Hello, Sam here. It’s been a while.

One of the many things NZ is famous for is the “Great Walks”, 9 multi-day hikes of 3-5 days with great scenic beauty and lots of campsites and camping huts en route. Apparently it would be wrong to come to NZ and not do one of these amazing walks, so we decided to do the easiest one- the Abel Tasman Coastal Track (with the idea that, if we liked it, we could look to doing a more adventurous one next.)

Having followed the advice of the gentleman in the local i-site (all major towns have one, basically a tourist information centre) we booked to get a boat to near the end of the walk (adding an extra 4 hours walking to our total journey, YAY!) and to walk back to start over the course of 4 nights and 5 days.

For the map enjoyer, we got the boat to Totranui, walked up the coast to Wharawharangi for the first night, then crossed Gibbs hill to come back to stay at Aworoa, The plan was then to stay in Bark Bay on night 3 and Anchorage for the fourth and final night. This isn’t how things panned out though…

On the walks there is nowhere to buy food, so you need to take everything with you.  We were staying in the Department of Conservation (DOC) huts, which had no cookers- just some tables and some bunk beds.  As a result we had to buy a portable cooker and sleeping bags, which we also had to carry along with dehydrated food for 5 evening meals, food for lunches (crackers, peanut butter and nutella mostly), snacks (nuts, energy bars and chocolate mostly) along with clothes and toiletries, and a few other bits and pieces.  All in I think we were carrying about 20-25kg between our 2 bags, which was excruciating.

The walk itself, whilst long, was generally an easy walk. There were a few steep inclines, but on the most part it was a nice and easy, well formed track.  The only problem was carrying gigantic bags made everything really difficult, and we weren’t cut out for it.  Laura “I love walking” Atkinson spent a surprising amount of time complaining about the walking (Laura: I was complaining about the bag, not the walking.) In reality it all just added to the enjoyment (Laura: Sam was most definitely  not enjoying)  and sense of achievement at the end- we walked approximately 70 km in about 21 hours over 4 days.  Why 4 days and not 5? We were feeling very confident about our abilities so after walking for 4 hours on the first day and 5 and a half on the second day we decided to amalgamate the walk to Bark Bay (4 hours) with the walk to Anchorage (3 and a half hours) into one mega seven and a half hour day.  On all the days we were exhausted and in bed for dark (there were no electric lights in the huts), but on this night we were ready for bed about 6 o’clock.

Exhaustion aside, the walk itself was a bit hit and miss; the first day in particular was beautiful, with lots of walks along serene isolated beaches looking onto deep turquoise sea which would give the Maldives a run for it’s money (if it weren’t so cold.)  Other days were mostly inland with little in the way of view.  A particular highlight was crossing to Awaroa, which had to be done over a tidal estuary. We had organised to do the walk in reverse so as to get the low tide in the afternoon, however we arrived quite early and the water hadn’t dried completely. Nonetheless, along with a bunch of Army boys, a German family and Lauras impatience we crossed through the remaining water (which got up to underwear height in places).  It took a while to wade through but was certainly interesting to have a walking track which 50% of the time is covered in water.

I definitely think 4 days of walking is about my limit. There’s a big hole in my right Ankle where there used to be skin and Laura had to walk two days with a bandaged toe, but it was an amazing sense of achievement at the end (and great to feel smug walking past the daytrippers with their tiny backpacks.)  Would I do it again?  Probably, but maybe trying to compress the walking over 3 nights so that we can carry less stuff. Those backpacks were seriously heavy and the worst part of the trip.

We’ve finished!

Where to start? We’ve absolutely LOVED being round here- it’s been nearly 2 weeks now and we’re only just beginning to think of leaving (with a little side trip to Golden Bay for a few days.)

I’ll start with the wine then (as Sauvy B drinkers we’ve definitely taken advantage.) As much as we liked the Hawkes Bay vino, Marlborough takes it to a whole new level- it’s SO good. We had another day cycling around vineyards, pretending that we knew what people were talking to us about (I don’t know how convinced they were of this though.) I’m not sure how wise it is to actively encourage people to cycle around main roads having had the equivalent of 4/5 glasses of wine, but NZ doesn’t seem to think it’s a problem, so who are we to argue with them?

