The weather was a bit drab for our one and only day in Wellington but we made the most of it by visiting the Te Papa museum, doing a little city walk and taking a tour of parliament. The tour around parliament was certainly different and made more memorable by having the opportunity to watch in on parliament itself. By midday the following day, we had nearly driven the 353km to Taupo from Wellington. Before we arrived in Taupo we stopped off at Tirangi’s I-sit...

Driving for three hours further north, we arrived in Blenheim in the late afternoon to do a little wine tasting in the regions (Marlborough) vineyards. We decided to save ourselves for the following day and made camp in one of the nearby DOC’s for the evening. The location was really nice and quiet but the solitude of having no one else camping nearby – safety in numbers and all that – was too much for Emma and she had to be nearly sedated to send her to sl...

Heading into Christchurch later that afternoon on yet another rainy day in Canterbury’s capital, we did a couple of chores and continued on our way to Kaikora, getting lost a little along the way because of yet more roadworks! We arrived in Kaikora quite early in the morning, having freedom camped the night before (saw Predator on the laptop – Emma loved it!!!!) not too far away. There are few places in the world that have such a proliferation of marine based...

Another cold night and frosty morning, we awoke to find that we had been frozen into our campervan. Eventually breaking free, we could now see that our very chilly night was well worth the effort the night before. The scenery that we were unable to see last night, now revealed a mountainous landscape and a nearby mirroring lake. Even though Queenstown is known as the adventure capital of the world, we decided to use it as more of a stepping stone to Milford Sound...

Our following days exploration of Hokitika took us around town and towards the mountains for a few short walks at Lake Kaniere, Dorothy Falls and Hokitika Gorge. Hokitika was easily the highlight of the day with its milky blue green waters and swing bridge backed by cliffs and fine rimu forest. We spent the evening in a place called Hari Hari, an area well known for police and its speed traps, needless to say we made it through unscathed. Continuing further south...