New Zealand is a Green Place: Rain, Rain Go Away

In the last 48 hours, we have discovered one reason New Zealand is so green.

When it rains here, they do not mess around.

I am sort of bummed out today because I was supposed to be flying over Milford Sound right now, and am not doing so because of the weather. Bummer. Since we cannot control the forces of nature, I am posting to the blog instead.

A few words about my stay at Lake Moeraki Wilderness Lodge - that place rocks. Check it out at http://www.wildernesslodge.co.nz/. The first night, we went to feed some eels. Here is Cory the naturalist with the eels. I fed them some pork tenderloin, which they seemed to like. My friend Deborah was much better at feeding them though.

The second day it was raining, but we still went on a walk to the beach, which was beautiful even though it was full of sandflies. Here I am on the beach:

The next day we were supposed ot have out longest and prettiest bilke ride of the trip. A huge storm moved in during the night, the likes of which I have not seen since the eve of the Gretchen 2.0 party in LaGrange last year! That storm dumped about 4 inches of rain, which was about the same as we got yesterday. I am certain it was raining sideways at one point. I chose not to bike, as did most folks. My friend Pam was hard core and knocked out 51km, here she is afterwards.

Our guide, Eoin (Owen), is Irish. He knows how to describe what type of rain is coming down in 20-30 different terms. Yesterday we moved from "wet" to "terrible." It stopped long enough for me to take this photo of a burned out pickup in front of a cafe:

No one biked up the Haast Pass, a 15k, 3000 foot climb. I did get this photo at the top:

We're now in Lake Wanaka, here was our first view of it, again in a quick break in the rain action:

Today may be better after all, even though it is threatening. Here was the sunrise this morning just outside my room.

Still having a great time. Otago region, where we are now, has wineries! And sheep. Plan for the rest of the day here is to visit a sheep station and a winery. A pretty good day if you ask me.