WR Foster

Our accommodations in the Nelson area was originally a stable from the 1800’s made with cob material (straw and clay). The present walls are still the same as they were in the original building but with a very modern interior. The owners are recent immigrants from the Netherlands who decided that the climate in New Zealand was preferable. There is a comfortable King-sized bed, living room, and wonderful shower, but the main attraction is a swimming pool the full length of the back yard – much appreciated after a tough day of wine tasting or whatever.

We arrived late the first day and had a nice dinner at a restaurant downtown. The next day we decided to tour the local area and taste some of the local wines – stopping at the Neudorf winery.

On the way home we stopped for a wonderful meal at the Mapua Wharf.

On the way out we stopped at a bike rental place on the wharf and bumped into a family from Victoria just heading out to bike around Rabbit Island. We also met some people that had just been to the same winery that we had – but on bikes. We thought we might try biking the next day but when we looked at the weather report, decided that we had better take advantage of the good weather to go to Abel Tasman Park. We drove to Kaiteriteri which is close to the near end of the park and took a water taxi to Awaroa Bay which is near the far end. On the way we stopped to see Apple Rock which is a large rock that was possibly split down the middle during the last ice age.

We also stopped at various beaches to drop off other hikers and kayakers.

At Awaroa we had a quick lunch at the Awaroa Lodge and then headed off through the bush.

We did about a two hour hike, mostly through the bush, but also partially on a beach to arrive at our destination (Tonga Quarry) before the rendezvous-vous time with our water taxi.

The next day we decided to take a drive over to the Marlborough wine country. We took the short but windy way through the mountains, stopping at this swimming hole for a short while to stretch our legs.

The skies in New Zealand never cease to amaze me with cloud formations I’ve never seen before.

The Marlborough wine area is located along the Wairau River. We stopped at a winery with that name for lunch. Julie’s sister Marguerite and her husband Wayne had given us some New Zealand money at our anniversary celebration and suggested that we have a meal on them in New Zealand so that’s what we did – including a couple of glasses of wine and a bottle to take home (thanks Marguerite and Wayne).

How civilized: you order your meal; then while you are waiting, you do some wine tasting and select the wines you want to have with your meal which you then bring back to your table.

Before heading home the long but not so windy way back, we stopped at Herzog wineries for another wine tasting (Julie tasted while I took a few pictures).

Today we decided to go into Nelson to the market. It was busy but entertaining.

We then wandered up to the church and took a shot down at the square below.

After that we walked up the hill to the “Centre of New Zealand”.

Tomorrow we are going to start packing and maybe go into Nelson and take a walk along the river.

I have only included a few pictures as part of the blog above. However, if you want to see more, you can click on NELSON AREA. Note that there are three sets of pictures there. In order to go from one set to the other, you have to click on the 1, 2 or 3 at the top or bottom of a given set of photos.