Day 19: Nelson

Update:

After leaving Franz Josef, we spent eight hours driving to the city of Nelson. Our last stop of the trip! This city is another tourist-orientated seaside town, but it has beautiful beaches. Our first full day was spent touring the botanical garden and art galleries. We headed to the Nelson Public Art Gallery, known as the Suter gallery after the second archbishop of Nelson in 1867. He was famously support of art and paintings, and his wife began this gallery as a memorial to him after his death. The curator of this gallery, Sarah, took us on a detailed tour. There were three main exhibits, and Sarah was extremely knowledgeable about each one. 

After our very thorough tour, we stopped for lunch and walked back to downtown Nelson. The afternoon was spent at the beach! It was warm, windy, and sunny: the perfect way to spend some of our last moments in the summer season.

Tourism:

Although I recognize the tourism-driven shops and towns of New Zealand, I do not think the country itself suffers from excess tourism. The shops pop up because it is a viable source of revenue for the shopkeepers, and they are smart to capitalize on this. However, the natural parks and beautiful landscapes still retain their sense of being separated from humanity. One can still go sea kayaking or hiking and not feel like one is fighting crowds and crowds of people. Those who do come into the country on holiday thankfully have not trashed the places they visit. Once the volume of people becomes too much for hiking trails and other natural places to handle, or once tourists begin wrecking the places they see, then New Zealand will suffer from too much tourism.