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18th January I am writing this from the bowels of the Pride of Cherbourg (or the Kaitiki as it's been renamed). It's really weird - I have been on this ship before crossing the English Channel as I recognise the layout of the kids soft play area. We crossed to france when Rosie was about two for a holiday. Little did I know then that I would repeat the experience but crossing between two distinctly different land masses and about 7 years later! How ones life pans out eh? We have loved our time in the South Island and I particularly love the ever changing landscape and the way there are so many different environments in one relatively small and accessible area. You can literally see rain forest, mountian, glacier, stunning coastline, waterfalls and local history and tales all in one day.We left Kaikoura and our amazing whale experience to head to the top of the South Island and the Abel Tasman national Park. On our last night in Kaikoura Rosie and Connie were charged with the job of choosing the menu, buying the ingredients and cooking our evening meal. Isla was in charge of pudding and felt extremely proud of herself. The meal was great and the children are already talking about their next shopping and cooking experience. We stopped for our lunch in a lovely boating town called Havelock near Marlborough Sounds which is the group of islands and waterways near the top tip of the South Island. We spent lunch choosing (and dreaming) a boat each from the marina! We're not doing badly if that's the only desiscion we had to make that day are we?Our camp site was in Motoueka which is the gateway town to the Abel Tasman National Park. The park is not the biggest in NZ but certainly unique. It's on the coast and boasts one of the most famous walking (or tramping) routes in the world. However nearly as many people explore the National park by kayaking around the coast in Sea Kayaks. I've put such a trip on my to do list for next time! We spent our time yesterday on a walk in the national park. Long walks are a bit out the question at the moment as Meg is so small and I haven't got a back pack for her. Saying that, she (and Isla) do brilliantly, kept going with plenty of singing and story telling on the way. The coastline is just stunning with picture postcard beaches and pretty, tree lined bays and Cicadas belting out their tunes from the bush. We stopped at Tinline beach which we pretty much had to ourselves and went straight in the water. It was lovely and warm and all the children went for a skinny dip which they found hilarious. Meg wasn't too impressed with the dead crab Isla found and we discovered she hated the feeling of seaweed but did love exploring for shells and her daily past time of chasing seagulls. It's lovely the conversations we have with the children while we are travelling without the pressure of school and daily activities to concentrate on. A lot of them are imaginary scenarios - like what kind of animal you'd be and what it must be like to be a possum in New Zealand. The children also have a million questions about the environment we are in like why there are no dangerous animals in NZ which leads into how animals move between continents, what is a continent, how they came to be, the beginning of the earth, evolution etc etc....... with the inevitable question - "but I thought God made everything"!! The other interesting question we've had recently is "why sperm whales are so called!" - I'll leave you to google it to find out why.We hiked back to the car and splashed out on some serious ice cream to cool us down and celebrate our great walk. The late afternoon was spent at a beach called Kaiteriteri which is meant to be in the top five beaches in the world (UK Guardian poll). It is truly lovely. The perfect sand, beautiful clear and warm water and rocks to play on. Rosie was in her element as she loves swimming and there was a strong current (in-coming tide) coming from the sea into a small lagoon which was like being in one of those current pools in the water parks at home. Connie spent ages collecting shells with Meg and Isla continued her rafting adventure by gaining huge enjoyment being washed into the lagoon along the current. Michele just lapped up the sunshine and I did my David Hasselhof impression keeping life guard (and looking for Pamela Anderson lookalikes). A perfect day came to an end with some very tired but happy children.Today we are travelling back to the North Island to continue our adventures and to spend some time in Wellington.
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