The real New Zealand
Trip Start
Feb 18, 2005
1
25
56
Trip End
May 20, 2006
Barrytown, New Zealand
Saturday, August 6, 2005
Stuart decided he was going to cook bangers and mash, 14 of us chipped in and it worked out at $3 each! This gave us 3 sausages, loads of mash, beans, onion gravy and broccoli. There was enough mash for breakfast the next day and even some for dinner as well. On the way we stopped at Pancake rocks, an area where two tectonic plates have met and pushed the rocks up and together (like pancakes), it is also next to the sea which has eroded it and caused blow holes to be formed (didn't think it was as impressive as Kiama though).
We arrived at Barrytown, a village with about 10 houses, a pub and a school. The backpackers was linked to the pub, we met the landlady Ma who had just arrived back from holidays and set about cooking. We had a marvellous feast and were playing pool, chatting and generally drinking the night away. I am still on a budget so was refraining from drinking, I hope you are all proud of me!
Just as the rugby started, a drunk giant came over and started asking the girls if they wanted a fuck! They politely refused and the landlord came over to ask him to leave. A fight broke out and all the locals got involved, they eventually got him outside and his mate came in and hit someone else so the whole thing erupted again even some of the women were putting the boot in, literally. Unfortunately one of the locals - Graham put his hand through the window and blood was flying everywhere, he managed to stem the bleeding but refused to go to hospital (he did eventually 2 days later). During all this South Africa had gone 13-0 up so the locals were even more pissed off! The two guys were from out of town, they had been kicked out of a pub down the road and were looking to cause trouble, the funny thing was that Jimmy (a local chef and pool shark) had just been telling a few backpackers that the west coast was lovely and they hadn't had any trouble in Barrytown for over 10 years, 30 seconds later look what happened!
On sunday most people went knife making, I decided against it as it was $95 and I wanted to go hunting for Jade. 6 of us staggered down to the beach, hanging around and playing in the surf trying to find the elusive greenstone. We found lots of green stones, but no greenstone unfortunately. Jade is considered lucky by the Maori and can be really expensive in the shops, but if you can find some on the beach they will polish it and put it on some leather for you free of charge. The evening was again spent in the bar, playing Uno and generally having fun. I decided to change my plans again and hang around in Barrytown for a couple of extra days as I really liked the ambience and the locals. Ma offered me a job, if I helped out cleaning I could get free accomodation and food.
The next day I planned to walk into the hills but the weather wasn't that great so I had a lay in and pottered around watching movies and generally cleaning until 6 O'clock when Spikes bus pulled in and I had some more people to hang out with. I met 2 girls from Dunollie called Steph and Valerie, Steph was getting a job at Barrytown for a couple of months and Val had brought her down to see Ma.
Tuesday started off dull but the sun soon broke through and Wendy (cleaning lady) gave me a lift to 9 mile beach, a place recommended for Jade by Ma and Russell, a local carver. Unfortunately the tide was still coming in so finding Jade was not easy, but it was a nice day and I searched for 90 mins before hitching a lift back to Barrytown. Tuesday evening saw me behind the bar. It was particularly busy as 2 stray buses were in town (Bushman arrived that day) and the local pub team were in a pool competition, if they won, they got a shield on the trophy and tension was high. They narrowly pulled off the victory and celebrations ensued long into the night. Mark (Irish lad on Spike's bus) and I took on two of the locals Jimmy and Corrie and won 2-1, but this may only be because they'd drunk so much they could hardly see!
