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Published: November 3rd 2009
We left Golden Bay and prepared ourselves for the twisty turny two hour drive to get back on the main drag to Nelson, I am such a rubbish passenger especially on hairpin bends!!!! We stopped off in Nelson for a mooch about, nothing that exciting there really so we moved on to Havelock for lunch, capital of the Green Lipped mussels and boy were they good!!! From here we went for a bit of a drive through Marlborough sound which was beautiful but as time was ticking away we made a dash to Blenheim and then onto the much raved about Marlborough wine region. I know Mum absolutely loved it there so we had very high hopes. We found a sweet campsite (old but sweet) and the guy in the office said rather than pay for a trip around the vineyards just to go and do it ourselves; we did consider doing it by bike but that was far too energetic! The weather was on our side and so at about midday we set off on our self guided vineyard tour. I’m not the biggest wine fan in the world but it was a pretty good day. We started off at
a little family run vineyard called Saint Clair where we tried a few wines and then we set off for Cloudy Bay. We only took a photo of the sign and decided to go straight to Allan Scott where we had the most amazing lunch in a beautiful courtyard. From here we went to Herzog where we decided it was rude not to have dessert and then we set off to find some cheese!!! We stopped off at one vineyard (purely to buy cheese!!) and then continued to Forrest where we were persuaded to do the whole tasting experience there. It was a perfect day and we sat in the sun trying all these different wines.Hsaving decided we may have had a little too much we made our way back to the campsite (all of 500m) but I did manage to stop off at boutique chocolate factory en route!!! The evening was spent drinking the wine we had accrued throughout the day while eating far too much cheese and chocolate -Happy days - New Zealand rules!!! The morning after our day of total self indulgence we were booked on the ferry so we drove the half hour to Picton where
we got our free ferry (Thanks Spaceships!!) over to North Island. The ferry seemed to take ages but I did get to watch Confessions of a shopaholic - very disappointing - the book was better. On arrival in Wellington the heavens opened and we were slightly stumped as to where to stay so ended up in the worlds most depressing and expensive campsite for the night. The next day I dragged Tel round the very cool shops in Wellington for a few hours and then we drove up to Napier on the West Coast. Napier is also a big wine region in NZ but having just pigged out in Marlborough we spent a day or two catching up on the blog, doing laundry, taking in the beautiful scenery and having a god awful Chinese takeaway! How Rock and Roll!!!!
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Moose
non-member comment
YUM!
Me too, I have to settle with Morrisons limited selection!