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Journeying South...
Monday 27th/Tuesday28th June
We decided to start to head south, south is where its all at! But we had a bit of a journey on our hands, bit of ground to cover in our sturdy and reliable campervan! Via Lake Taupo, Napier on the East coast for a night then south towards Wellington to catch the ferry to the South Island across the 'Cook Straight'.
Journey towards Wellington is again stunning scenery, very reminiscent of Glencoe or the Cairngorms, reached Wellington which looked like a nice city but no time to explore before jumping on the ferry! Couple of beers while we enjoy the 3 hour crossing ...the Cook straight is supposed to be one of the most choppy crossings in the world but luckily for us it was a stunning clear, crisp Autumn day so it was a lovely journey. Spent a bit of time on deck just in case we saw some of the migrating humpback whales or dolphins but unfortunately none.
It gets dark here around 5.30pm so it was dark when we arrived in Picton on the South Island lsland but our priority was to head straight to Blenheim which is a few km south of Picton and in the heart of the Marlborough wine region - wine tasting was the first thing on our list!!
Next day (Tuesday) was the first day we had no need for our campervan and went straight to hire bikes, campsite had these available so no hassle whatsoever! Morning bike ride to our first port of call .... chocolate factory of course! Then off to the numerous wineries, Saint-Clair was an obvious one and on to a few others. We decided to pick up a bottle of wine at each winery, so we now have quite a few to get through before we leave New Zealand!!! Found an amazing winery around lunchtime which also had a restaurant, was run by an Englishman and a Welsh woman so was nice to spend time chatting with them - we were a little worried that we sounded like a couple of drunk Scots at this point ... again food was amazing, check out the pic of our cheese board!!!! A little wobbly journey back to the campsite and night falling but we made it!
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