Day 94 - hospital

St Arnaud —-> Nelson 85km drive

Waiting outside the lodge in eight degrees didn’t improve my fairly miserable mood this morning. Our ride being almost half an hour late definitely didn’t.

I was still pretty downbeat about having to leave the trail, I hadn’t worked out how we’d get back on trail yet - eye first, plan later.

On the plus side, we were going to Nelson. A place we’d not been to before and heard it was quite lovely so we planned to stay a few days and explore if my eye allowed.

Our ride finally arrived and we were at the walk-in centre at Nelson hospital by 9.30am. I’m pretty sure it wasn’t also an animal hospital but no one seemed at all bothered that a guy had brought his cat with him.

I was seen after a couple of hours; my eye throughly cleaned, scratch confirmed and eye drops administered. No plant material remaining, phew. It was still feeling funny, but a proper rest in a bed last night had already done it a world of good.

We grabbed a distinctly average burger from a place in town for lunch (incredibly annoying as two separate locals had recommended it…) and then headed to the Airbnb we’d booked for a couple of nights.

I spent the afternoon working out potential options for trail whilst basking in the sun trap of a courtyard at the Airbnb.

Josh tested the Airbnb bed.

We headed to a local pub in the evening where I met a guy from Blaby (proudly wearing his Leicester City shirt). After a few drinks, we ordered an Indian from across the road and headed back to our Airbnb. I’d almost forgotten about my eye. I liked Nelson.