Sunday 10-3-10 Are we on an Indian Reservation?

Papa Paul woke them up at 9am with a "guten morgen germans!"  We made them coffee, eggs with cheese and avocado, and sausage. They brought over chocolate hazelnut spread and bread.  It was the first time they had cheese in their eggs or had it with avocado.  They thought it was cool to have a breakfast like Americans do. I told them that it's a Miller thing and that not all Americans eat there eggs with Avocado and cheese.  The morning was nice, they were very grateful for the wonderful meal.  Again Paul and I had to tell them we were leaving, I think they would have followed us if they did not have to report to a peach farm for some work they lined up.  They did tell us we should drive the east cape, see the light house (eastern most point in NZ) and stay at Brian's place a really nice hostel.  We exchanged emails and told them if they make it to the states to look us up, and they said if we are ever in stuttguard (sp?) Germany to look them up.

Following the german's advice we decided to drive the east cape.  They said the drive would be about 2.5 hours. It took us a bit longer. The road was very uneven and every half mile was a washout or land slide that took up part of the road.  Driving down a mountain pass the lanes goes down to 1 and it says give way. The problem is you can not see the other side because it is on a corner or right before the top of a hill.  The towns we passed looked very much like U.S. indian reservations, run down buildings and cars with lots of dirty and or prig random dogs running around.  We finally got to the road to the east cape light house and that alone took 45 minutes on half paved and half gravel road that was literally falling into the pacific ocean.  We made it to the light house though and the after about 400 steps up the view was awesome looking south at the ocean cliffs, volcanic peaks and pastures, we quickly ran down to get on the road as quick as possible so we could get some where to sleep as the drive this far had been about 4 hours. 

After 2 more hours of driving, 16+ washouts, 14+ uneven road sections, 6+ almost head on collisions, 8+ one lane bridges with no view of oncoming traffic, 9 pheasants, 25 locations that looked like the shire, 0 hobbit sightings, 1 rabbit sighting and a whole lot of sheep, cows and  turkeys we made it to Tokomaru Bay and decided to take the Germans advise and find Brian's Place Hostel.  Easy find, we both had our first shower in a couple days, sipped wine while watching the sun set from our chalet, and chatted it up with a older couple from Perth. The manager of the hostile if from sweden and is in the process of extending her visa for a  third time, the australian couple LOVES to talk and we both found ourselves cornered on several occasions looking for a way out.  They were very nice but talked and talked about everything from Perth providing all of Aust.'s $ to the tube coming out of the man's stomach draining prostate fluids to watching some birds mating, a $60 each trip that we just "have to do"!... don't think so.  We chatted up for a while then when we were finally able to break free we ate some dinner  brushed our teeth and wet to bed.