One of the great things about having your own transport is having the freedom to make/change plans at a moments notice. We’ve done this alot- woken up and decided we felt like doing something different to what we’d intended. I’m starting to see why people in UK buy camper vans- I’d never really thought about it as a holiday alternative but I definitely would think seriously about it in the future- I’ve floated the idea of hiring a car in June when we’re in US and driving the coast to coast. We were planning on taking the AmTrac but now I think I’d prefer driving. Especially if it’s an automatic- why have I always driven manual, it’s so much harder!

Anyway, back to Marlborough. After overhearing some Kiwis in a restaurant, we decided to visit Mapua Wharf and Rabbit Island, which was BEAUTIFUL. So quiet and just the most gorgeous beach with crystal clear water.

We’ve done a fair few hikes as well (in preparation for our big 5 dayer, which we’ve just finished today.) I think it might be time to leave the hiking boots off for a week or so (I can hear Sam cheering from here) and maybe do some more kayaking- hopefully we’ll see some of these elusive dolphins- I don’t get why we seem to be the only people in NZ who don’t see them?!

One thing to note: We’ve finally had some of the famous NZ fish and chips- AMAZING! Totally worth the wait.

So, after Golden Bay we’re going to head down the west coast, but as yet neither of us has any idea about what’s there, apart from some big glaciers. I’ve been frantically trying to sort out Xmas and NY in Fiji- it’s peak season there then and everything’s filling up fast in the Yasawa Islands. Oh yeah, and I also need to start thinking about applying to schools IF I decide it’s what I want to do next year. The only problem is, I’m going to have to apply to schools in so many places to keep all our options open. Yawn. I can think of other things I’d rather be doing, like this:

Admittedly it wasn’t very hard.

On Sunday we left Wellington (and the god awful car park campsite) and took the 3 hour ferry to Picton at the top of the South Island. Everyone told us it would be way more scenic down here and we thought “hhm, really? The north’s pretty great.” But so far, they were right. Everywhere we drive, every corner we turn around, we’re amazed by how beautiful the views are- including the ferry. Words can’t really do it all justice, so here’s some pretty photos instead;

10 points if you can spot the dolphin

We’d heard about a really great hiking trail called the Queen Charlotte Track, so we decided to do a bit of that. SO PRETTY. The next day, we climbed, for what seemed like forever, to a lookout. Again, SO PRETTY. In Asia we got temple fatigue- I wonder if we’ll get amazing view fatigue here? Because surely it can’t keep getting better and better?

We’re spending a few days near Nelson, around the Marlborough Sounds, in preparation for our first 5 day trail on Monday (I’m really excited, Sam is less so,) We’ll be doing the Abel Tasman Trail, which is one of the great walks in NZ- 5 days, 4 nights and loads of mosquito bites, yippee! So we thought we’d take some time out and relax for a while (because we haven’t been relaxing for the last 3 months at all.) It just so happens that this is a great wine area- this had absolutely nothing to do with the decision to base ourselves here. Nothing at all.  There’s  a beach nearby, loads of lovely restaurants and most importantly, SUN!

Happy Weekend everyone!

We’ll keep this up to date as we go to new places, but just so you can see how far we have/haven’t travelled.

Some of you may have heard of Hawkes Bay; if not, keep an eye out as you walk past the Chardonnay in the supermarket aisle.  Famous for its wines and beautiful views we decided to change our route south to come via wine country for a day or two, which eventually became 4 nights because we loved it so much.

We’ve also been very lucky with the weather; it was sunshine without rain for about 4 whole days straight, which was lovely, but did mean that Laura had us doing more exercise again; walking and cycling! I can cope with cycling when it’s from vineyard to vineyard though.

There are over 70 vineyards in this region, which made it quite easy for us to cobble together our own wine tasting tour. In the end we only went via 4 vineyards as each one would involve tasting 6 or so wines which quickly adds up when on 2 wheeled transport (although the 40km round trip certainly helped to clear the head). All the tastings were either free (yay!) or $5 (about 2 quid) which really wasn’t bad at all considering the volume of alcohol doled out.

Although Hawkes Bay is known for it’s Chardonnay (and Laura & I are known for our hatred of it) we were pleased to find the wineries also usually had a sauvvy B available, and always had a selection of really nice red wines. I’ve never been big into my reds but I’ve really been enjoying them around here.

