See Oban blog E M xxx

After the downpour yesterday we awoke to a lovely sunny day and were sad to be leaving Mount Cook behind as we set off for Dunedin.After leaving the magnificent mountains of the high Southern Alps the journey took us through some wonderful scenery of a different.As we moved into more rolling countryside we had our first glimpse of Maori art (it was nice of them to do the paintings so close to the main road!).The rock paintings weren't really very distinct and som...

Sad to leave lovely Akaroa but leave we must - and in any case we were looking forward to Mount Cook, New Zealand's highest mountain.It was a fine morning as we left Akaroa but as we drove through the pretty countryside the weather started to look ominous with big heavy dark clouds and a stiffening wind.Fortunately, however, we just managed to skirt it when we turned inland towards the mountains and out came the sun.It was therefore in glorious sunshine that we g...

We'd enjoyed Christchurch and were a bit reluctant to leave, but we had to because there is so much ahead of us to see. We'd had a glimpse of the Banks Peninsula from the top of the Gondola and it did look enticing. Our drive there was over narrow, steep climbing roads with lots of intrepid cyclists and wonderful views over land and sea. From the top of the saddle overlooking Akaroa harbour - very like a Scottish sea loch but actually a flooded volcanic crater (a...

We touched down in New Zealand - our 17th country and 13th totally new country - at 11 pm on 29 February.We'd booked a room ahead at the Hotel So right in the centre of town and it turned out to be really handy, not to mention very unique.It was also good value, possibly because we didn't have a window, but it did have every mod con and more to hand.It had a large wall-mounted flat screen TV at the foot of the bed which showed 'mood scenes' of New Zealand to wake...