Nelson - named to be the sunniest town in New Zealand I had booked a backpackers called 'INNBETWEEN Lodge & Backpackers' which had a really high rate on both Hostelworld.com and Booking.com so my expectations were high. And I was not disappointed - it was the best hostel I stayed at in New Zealand. The hostel is to be found right next to the beautiful Cathedral at the end of the Main street of the city, only a 10 min walk from the bus stop located at the i...

Picton - the calm ferry town I stayed in Picton for 1 night as well and was lucky with the weather. On my arrival clouds were covering the sky and the temperature was around 20 degrees. Picton had a very calm vibe, a lovely small waterfront area with benches to sit and enjoy the view of the harbour, small but beautiful walking street and tiny beach near a small mountain. I talked to a man working at the local cinema/aquarium who said that Picton would al...

Kaikoura - the town of seals, whales and Dolphins I only had 1 night in Kaikoura but from what I experienced it was a nice small town with a few Fish n' chips shops, a cool beach (not sand but stone, still beautiful though) with mountains west of the beach and a nice bookshop. There is certainly more to the town than this - a lot of it is to do with Whale watching and dolphin watching/swimming. The tourists pass though Kaikoura in the hopes of swimming w...

Christchurch - a Re:START city (The 13th of Feb to the 17th of Feb) Started my trip to New Zealand by arriving in the middle of the night at the Christchurch Airport, tried to sleep on the floor of the departure hall but airport staff came and told everyone that we could not sleep on the floor only sit on the seats. I found out that there was a small lounge area but all the space was taken so no opportunity to catch any sleep that night/early morning (00:20am S...

I know, it's been a while, I have been busy and the lack of a proper internet connection is not helping either. The four weeks I've had in NZ has flown by and it would have been nice with a few more weeks to explore the North Island but oohh well, can't have it all ;-) I loved NZ, well almost all of it! I have talked to so many different people (locals and backpackers), on a wide range of topics, discussed point of views and opinions on culture, politics and ...