We culminated our wine experiences on the final night with a trip to Craggy Range Winery for dinner. We went slightly over budget, but it’s the first time we’ve not cooked in 3 weeks and we had some of the best food and wine I’ve ever had; the steak here genuinely may be the best I’ve had.  The thing that really put us over was the taxis; turns out they’re really expensive here and we ended up spending about 50 quid return!!

Too much wine to choose from!

It also wouldn’t be NZ if we didn’t talk about how flipping beautiful it is around here.  On our last day Laura had us hiking up Te Mata peak, the highest hill in the area for stunning 360 panoramic views of the area.  Although it was a fairly steep 2 hour loop, the views at the top were worth it and some amazing bits of nature along the pathway.

Sadly we had to leave yesterday as we’ve got our ferry to the south island on Sunday and we wanted to get some time in Wellington int.  4 and a half hours of Vanatar grunting his way up and down the hills we reached the only camper van site in Wellington (which is a glorified car park) to discover they were fully booked. As a result we’ve had to head out of town by about 15km to the nearest holiday park, but every cloud has a silver lining; we have fast wifi! So fast that in under 12 hours we’ve burnt through about 12GB of downloading software updates, offline maps and films.  Unfortunately, iPlayer is having none of it so it looks like we still can’t watch GBBO.

NZ, you may well have taken the spot for our most favourite country….big statement but I feel it’s worth it.  The longer we spend here, the more we seem to love it (don’t worry Mum, we WILL NOT be moving here. There’s too many sheep and the flight was horrible.) And we haven’t even gotten to the south island yet…..

We’ve travelled from the Bay of Islands (highly recommend) over to the Kauri Forests, which were amazing- there was practically noone there (tourists or locals) and loads of awesome windy roads for me to drive round (and for Sam to hold on tight- he seems to hate my driving for some reason. It could very well be something to do with the fact that I reversed straight into a picnic bench this week. Oops.) From there we travelled down past Auckland to Hamilton for lunch with one of Sam’s friends. The onwards to Rotarua, which is a geothermal hub.  Apparently, they’re a big deal and we didn’t really realise until we got here. The rotten egg smell is everywhere but you get used to it after a while. We went to some hot springs and DID NOT want to leave (mainly due to the freezing temperatures outside) but they also had amazing showers.

There’s loads of geothermal ‘parks,’ we visited ‘Wai-O-Tapu’ which was fantastic. Check out this geyser, which spontaeously explodes with boiling hot water. AMAZING!

Also, there’s a really cool winery (Volcanic Hills.) Highly recommend for a boozy afternoon.

Showers are something I’m really struggling with, or more specifically, the cleanliness of showers. I have no problem with cold showers (unlike Sam) but I really really hate dirty showers. Every shower I go in, I feel like I need to wash it down first. Maybe I just need to lower my standards. Maybe. Maybe I’ll just continue washing them down,

This week we’ve fulfilled Sam’s one requirement for coming to NZ- visiting Hobbtion. Now, I’m not a LOTR geek at all (I didn’t even make it through most of the films) but it was pretty cool to see the set. Sam was in his element. There’s so many photos on our camera of him grinning insanely next to a hobbit hole. See below for one of many:

Apparently the tour record for photos is 3440. I think the American tourists with us might have taken more. I kept huffing and puffing and sighing to get past them, “ooh it’s a small bench, let’s take a photo,” “wow, a field. Selfie time,” “ The house where Peter Jackson stayed! Wow! Gotta get a snap.” MOVE ALONG, PEOPLE. The only issue I had is that we were herded around like sheep, which I get because it’s a huge tourist attraction, but it was still annoying. Kept wanting to punch anyone who got out their selfie stick and stopped right in front of me. There’s probably hundreds of selfie photos with me scowling in the background. Apologies to anyone who has a stick but seriously, WHY?? Sam bought me one once. I promptly gave it away.

Every day is busy busy, I think all Sam wants to do is chill outside with his kindle but I keep finding stuff for us to do. Take our time at Lake Taupo as an example. This is an extraordinarily beautiful spot, with the lake being the size of Singapore.

In the past 3 days we’ve been hiking, cycling (me excitedly, Sam reluctantly) and kayaking. It’s just that there’s so much to see and so many things to do, I think I have FOMO. We met a girl in the hot springs, who put it well: “You have 3 months. Slow down.”

Duly noted.Today we’re off to Hawkes Bay aka the start of wine country, YIPPEE!