Today started after a surprisingly sound sleep in our Royal Hotel, in my case I suspect simply because it was a solid pillow for once.\u00a0 After a quick breakfast we\u2019d boarded Princess and headed down to the Central Otago Rail Trail. Formerly a rail line bringing passengers into the area during the gold rush, the rails have been removed and the resulting well graded right of way turned into a massive mountain bike\/horse\/hiking trail through some gorgeous scenery. This morning we did a 33ish km chunk of it from near Naseby down to Hyde. We had sections passing livestock, little sheep faces and bored looking cows. (Fun fact: New Zealanders have 10 sheep for every 1 of them.)There are also a ton of deer farms in this area and it\u2019s very odd to see a field full of deer placidly looking at the bus heading by instead of running in fright.<\/p>\n
Our section of the trail ended at a really nice little cafe overlooking a vast expanse of rolling hills and farms. I\u2019m quickly becoming repetitive with comparing NZ to Canada, but it\u2019s true New Zealand seems to combine most of Canada\u2019s scenery types into a nice compact package. In any case I was very much reminded of the foothills of the Rockies in places along the trail. It\u2019s very much uniquely New Zealand as well though. Nikki and Naama actually got lost in the beginning as we all took off without realizing their bikes were still being adjusted, so by the time they arrived at Hyde we\u2019d all had time to have a lovely lunch\/snack, much better than yesterday\u2019s atrocity.<\/p>\n
The rest of the day was getting to the Rangitata Gorge rafting lodge via a few stops. We had a brief stop at a very large open pit gold mine, something most of the Europeans hadn\u2019t seen before. Next we headed down to the Pacific coast and visited the Moeraki Boulders. These boulders are very smooth near spherical bubbles of rock that have fallen out of the muddy coast onto the beach and look as if they\u2019ve washed in from sea. They have strange veins of quartz looking material that makes them look very alien to the landscape. Very neat though, and I couldn\u2019t resist getting a few photos.<\/p>\n Naama Nikki and David enjoying the boulders<\/p>\n The lodge itself is nice enough, though we got here quite late and can\u2019t really enjoy the scenery (especially with a 6:30AM departure on tap for tomorrow) so it will have to go on the list of places to come back to next trip here. Our rooms tonight have 9 beds but we\u2019re sharing just the boys so it\u2019s only 5 of us. This is a particularly good thing given that three of them are third level triple-decker bunks that have got to be close to 10 feet off the ground. This is our last real night on tour as half of us will be getting off at Christchurch (Andrea and Simone left today to go to Dunedin for a bit rather than sit around in CHCH waiting for their flight with little to do.) We\u2019ll be dropping off five more I think and picking up 8 people who will be starting their south island tour, but we\u2019ll only be sharing the bus with them as far as the ferry in Picton. Here\u2019s Lisa again now, walking in as if it\u2019s her room. I know they\u2019re travelling together but go sit in the common areas together (and you know, talk to people) if you wanted to be together constantly you should have sucked it up and paid for a double upgrade. Of course if it was other people we wouldn\u2019t care as much but frustration with them amongst the whole tour group is pretty high.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/cheatingbulldogs.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/03\/DSCN1441.jpg\" "\\"Once")
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