Greetings From the 42nd Parallel

So the crossing from Wellington to the South Island went well. After a few hours of driving through hilly, temperate rain forests we finally arrived at the Monaco Resort (which is in Stoke, not Nelson, as we had been led to believe) on the northern coast of the South Island. The resort consists of a number of Olde English buildings containing a bunch of rooms. Ours was a studio. We dined at their French restaurant, the Orangerie, where I got one of the best filets I've had in my life. The food there was seriously good. Sadly I awoke in the middle of the night with horrible stomach pains, so I was unable to enjoy breakfast there.

Today we started with a trip to the wearable art museum which incongruously also holds a car museum. The wearable art part of the museum is cool because it holds the trippiest costumes you've ever seen. Evidently the area has been having a high fashion show for twenty years now. Who knew?

We then drove west to the West Coast region which is wild, empty and beautiful. We went to a park on the coast which has "pancake rocks" which are sedimentary rock formations that are layered like pancake stacks. Whilst in the park we happened upon a family of Keas (or possibly Wekas) on the path in the underbrush, which was very cool. We finally got here at our B&B, where I'm currently chilling. Tomorrow is a trip through the mountains and glaciers of the south. In really stoked because I'm expecting something out of Lord of the Rings. Time for bed now!