South Island NZ, Part 1: Marlborough to Franz; wine, seals and life on wheels...

So we’d said goodbye to the North Island, hopped on the worlds most beautiful (and windiest!) ferry with our absolute queen Large Marge, and arrived in Picton ready for some South Island adventures. Here’s what we got up to...

Marlborough

Welcome to a sunny patch of coastal vineyard clad, mountain surrounded beauty, you’re gunna love it here.

Cycling the Golden Mile Wine Tasting

Marlborough is COVERED in vineyards, they’re everywhere you look, so it’d be pretty rude not to give them a visit. And a taste. Or quite a few tastes. Wouldn’t it?

We hired bikes from ‘Bike Hire Marlborough’, they’ve not been incredibly creative with their name, but their service was fab. They picked us up and dropped us off at our campsite for free, and they give you a map and a little chat about the different cellar doors letting you know which ones are more/less expensive, which ones are popular, and vitally, which ones sell cheese. They size you up for a bike (which doesn’t sound like it’s about to explode- if you’ve ridden bikes in Asia you’ll get it) and let you go do your wine tasting thing! We had the absolute best day. The scenery is stunning, and the wines were genuinely super tasty and so diverse! I was convinced I’d never be able to tell the difference between them and I’d just have to smile and nod, but honestly they were so different! The people who work at the cellar doors are super friendly and so passionate about the wines that it’s just really good fun chatting to them. If you’re in Marlborough, it’s an absolute must.

Queen Charlotte Sounds Mail Boat Cruise

Whilst in Marlborough we wanted to see the Sounds as we’d heard they were stunning. A lot of cruises round the area are pretty pricey, but we found The Mail Boat Cruise on Beach Comber Cruises’ website. The people who live in the sounds have no road access to the main island, so their mail is delivered by boat, and you get to hop on board for the ride! Because it’s a working mail boat, no day is the same and it’s a less touristy look at the Sounds, which is lovely. The skipper is super knowledgable, and he chats about the history of the area as you go which was really interesting. We also enjoyed eyeing up the cute little houses we wanted to buy. All in all, a really nice way to see the Sounds, but take a jumper, it gets darn windy!

DOC Camping: Rarangi Recreation Ground: one of my favourites. It’s right on the beach, the views are just stunning, and there’s a glow worm cave a few minutes walk away. The lady that looks after the site is very friendly, but the showers are positively icy- they’ll wake you right up!

Paid Camping: Spring Creek Holiday Park: A handy one for exploring Marlborough. Set alongside a creek with some resident eels and has a swimming pool which is perfect for those warm Marlborough afternoons.

Kaikoura

Next, we headed over to the East Coast to get up close and personal with the local wildlife...

Seal Swim Kaikoura

Kaikoura is home to several colonies of fur seals- drive just out of the town and you could spend hours watching them. We were lucky enough to be there as the new pups were learning how to seal and my gosh were they cute little comedians. Seal Swim Kaikoura also offers you the opportunity hop into the sea with them and watch them in their absolute element.

Seal Swim kit you up with some deeply attractive (but necessary because sweet llamas that water is cold!) gear that makes you look not unlike the seals yourself, and plonk you in a little boat. The company is family-run and the owners themselves still get in the water daily which is a really nice touch. Our guide was the son of the founder and you could tell he really loved his job. The day we went out it was pretty overcast... unfortunately the reason fur seals get into the water in the day time is because they’re too hot. But the clouds meant they were just the right temperature and were instead content in lazing on the rocks like giant slugs. Whilst we were waiting for them to make any sort of effort at moving we were lucky enough to see several groups of Dusky Dolphins and some Little Blue Penguins too- that’s the great thing about the waters around NZ, you might be out looking for one type of wildlife, but there’s so much that lives there that you’re highly likely to see more than what you bargained for. Meanwhile, the fur seals really weren’t having any of it, but thankfully there was no tour booked in after us and so our guide let us stay out for an extra hour with no extra cost, in the hope that we’d get to swim with them. And guess what? The sun came out and the fur seals hopped into the water, and so did we. We ended up having a really good amount of time with them, and they’re just magic to watch. Absolute Olympians under the water, the cutest giant slugs above it.

