Punakaiki

We headed down the wild West coast which certainly lived up to its name as we had a day of strong winds and rain. We drove through the Buller gorge and had a short walk to a seal colony at Cape Foulwind which was actually great fun as a we tried to stand up in the wind and saw lots of seal pups lying on the rocks. Next stop was Punakaiki which is famous for its layered 'Pancake' rocks. The rocks were pretty cool but it's definitely not as great as it's made out to be. Worth a stop though. We stayed the night in Barry Town which has about 6 houses and a pub to its name. We stayed in the pub and as there's nothing to the town the stop becomes the place for a fancy dress party which was great fun. I got up super early the next morning to carve a piece of greenstone into a pendant for a necklace. The pendant took 4.5 hours to make and I got one on one instruction from a local carver into how all the tools work and I was amazed how difficult it was to carve and then you have to polish it in 3 different ways. I'm pretty happy with my unique souvenir. The design is off a fish hook which is important in Maori mythology as a fish hook was used to haul the north island out of the water (the north island looks like a fish). It also represents strength, determination, and brings peace, prosperity, good health and safe travel over water which I thought was quite appropriate.