If someone asked me....

how to sum up traveling in New Zealand, I would tell them this story:

Shortly after finishing my last blog post, I went through a wander through gorgeous Kaikoura. I met a woman from Alabama at an art gallery, got coffee, and enjoyed the sunshine. While heading back to my hostel, I heard someone yell out my name. It turned out to be a guy named Marc who I had ridden the bus with through Milford Sound and Stewart Island. We had a chat for a while and since neither of us had anything to do that evening, he asked if I wanted to meet up for pool later. So we went out to the bar, had a few pints, I lost horribly at pool (no surprise there!), and some Aussie guy asked us if he could challenge us, but since he was on his own, he grabbed some random dude from the bar who was watching tv. I got to chatting with this guy, whose name was Cristian, from Chile, and it turned out that he was from Picton, which is where I was headed the next day. He works as a fish engineer, at a salmon "farm" (basically like DIPAC, not an evil salmon farm). He was a really interesting guy, had a degree in marine biology, had just learned how to surf, was buying land in Chile to start a hostel, etc. I mentioned I was going to Picton the next day and he said, "why don't you come over for dinner, I don't know many people in Picton and I have a huge fresh salmon I need to cook". I then convinced Marc to postpone his travel plans (he was going to head to Christchurch the next day), get on the bus with me, hang out with Cristian in Picton, and then I'd drive him to ChCh the next day. He agreed because hey, who doesn't like a salmon dinner and free ride to Christchurch!

So the next day we got on the bus, hung out in Picton, I got my car from where it had been stored, and we went over to Cristian's lovely house by the beach where he proceeded to cook us the most amazing dinner I have had in ages. Salmon seviche with garlic, onion, and fresh-squeezed lemon juice (he got the lemons from his boss' lemon tree and I squeezed them myself!), veggies, salad, and I hate to say it, but the best barbecued salmon I've ever eaten (sorry dad!). Plus lots of wine and beer. He then offered to let Marc and I stay there for the night, he had plenty of couch space and an air mattress, so of course we did.

The next day we had a lovely breakfast, hung out with Cristian a bit more, and eventually hit the road to ChCh. At the half way point in Kaikoura, we decided to stop for coffee. We were sitting in the cafe when all of a sudden, my friend Owen that I had traveled with about a month ago and who I thought was in Australia, walks in! Apparently he had gotten a job in Kaikoura and decided to come back from Oz. Such a weird string of coincidences!

If I hadn't run into Marc, I wouldn't have gone to play pool that night. If I hadn't gone to play pool, I wouldn't have met Cristian. If I hadn't met Cristian, I would have missed out on an awesome night of free food and accomodation and lovely conversation. If I hadn't stayed the night at his house, I wouldn't have gone to Kaikoura that day. If I hadn't gone to Kaikoura that day, I wouldn't have run into Owen.

And that is pretty much traveling in NZ in a nutshell. Just when you're feeling down, a whole bunch of weird shit coincides to make life good again.