Whale Watch Kaikoura

Kaikoura is one of the few places in the world where Sperm Whales can be seen year-round and close to shore. They congregate here because the 3km deep Kaikōura Canyon runs right up against the coast creating a rare system of sea currents that sustain an incredibly rich marine food chain. We went out to see if we could spot them with the creatively-named Whale Watch Kaikoura. The boat ride out was choppy. And I’m talking 80% of passengers at the back of the boat throwing up choppy. But, in the end it was worth it because we eventually managed to spot a male sperm whale come to the surface, swim for a while, and then give us the iconic flick of the tail as he dove back down. Very cool. The staff were great and very enthusiastic about the wildlife in the area (I’ve never seen someone so excited about an albatross).

Paid Camping: Donegal House $20 per van (non powered) $4 hot shower. This spot is essentially a pub who have space for campers. It’s actually a lovely little spot, backing onto a little pond with a group of horses in the field next to you.

Abel Tasman

From Kaikoura we headed back over to the West Coast to the stunning Abel Tasman National Park...

Abel Tasman Kayaks

We only had one day in Abel Tasman, but my gosh do I wish we had a week. It’s the most beautiful place. We spent a day with Abel Tasman Kayaks (no messing around with the name here either), and it was brilliant. They offer several different packages from 1 day to 3, but ours involved kayaking in the morning and walking in the afternoon. Our guide was fantastic- lots of fun but we learnt lots from him as well, especially enjoying his Maori stories, oh and he makes a mean energy ball too. The National Park itself is insanely beautiful, we kayaked past beaches, fur seals, and even hopped into some caves. We had lunch on the beach (which was vegetarian, insanely tasty and he even let us take the leftovers home for dinner!), and then began our coastal walk from Observation Beach to Anchorage, which had the most beautiful views. The water taxi then picked us up from the beach and took us back to Marahau where we had free hot showers (campers will appreciate this is big), and free beers from our lovely guide. Couldn’t recommend highly enough, the absolute best day.

Freedom Camping: W F Moss Scenic Reserve-a quiet little green spot not too far from Marahau, the starting point for our kayaking adventures. But beware the sand flies!

Franz Josef

We drove down from Abel Tasman to Franz Josef via the bizarre Punkaiki Rocks, nicknamed the ‘Pancake Rocks’ because they look exactly like a stack of pancakes. It’s a nice little walk to break up the drive, but I wouldn’t go out of your way to get to them.

And then it all went a little bit wrong. This part of our trip did not go to plan. At all. As we arrived in Franz Josef the South Island encountered some freak weather, flooding huge sections of the land, cutting off access to towns and completely devastating the road from Te Anau to Milford Sound. As a result our Franz Josef Heli Hike was cancelled, Mount Aspiring National Park was closed, and Doubtful and Milford Sound were rendered completely inaccessible. We tried to get to Doubtful but ended up having to constantly reroute due to the flooding, eventually getting stopped by the Civil Defence who were a lovely bunch and gave us free tea and biscuits in the community centre whilst we worked out what on earth to do. What the freak weather did show was how lovely New Zealander’s are- they came together quickly and efficiently to help others like us who were stranded, and they did it all with good humour and at no cost. What a blooming lovely bunch.

West Coast Wildlife Centre

If you end up stuck in Franz with bad weather, the West Coast Wildlife Centre is luckily all indoors. They’re home to the Rowi- the most rare of the 5 species of kiwi and work to conserve and grow their numbers. We got to see one of their baby Rowi’s snuffling around in the dark, and my word he was cute. There’s some good info on kiwi’s and their conservation, the glaciers and also a section on Tuataras-reptiles endemic to NZ and who can be traced back to the age of the dinosaurs 200 million years ago.

Paid Camping: Orange Sheep- Right in the centre of town this spot is in walking distance to everything and has good facilities- powered and unpowered sites, kitchen and hot showers.

Standby for South Island NZ, Part 2: Queenstown to Christchurch; peaks, leaps and dolphin meets.