day1 we headed out of nelson along to westport. we stopped at the nelson lakes to do what was meant to be a 45 min walk but as we got lost and took the wrong turning it took a bit longer. after retracing all our steps we finally managed to locate the group 200m from where we went wrong... typical. got some great photos of the lakes and resident ducks and had a really fun time skimming stones. after this we made our way to westport where we got cosy round the tv...

today we left kaikoura and headed to a seal colony where we had a 5min break to see them then headed up to picton where the groups split, those going north and those doing the south island (us) we then headed through lots of vineyards and tree plantations to get to Nelson. we saw a lovely rainbow on the way there but the rain soon stoped. we arrived and had a wander around before meeting up with Aiden and going back to meet Sally and the family. we had a yummy me...

we arrived in kaikoura and had booked onto a whale watching trip but due to bad weather it had been cancelled boo. hopefully when we come back here in a couple of weeks we will be able to see some. we went to catch up on some sleep as we were exhausted. in the evening another thai green curry was made yummy and a marathon of movies. great view from the balcony!

after nearly missing our flight n much running around due to huge ques and unhelpful assistants, something you dont need after getting up at 6, we got our flight to NZ. approaching NZ we got some fanstastic views of the southern alps (see photos). it was cold when we arrived but not raining. oh and we got our boots cleaned for free by border control, they dont want dirty Aussie soil contaminating their beautiful Kiwi soils. a lad called James that we met al...