New Zealand - South Island - Wellington - Piction - Blenhiem

After Alison alcohol fuelled birthday celebrations, the brave Rogersons departed Wellington and made the 3 and a half hour ferry crossing from the North Island to the South Island. Nothing like a rocky ferry ride to clear your hangover. Through the Cook Straits into the Tasman sea and into the beautiful Malborough Sounds. Neil as usual was up on deck taking photos to document the journey whilst Alison slept off the rather nasty hangover.

We arrived in Picton and were met by Kath and Pete who had so kindly offered to put us up for the next few days - very brave seeings as they were in grips of a house move themselves. So, from a hostel to a beautiful Blenhiem house where we were able to sit on a sofa, play with their new dog Harry and catch up on some gossip. It was great to see some friendly faces and talk to people that know you. This accommodation however, had a cost - Neil was roped into helping with the house move and out came the removal man in Neil - did you all know that he worked as a removal man in LA when he was a student????

Blenhiem is a beautiful town surrounded by vineyards which all vary in their snobbishness from the ones that will only let you over ther threshold if you are wearing a smoking jacket and matching crevat with full intentions of exporting large quantities of NZ wine to the very poshest resturants in London, to those that know you are backpackers just looking for a few glasses of free wine. Guess which one we went to? There were no questions from us about which grapes, what year, how it is bottled, just "is this one free?" We visited a great vineyard called the Mudhouse which is so much better than it sounds. Not only does it produce wine but also distills Prenzel, which is a range of liquers ranging in dark chocolate to mocha to butterscotch and peppermint. They are all served as shooters and ice cold. Neil favourite product was the tispy toppers which were high alcholic syrups for ice cream (still a boy a heart).
We also visited Highfield which is the venue for Kath and Pete's wedding in February - it takes your breath away - we thought Haigh Hall had a great view!! We will put a photo on the website.

After a couple of days with Kath and Pete we moved just a few km's down the road to Picton which is a tiny little town with the port that receives all the boats from the North Island. Piction itself is not a beautiful place but is surrounded by the most stunning scenery. This area is home to the Malborough Sounds and the Queen Charlotte track. The Queen Charlotte track is a 4 day walk around the area and is only accessable by boat. We had brave and full intentions in the UK of doing the full 4 day walk but chickened out royally and decided to do a 1 day (16 km) walk and how glad were we that we just did the one day. It really was beautiful, breath taking and stunny but most of all it was totally knackering!!! The thought of putting up a tent at the end of that walk and then getting up in the morning and doing it all over again was horrible. Instead we got the boat back to Picton and had fish and chips, lovely!!!

Leaving Picton (minus our wash bag - another story) we head over the Queen Charlotte driveway to Kiakoura - yet another story for another page. Sounds exciting? We are having a wonderful time - in fact the time of our lives. We have put the clocks forward and we are heading into summer, the weather is improving. The South Island is very different to the North and we are noticing it already - there are fewer McDonald and Subways and there appears to be very long distances between petrol stations....