Tuesday 21 April, 6:30 pm local time. At an internet café called "Blah Blah" (what an appropriate name!) in Christchurch.

Good day all!

It's been one week since our last update, and needless to say we've kept ourselves busy. The one adjustment, however, has been to spend less time driving and in the camper van (don't even get me started… got a mouthful to say about camper vans, but I'll keep my negativity in check!), and more time sightseeing at a leisurely pace (it was starting to feel a bit too "Amazing Race" -ish… hehe). This means that we haven't seen as much of the South Island as we would have liked (in particular the Franz and Fox Glaciers, Queenstown, and Milford Sounds), but what we have seen has been lovely, and we haven't collapsed from exhaustion!

Before we departed for the South Island, we hiked to Waitanga Falls in Tongariro National Park (located at the Southern end of Lake Taupo), and while taking in all of mother nature's beauty, we were viscously attacked by blankets of tiny black flies… we were literally swatting them away for minutes at a time! Luckily neither one of us ended up with too many bites...

From there, we drove to beautiful, artsy-fartsy, cultural Wellington (which is the capital city of New Zealand. Most folks think it's Auckland, or maybe it was just me...?!). Sadly we were only able to spend one night there because we had to catch the Interisland ferry across to the South Island the following morning. The Harbour front is absolutely stunning/charming, and is complimented with a mixture of old and modern buildings. Our time in Wellington also marked the beginning of the end of our camper van. While trying to park the clunky thing one night, we drove it into a parking lot with a maximum height restriction of 1.8 meters. Bet you can guess what happened next. Yep, we cracked the roof, and funny enough, only the inside collapsed/crumbled (the ceiling ended up in a 45 degree position... see the pics for a full understanding!). We were in shock for a long while, and after speaking to the rental company, decided to keep the camper anyway, as planned (what a gosh darn mistake that was!).

We crossed from Wellington in the North Island to Picton in the South Island on the 16th of April, and continued our adventures with Picton as "home base". On the 17th we set off bright and early for a 3.5 hour drive for Abel Tasman National Park (located in Nelson). En route to Abel Tasman, our camper decided to run out of battery while parked for ONLY 30 minutes (yes, the lights were left on, but come on! The battery should be good for at least a few hours...). Thankfully two Kiwi angels came to the rescue and we were on our way shortly after that. An hour or so later, the rest of the camper van ceiling came crumbling down, which was both scary and incredibly frustrating (again, see pics for more details). Once that mishap was sorted, we continued driving and finally arrived after 5 hours! Once at Abel Tasman, we took a water taxi to Barks Bay and trekked alongside golden-sand bays/beaches to Torrent Bay where we were collected a few hours later. Only complaints were the over cast weather, and the persistent sand flies that kept biting our ankles until they bled!

The next two days were spent in the Marlborough Sounds/Motuara Island (on an "Eco-cruise" where we spotted all kinds of marine wildlife - blue penguins, fur seals, hector dolphins, and a bunch of birds...), and in the Wairau Valley on a wine tour (highlight was a small, family run vineyard called "Forrest"… they make a mean white wine called "The Doctor's Riesling", which we thoroughly enjoyed!).

We were meant to go whale watching in Kaikoura on the 20th, but due to extremely bad weather conditions (mainly out of control wind and rain), all trips were cancelled. Instead of staying another day and hoping for sunshine, we drove straight to Christchurch. Today we spent the day taking in the sites (Christchurch Cathedral, Art Gallery, Canterbury Museum), strolling by the Avon River, and riding the Christchurch Tram (by far the best part!). We've only been here a day and a half, but already feel very familiar with the "city" - it's more of a glorified village, really. Or maybe it's because it reminds us so much of London... it's little England over here (New Regent St, Oxford Terrace, Gloucester St...).

The plan for tomorrow - our very last, full day in New Zealand - is to visit Arthur's Pass National Park during the day, and to see Miss Saigon in the evening... should be a good way to say ta-ta to this fantastic country.

Until next time, lots of love from us to you!

Jennifer & Daniel xo