Alison's waterhole in Wairoa Gorge

We left Alison's at 8:30 am, went to Isel Park, one of the oldest homes in Nelson. It had some trees that were planted in the 1840's. Drove out to Wairoa Gorge where Alison used to live. Her landlord wasn't home but we were given permission from a worker there to go down to the waterhole.

It was a wet walk through the tall grass & wildflowers, down to a ridge or cliff that overlooked a most beautiful body of water. It was deep in some areas for diving & swimming & the rest was where the river runs through. Alison said she used to go skinny dipping there all the time.

We stopped at a shop called Hoglan Glass. They produce gorgeous blown glassware. Then we drove to Richmond to a frame shop that Alison works part time, so she could pick up her sunglasses. We stopped at Berrylands where Alison picked up raspberries & blueberries.

Off to Nelson Lakes National Park where we sat on the edge of a lake & had lunch.

Then on to Lyel. It was a ghost town that just has a grassy park where the town used to be. We hiked up a hill & saw an old cemetery with graves dating back to 1893. Before hitting Lyel, we stopped at a place where train tracks were laid in 1923 & then pulled up in 1949. The track was almost finished when someone in government felt a train wasn't needed. Alison says it was a rich trucking owner that bribed the politician into halting it. What a waste. We walked through the abandoned train tunnel.

We passed over a lot of one-lane bridges & roads in this area. A couple of the mountain road, one-laners, had mirrors to see the on coming traffic. I spent much of the day leaning to the center of the car because there were very few guardrails and it was a long way down. Alison was given the nickname "Ditch witch" earlier on the trip because she told us how many times she had gotten stuck in the ditch on her hill. That didn't help my fear at all.

We made it to Rona's (Alison's friend) by 9pm.