Blogs from Greymouth, South Island, New Zealand, Oceania - page 10

I was planning to tell the diary all about our wonderful stay in the beautiful city of Greymouth but Greymouth was as grey as its name. It simply rained all the way from Franz Josef to Greymouth and continued overnight with the addition of a very strong wind. The van really rocked during the night but that is perhaps another story. I am sure that Greymouth is a really nice place but all we saw was the supermarket and the local restaurant - The Australian. Don't ask me how it got its name - nobody could tell me. One strange (to us)thing about Public Houses over here is that they all have a bookies attached to them with a few television sets showing all kinds of sports and up to a dozen one armed bandits. They ... read more

We awoke to a beautiful day of sunshine and not a cloud in the sky! After the classic breakfast of beans and scrambled eggs (particular mention should go to the synchronised toasting of 9 slices of bread!) we packed up and headed towards the Franz Josef glacier. Once again opting for the cheaper option of our own guided tour, we reached the lookout point rather quickly and headed back to the car. Ollie seemed far more interested than the other two but then he hadn't seen a glacier before. After our quick tour of the glacier we pushed on further north along the west coast until we reached a town called Greymouth. We refuelled and stopped for some fish 'n' Chips when Mark noticed the sign for the Montieths Brewery! Dale quickly consulted the guidebook and ... read more

Today we drove up from Westport to Karamea about 95K. It is truly the Wild, Wet West. There are a lot of old gold and coal mines. They call it coaling in clouds. We then drove down to Greymouth. This is the largest city on the West Coast of the South Island (About 13,000). It has the feel of the Iron Range towns in Minnesota, sort of Virginia, MN on steroids (with the mountains and the Tasman Sea). We went to an old Union Hotel for supper and as the Kiwi would say, “had a Lovely meal”. Kiwi word for the day is slicker. This is what you put in your Chilly Bin to keep it cold. ... read more

well, we're well inland from Greymouth, at a lovely little town called Reefton, famous for being the first town in NZ to have electric lights. Its in a spectacular setting, surrounded by mountains and rivers, and last night I took a chair outside and watched the sun go down over the hills. Tonight its a bit cloudier, so maybe not. Anyway, all the hills round here are riddled with gold and coal mines, well, the remains of them. And everywhere you go, there are photos showing what it looked like in 1860 or 1910 - mostly a lot busier than now. In fact, its hard to believe that there could once have been a thriving town on that little ledge of rock etc. However, all the paths and tramways are preserved, and make excellent footpaths, and ... read more

Hi everyone, me again!! Trying to plough through these blogs lol!!! Arrived in Greymouth around 4ish!! What a sorry looking little town, so grey and lifeless-didnt like it at all!! And the town was awful, nothing and nobody there, lol!! Was an old mining town and it kinda still looks like it would of back then, very strange!! Karl our new coach driver had basically said there was nothing to do there so he had organised a bbq for everyone!! He was really good actually at getting everybody to go out together-made a real difference from our last driver-who was a miserable so and so! Karl actually knew all our names by this point so we kinda all started 'bonding' lol!! Anyways......there was only one other thing that Greymouth was famous for and that was its ... read more