We are driving north to the wine reigon. We visited a winery called Yealands and watched a video and found out about Peter yealand and his wine. Mum and dad tasted and bought some wine to drink in the van. As we were driving we saw all the grapes on the vines. We drove through Blenheim for lunch and went to a really fancy restaurant called McDonalds! Afterwards we went to cloudy bay vineyard. Eli and I found a rugby ball, so we kicked it around for a bit. The lady was really nice and gave us free wine glasses and told us about a museum in wellington. We then drove to Picton and stayed there tonight.
Today we went to a cake decorating show and we were given voting cards to vote. There were really cool cakes there. We found a picnic area to have a cup of tea and biscuits. I think this was the highlight of dad's trip so far. It's now time to get on the ferry to Wellington. It took three and a half hours to get there. The ferry was massive and the views on the way were pretty spectacular. It took ages for us to get off because the huge double trailer trucks had to go first and they had to basically fold themselves in half to get off. It was funny.
The next morning we went into town and the Sunday markets were on so dad had pizza for breakfast, Eli had a chocolate filled churros, mum had green tea and I had an apple. We got some fruit and veg for later too.
Then it was time for the Te Papa museum. It was massive. They had a colossal squid which was caught in the Antarctic and had eyeballs the size of soccer balls! We went in an earthquake simulator house that shook and saw loads of Maori instruments. We had a fantastic morning, but we were starving so went back to the markets for lunch then we just started driving and ended up at Wanganui where we spent the night! Eli and I got very dirty playing rugby but are getting better.
The next morning we drove along the Wanganui River road which is very long and windy. And I didn't get sick!
We came to a place called Tongariro National Park. It's pretty cool here, we are right in the bush and there is a creek running right behind our van. We went on a two hour walk in the national park this morning to Taranaki waterfall. There were loads of streams and all the water was crystle clear and we saw where the lava flow stopped when the volcano erupted years ago! After we got home we have spent the rest of the afternoon doing our schoolwork and washing.