This entry was posted on 1/15/2007 4:32 AM and is filed under New Zealand.
Nelson is our last stop in New Zealand and our favorite city in the South Island. It's a beautiful artistic town filled with glass blowers, jewelers, weavers, painters, potters and writers.
The main streets of the center of town are lined with beautiful round baskets of flowering plants...
On the way here from Blenheim we drove 73 miles north through much of the Marlborough district which is New Zealand's sunniest area and country's premier wine-making region. We passed vineyard after vineyard separated only by the fields of sheep and cows and the one little field of pigs.
Nelson was first settled by the Maori hundreds of
years ago. It
is now the country's chief fishing port with vineyards and olive groves
developing into a major industry.
There are also lots of fruit trees here and PYO (pick your own) fields of raspberries, blueberries and apricots. It's the first place where we saw huge crops of kiwi fruit growing.
We've had two fabulous tours here. The first was to Höglund Art Glass Gallery. They wouldn't let us take photos of the gallery or the factory so we can't share that much with you visually.
The owners have apprenticed two of their teenage sons and several of their friends for a 10 year period. We watched these young men for over an hour as they blew and formed magnificent eclipse glass vases. It was an open air studio and the young men were just wearing t-shirts and zorries as they worked in teams to produce these gorgeous pieces of art.
The 2nd tour was of the World of Wearable Arts Gallery (WOW) and the Collectible Car Museum - http://www.wowcars.co.nz/wearableart.html - all in the same building. It was a terrific display of some of the zaniest costumes we've ever seen. They have an annual contest and show of these wearable art creations including a "Best Bra Entry". Next show is September 7th in Wellington, North Island.
Carved Fish Boat...
Head Light Bra...
Warrior out of car parts...
Turtle Shell Bra...
Collar Lizard Bra...
Bee Hive Bra...
Here's a little movie of some of the crazy clothing...
