Perano Apartments Picton

We had a lie in until 8.40 (yay!) and then a man in a van picked us up for our day of wine tasting. We headed out of Picton towards Blenheim in the Marlborough Wine Country. We drove down through the valley surrounded by forest and hills. We stopped at a pretty little vineyard where we tasted a delicious Reisling that had essence of passionfruit and a very gentle pinot noir. I had never had pinot noir before last night and I liked it very much. At this ...

Day Fifteen - Wellington to Picton
I got up at 5.45am so I could have breakfast before the Champions League final. Barcelona v Man Utd promised to match two of the best attacking teams in the world against each other, which had the obvious outcome of being a dull match. United were a shell of their normal selves, losing 2 -0, which put a ...

... and views.

I spent the afternoon exploring the outskirts of Picton and drove up to the Peninsula lookout point and almost over to Oyster Bay on the other side, it was worth it though as the views on the other side were brilliant with a deep blue sea, despite the greyness of the Waikoma side.

The next day was a bit scary for me!! I checked in my luggage at the ferry office and took the hire car back. The sun came out and although the wind was absolutely ...

... hiding in the bay as it was so bad! Very upsetting, as that was what we had come for but we were pretty lucky with the dolphins so cest la vie. On the way out we also saw sealions really close and playing on rocks - they were very relaxed, we got very close to them and they didn't react. Made it to picton and went round shops in the early evening - ferry crossing tomorrow.

... die wären doch wohl grad alle in Neuseeland und so wundert mich nicht, dass unser Boot mit Deutschen voll besetzt ist. Highlights der Tour waren das Kentern, Sprünge von 8m in den Fluss und das BBQ im Anschluss. Für diese Nacht haben wir uns die Grosstadt ausgesucht, zumindest war der Name auf der Karte fett gedruckt, was für mich Grosstadt suggerierte - Westport 4800 Einwohner ist tatsächlich eine der größeren Städte ...

mixed feelings really... overcome with sadness that our romp through the south island is now over. but elated with joy at the north island ahead. picton was our last stop in the south island. it usually is for most everyone since this is where you catch the ferry to the more populous, more cultural north. the Picton area is mainly known for three things. first, the ferry that carries people to/from the north island to the south. second, the ...

Marlborough Sounds is an area of many bays, reserves, islands, coves, penisulars and winding coastal tracks. One of the main walking tracks is a 5 day tramp cross country (The Queen Charlotte Track), which we hoped to be able to find and to follow for a while. Starting at Havelock (home of the Green Lipped Mussel as they say!), we started up the single winding road into the Marlborough and Pelorus Sounds. As we followed ...

... craic. We did go on the Luge thingy where you fly down a hill on a big plastic tray with wheels, great views of teh town from the top of there. After there we headed off to Te Anau and then to Milford Sound for a look. Maybe it was´nt worth the money heading that far as the road down the west coast is as nice as the boat trip there. We then headed down to the southern end of the south island but there was´nt really a whole lot around there. We ...

... being disappointed so we decided a warm up was needed. We plotted a route through the wine region that would gradually allow us to work our way to Cloudy Bay. See, we do do some work. ;-) We were presently surprised with the wines we tasted along the way and had some fantastic aromatic Rieslings, buttery C******nays and yummy Pinot Noir's. It seemed the region was good for more than just Sauvignon Blanc. By the time we reached Cloudy Bay we'd sampled some fine ...

... our ferry across to the North Island an carry on to as close to Picton as we can, stopping once to see a seal colony which is amazing as they're probably my favorite animal and there's over 50 of them with the cubs playing in the sea. We get to Blenheim and have a beer and then carry onto a rest area where we sleep under the stars again, well the car roof.