Rain Rain go away!

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The ferry ride over from Wellington was gorgeous and we were so lucky to have a nice clear day. The views were superb once we got into the sound of the South Island. After arriving in Picton we headed straight to Kaikoura where we spent our first night camping in New Zealand.

We arrived and as you can see the weather was lovely but that was short lived and at midnight that night the heavens opened. We were a little bit wet in the morning but we soldiered on to our first trip swimming with dolphins, sadly they did not want to be found and we instead spent the time on the boat watching various NZ sea birds including albatross!

After leaving here we headed to the Banks Peninsula and to Akaroa - a little sleepy harbour which still maintains its french heritage. It was still raining as we arrived so thats 14 hours solid rain.

We spent the night in Akaroa at a wonderful wee place - a 150 year old cottage. Lo and behold in the morning we awoke to more rain so we backshelved any walking plans and went to the museum and the local shops and got the best fudge ever!

We headed away from Akaroa to Arthurs Pass where we spent the night camping in the wild landscape at just over 900m. We had a pretty good night weather wise there though the kea birds (massive parrot like birds with big beaks!) were a bit of a menace. We awoke to a pretty clear morning and decided to try to climb Avalanche Peak which is nearly 2000m but the snowy weather stopped us getting to the top but we made a it a fair distance up the mountain.

We left Arthurs Pass and headed to Punakaiki which is famous for the Pancake Rock formations we also camped here - 2 nights in a row!

We are now in Fox Glacier and are going to be doing our glacier day walk tomorrow which should an adventure!

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Photos

The Kaikoura coast road
Ernie our car!

Arthurs Pass
This was our morning view after camping

Comments

[Clare Uytman]

So jealous of you guys!!!
Hello you two, Sounds fantastic you guys, Very bizarre cause it sounds like you are camping in the same wee places as us, Did you go in the adults only Jacuzzi in Kaikura?? Had Hamish's Christening last weekend then went away for a week to Piperdam near Dundee, Not quite as good as NZ but fab anyway. Will send you photos soon Love you! XXXXX

[Lindsay Davidson]

Love the pic's!
Hey guys, loving the pic's and the updates, don't think me and Lucy can even try to keep up! Looks like you're having a fabulous time! Hope the glacier walk goes well!!!!xx

[d2]

mate thats a real nice tent how much was that? and where did you get that hat its class looks really warm must be from somewhere really cool and it looks expensive! hope youre havin a great time we sent the weather to remind you of us! d2

[Foote]

How's it going?
Looks like your both having fun, just letting you know I still read everyone you send Jiggaman. Stay safe.