Whakariki Beach

Brian and Dee had one day off together, so instead of going skiing again, they went to the beach! Golden Bay was our destination - north of Nelson, to the most northern part of NZ's south island, in fact. The ride up was fairly uneventful, with the exception of some sweet ipod tunage and a bit of crocheting in the passenger seat. Up past Fairwell Spit is a remote place called Whakariki Beach (Fah-kah-ree-kee)... I've been there before and it's beautiful, but Brian missed out by 6 km when he was up in that area on his bike. Doh! The sand was gorgeous, the waves crashing, and the sun was out, but it was c-o-l-d and pretty windy, so what did Brian do? He took off all his clothes and ran into the water. Yeah, "WHAT?!" I wasn't quite so brave, so I took the opportunity to photo document the whole thing:

I quite like this picture (that I had to modify, for obvious reasons):After Brian put his clothes back on and attempted to warm up, we strolled the beach for a bit trying to dodge the two elderly folks who had caught Brian with no clothes on. "Sorry elderly people, we didn't mean to scare you."

I could barely put my feet in the water, so I'm not entirely sure how Raynaud's-Syndrome-Brian managed his entire body... Brrr.

The lovely scarf Brian is wearing is a Dee Special. I finished it in the car on the way up to the beach. It's made out of possum fur and merino wool - the best combination for warmth and softness. Oooh, it's just yummy! The most excitement that afternoon wasn't actually Brian's skinny dip, rather helping out two German kids driving one of those holiday vans which happened to be very stuck in the ditch. They couldn't speak much English, but with the help of hand gestures, two locals, one weak chain and a decent amount of luck, we got it out of the ditch and back on the road. The best part was hearing the two kids saying, "Ah, Sheet, Sheet, Sheet" and then mixed in with "Sheiza" (spelling? I take that as the German form of 'shit').

Back on the road, we scarfed peanut butter sandwiches with apple slices (who'd have thought of having an apple sandwich? So awesome!), and headed back to Takaka and up to the Anahata Yoga Retreat where Brian got to experience 30 minutes of guided meditation, homemade soup, visits with the Swamis and Atmabhava and Zac, and then a Kirtan (getting 'giggy wid it' using the harmonium and bongo drums)... I want to take a drumming class sometime soon.