Dm..dm..dm..dm.. another one bites the dust!

We thought we’d got away with only one casualty so far – M’s sunglasses after she fell asleep on the inter island ferry, leant on them and broke part of the frame –oops! But when we got back from Nelson this afternoon, our little tent, which should have had a nice rounded dome shape, was looking distinctly more angular than expected.
One of the flexi poles had decided not to flex, but to break instead. Now I can hear all the wry laughter from the Scout contingent..yes it does happen without the intervention of a careless, rowdy or even drunken Scout – or Guide, for that matter! But we were a bit annoyed as 21 nights use is not really what we had in mind.
Still, being the resourceful types we sat down and cried!! It was 6pm and as you will know by now NZ was closed. Another guardian angel in the form of the site owner came to our rescue and had a set of poles the correct diameter but the wrong length. He’d had them for a while and was about to throw them away after a recent clear out! Phew! Suffering withdrawal symptoms I decided to do my quartermaster bit and cobbled together a pole of the correct length and so far as I can see its holding up. Lord, why don’t you send me a....fully equipped workshop or at least a camping supply shop tomorrow? Don’t be so ungrateful – he gave you the poles, a broken mole wrench and a hacksaw; we had the tent peg and the mallet and before you could say flysheet, we had a fully functional tent again! And if we ask nicely, there may even be a camping shop tomorrow!
As you may have gathered, we’re now in Nelson for a couple of nights. We still have to go back to Picton on Wednesday ready to return the Nasty Nissan, and catch our train to Christchurch, but it seemed a good idea to explore a bit more of this area. It’s another wine area, but also near Havelock, the green lipped mussel capital of the world! Not surprising after what we saw yesterday, although I was a bit surprised to find out that in 2000 they shipped out 24,000 tonnes of them!!!! No wonder they weren’t worried about the few we “scrumped”!
For such an isolated part of the world it was surprising to discover that not only did Ernest Rutherford come from this area, but also William Pickering. Who were these people? Well, both were renowned scientists and were involved in significant sub-atomic physics and in space travel.
We went into Nelson intending to visit the “i site” (tourist info) but were waylaid by this sign saying “Brewery”!
It was actually the Foundation Park, a museum of sorts. Being only a very young country and being plagued by earthquakes, there are very few “old” buildings. What they’ve done in Foundation Park is to “rescue” or reconstruct replicas of this area’s important buildings. Some were important for who owned them, others because they were “of a type” – an apothecary’s, a cottage hospital, a dentist, a cobbler etc. These were fitted out and open for you to walk inside. It reminded us of Beamish or Amberley working museums.
This one had the added attraction of a restored railway and modern craftspeople including a potter from Allington! (Maidstone) who used to have a studio at Cobtree Museum near where we used to live! There was also a furniture maker, baker and a micro brewery which was still being run by the family who started it 6 generations ago. Needless to say, their wares had to be sampled! Ron had 5!!!! To be fair they were taster samples of each of the beers they made, but 5 sounds better!
We spent ages talking to a Swiss Cooper who had his workshop here. Once he realised Ron was very much into working wood, he stopped work and chatted happily about all sorts of different aspects of woodwork. Ron was a very happy bunny!
For those interested in fashion, we interrupted, inadvertently, a photo shoot of a girl dressed in 30’s art deco style costume with an aircraft theme. The dress was made from plastic upholstery fabrics so it looked like leather. Her handbag was in the shape of an aircraft nose cone and propeller. You can see the sort of thing if you look up “wearable art” on the net. We were inside the Bristol cargo plane at the time.
More on Nelson tomorrow, as I have a date with a red head to deal with. What he’s talking about is a bottle of Redhead beer from the Foundation Park Brewery!! Honestly Ron!! I suppose it could have been a Tall Blonde (another beer!)