A Thankful Thanksgiving in New Zealand

"I'm Australian, and don't know what Thanksgiving is, but I'm very thankful," says an Australian backpacker. We made our own Thanksgiving dinner here in Nelson, NZ. Couldn't get a turkey, apparently we would've had to special order it ahead of time. So we had kingfisher fish from the fish shop a hasher friend works at, and got plenty of beer from the brewery another hasher friend works at, and made do with what else we could find. There were so many American backpackers here, we had dinner for 10! Bob made FOUR apple pies and we ate them all. I made those sweet potatoes with the marshmellows on top. Alison made the mash potatoes, and Gary made the fish. Neill cleaned up, as he states he's best at that.

Everyone loved my sweet potatoe dish and wanted to know what it was called. I said, "sweet potatoes with marshmellows on top." The day got even better when we went to see Harry Potter (opening night here) after dinner. Brenda, I hope you have seen it too, it really rocks! Other stuff we've done here, glaciar hiking (I haven't worn cramp-ons in years!), mountain biking up to the center of New Zealand, and sea kayaking in Cable Bay.

We're off to learn how to carve bone today, they have classes for everything out here! I hopefully will be making some lovely trinkets for you all at Christmas time...

Car is still holding up, even with me driving it. Hopfully I can keep it in one piece by the time we make it up to Auckland to sell it. ha ha

Met up with the Nelson hash, as I referenced earlier with the beer and fish connctions. They were a really friendly, welcoming bunch, and there was a total of 8 visitors at the run. One of them, Crystal Tits, was visiting from Montreal, and Alison knew her already! They met at a hash in Ottowa one weekend last April. Talk about random meetings! Another couple I had met already at the interhash in India. They were touring around still just like us.

Well, I am thinking of you all, my friends and family, especially during the holiday season. I hope you are all well and had a wonderful Thanksgiving.

Love, Carla