot of polished wood.We also visited the Founders Brewery in Founders Park where we enjoyed a tray of samples and had a brief look behind the scenes. 5he brewery is organic and uses entirely organic hops, yeast and malt (barley and wheat). We liked the wheat beer (seasonal) and the famous (it's in the thousand top beers list in a big book we found in their bar) Fair Maiden Pale Ale. Pretty good. Founders Park also contains various old buildings in the colonial style that have been collected together - a church, station, printers, tea room (we arrived too late to sample the Devonshire Tea, sadly).We also did a bit of shopping - Guy's pedals (from Whangarei - not long ago) are already clicking, look cheap and nasty, and have been replaced by proper sealed bearings pedals that are up to a few thousand miles (well, so it claims on the packet and they do look a lot better).Back to the tent rather late, toan evening of books. I finished George Sands La Mare Au Diable, a simple touching and, unexpectedly, happy tale.
About 8 kms or 5 miles spent cycling around the sights of Nelson.Since Christmas is upon us and shops are often shut and campsites full we're at Nelson (Tahanui Holiday Park) until Boxing Day doing various sites. We particularly like Nelson because it claims to be at the geographical centre of New Zealand and, ah what luck, that centre turns out to be at the top of a very nice hill just a brisk half an hour's walk from the city (there's a cathedral where we will go to Christmas services) centre. Is it credible that the centre should be so conveniently located, not in an offshore ocean trench in the gap between North and South Island, or a bit of fly swarming swamp? Cruel questions indeed. Anyway I visited the centre as a neat place between Cape Reinga and Cape Bluff (where we're headed). A picture of the official (?) centre of NZ is above - a sort of concrete geographical marker thingy.The cathedral is a bit odd looking from the point of view of a Brit because it does not look finished and has a tower that's a bit like a fire station practice tower. Inside is much better since there's superb colourful stained glass and a lot of polished wood.We also visited the Founders Brewery in Founders Park where we enjoyed a tray of samples and had a brief look behind the scenes. 5he brewery is organic and uses entirely organic hops, yeast and malt (barley and wheat). We liked the wheat beer (seasonal) and the famous (it's in the thousand top beers list in a big book we found in their bar) Fair Maiden Pale Ale. Pretty good. Founders Park also contains various old buildings in the colonial style that have been collected together - a church, station, printers, tea room (we arrived too late to sample the Devonshire Tea, sadly).We also did a bit of shopping - Guy's pedals (from Whangarei - not long ago) are already clicking, look cheap and nasty, and have been replaced by proper sealed bearings pedals that are up to a few thousand miles (well, so it claims on the packet and they do look a lot better).Back to the tent rather late, toan evening of books. I finished George Sands La Mare Au Diable, a simple touching and, unexpectedly, happy tale.