Gemstones and Gold on the Beach!

Riverton was a lovely place to start the day, we took in a 5 local buildings that are listed in the Historic Places records.
Boy, it was bitterly cold with a cold, stiff breeze blowing in from what felt like the South Pole.  (And probably was,  given where we are!)
We headed off towards tonight's destination - Manapouri.  On the way, we stopped at Otepuri,  or Gemstone Beach.  Here, you can find gorgeous rocks of different colours lying on the beach.  (Let's call them gems...)
We wandered along the beach through the freezing wind to chat to a guy who had a gold panning system set up on the back of his four wheeler!  It was amazing!  He literally shoveled sand off the beach into his contraption, had a little water pump sluicing it over a washboard-like set up on the back.
He said he does it every day and that he makes a living out of it. So interesting!
So, after gold and gems, we carried on to a 1899 suspension bridge north of Tuatapere.
Made it to our campsite on the road into Manapouri.  What a stunning site! The grass was immaculate, heaps of space and the bathrooms big and private and clean and modern.  The lady was a quiet soul who you got the feeling really didn't want to deal with people,  but hey,  it's also the cheapest in town,  so who is complaining?
PB had an absolute blast playing with some little friends who were also at Riverton last night.  (Skyler and Cora).  We chatted to two lots of parents at the play ground and discovered one set were from Holland & Austria and the other were from Cockle Bay!!  Small world!
Off on a big adventure to Doubtful Sound tomorrow,  so need to be up early!