Kiwi travels by Lemmo

We spent a weekend in the Marlborough wine region for a holiday within our holiday.  Renwick was our base, at a homestay accomodation that was fantastic (Antares homestay - highly recommended!).  The owners of our accomodation kindly provided us with bikes with paniers designed to carry 4 wine bottles a piece.  With the sun above us on a gorgeous spring day, we pedaled our way around half a dozen wineries, sampling as much wine as we could until mid-afternoon by which time we wobbled our way slowly back home, loaded up with our maximum 8 bottles, and jumped straight into the hot tub to recover...  The next morning we nipped back to some of the wineries and bought another 4 that we couldn't carry back the previous day and shipped them back to the UK for Christmas.  Excellent way to spend the weekend!  (Plus we got to kick back and watch England beat the French in a great game of rugby - awesome!!)

After a relaxing, wine-soaked weekend, we drove to Marahau, in the North-West of the South Island, ready for a couple of days in the Abel Tasman National Park.  We walked 7 hours of the coastal track on our first day (this is supposed to be a 2 days walk, which we managed in 1!).  We then sea kayaked much of the coastline on the second day.  The weather was hot and sunny on both days and the scenery spectacular.  Abel Tasman is a coastal park with dozens of small bays and empty beaches, a number of beautiful blue-green lagoons and plenty of entertaining wildlife, such as seals and penguins.  Kayaking for a day was the highlight - particularly floating in some of the lagoons and paddling around Tonga Island, watching seals and a Little Blue penguin swim past and between our kayaks.

Next we have a couple of days to chill out before heading on the ferry over to the North Island...Fingers crossed our 3.5 hr crossing does not turn into an 11hr crossing from hell, as often happens around here!

Elle and Tom  x