We woke up fairly early this morning, and got the hell out of our camping spot. We were starting to get covered in sandfly bites. Little did we know… We finally rolled into Nelson around noon maybe, and stopped at Mcdonald’s to use the free wifi, after which we headed to a few of the skateshops in town so that Nick could get shoes. In one of the ones we went to, I found some thong sandals for myself. First pair ever, so we’ll see how it goes. For that day, they left some blisters on my feet, and they hurt, but it’s pain for pleasure, and it’s so flippin’ easy to just slip into them. Once we were all set in this town, we drove around and eventually found the beach, conveniently when the sun was at its peak. It was a beautiful day out. It was also Nick and Brendan’s first time swimming in the ocean. The verdict: salty as hell. After the beach, we headed back downtown.

First order of business after swimming: have some beers. So off to 623 In the City, to indulge in some of their frothy pints. After our time there, we headed to the skatepark, where it turned out you could camp for the night. So we did just that. We skated around the park until sundown, met some kid who had moved there from Australia just last week, and had a good time. We stayed in Nelson just relaxing and doing the same thing for another day or so, and then headed back to Hokitika to plan our next, much larger excursion: Queenstown.