Sunday. Mmm, Beer and Pizza. Bitcoin!
For those not following, this is a crazy experiment explained in this post.
So today my partner and I went up to Taupo, in hope that the only brewery that accepted bitcoin in the area was open on Easter Sunday. Turns out it was (and a lot of other stores, guess not really a holiday)!
So we went to Crafty Trout Brewing Co. I found them on the bitpay directory (search for New Zealand), but it seems noone had actually used bitcoin at their store. Ever. I was the first bitcoin customer since they opened a year ago! I paid for a tour for my partner and I, and enjoyed some tastings up on the deck.
So during the tour (I won't give too much away, as you should go yourselves to check it out when in the area), I found out they are the only brewer in New Zealand (and maybe the world), that uses a fully automated system. Not just bottling (the is actually manual (the owners have some teenagers that help), but the cleaning, the filtering (which usually takes 7 days, for them ... 2), etc etc. All with a fancy computer system. Go check it out!!
After the tour, we went up to Huka falls for a walk, and did some geocaching. We found one, and I left $1 worth of bitcoin as a paper wallet (see comment here). This has been something I've started doing since Christmas last year (leaving bitcoins that is, been caching for a while). I have had 1 cache "redeemed", which was in Melbourne, and the private key was hand written!
After the caching, we went back to the Crafty Trout to catch up with some friends for a few drinks, as they are leaving for a long holiday in Europe soon. Paid in bitcoin :D.
Thats all for the trip, be coming back to Wellington tomorrow. Hopefully getting a haircut on the way down (potentially with the bitcoin symbol shaved in ;))
If you can offer assitance, just do it! I'm on twitter as haquaman, on reddit as haquaman, on IRC as aquaman (no h), and email at hugh AT davenport DOT net DOT nz.
Feel free to donate to 155WivS5TdBdU1UMQVZNLodywzCUdLdBBk.