InterIslander

We woke after our last night in the Marlborough Chateau. The bed was so big, so soft, so gorgeous. Must we really leave? Yes, or we are going to miss our ferry to North Island. We are going to take the scenic route to Picton, the ferry terminal. This takes us to Havelock and then along the Marlborough Sound shore to Picton. This is the Queen Charlotte Drive, but in a number of locations, it should really have been called Half of the Queen Charlotte Drive, because the other half had slipped down the mountain and disappeared into Marlborough Sound. It was a delicate drive at times, hugging the mountain and avoiding the massive diggers putting the road back in place. We did see a cruise liner pulled in at the local timber yard. This was an extremely big cruise liner, but paled into insignificance compared to the timber yard!

After a coffee at Havelock, we arrived at our ferry terminal, loaded up and sailed at 2:15. On reaching our lounge, lunch was already being served.

A stroll around the upper decks and a little snooze later, I awoke to afternoon tea being served. Sue seemed to think we were still on the wine tour, having a Pinot Gris with lunch and a Prosecco with afternoon tea!

Farewell South Island, Until Next Time!

So far on this holiday, things have been going very smoothly, but you can never be sure when a disaster is going to strike. In my case it was in the ferry queue. Having been waiting for a while, I needed to go to the loo. Having our own facilities, I decided to avail myself with a quick comfort break. However, this facility is very cramped, even sardines would find it a bit uncomfortable. Having entered the loo and shut the door I manoeuvred into position and heard a loud bang and a smaller bang in the toilet bowl, as I watched my bluetooth headphones case and a bluetooth headphone disappear into the dark depths of the loo!

This was in deed a massive disaster, but I had to consider a couple of upsides:

1. We had emptied the loo before staying at the hotel; and

2. My hand, when slightly dislocated and covered in washing up liquid, fit through the hole where everything had disappeared.

I therefore managed to recover the case and a bluetooth headphone. However, when I opened the box, it was empty, so I had also lost the other headphone. A further deep dive in the loo was required. When I finally managed to get around to what I had come in to do in the first place, Sue shouts out "the queue is moving". After a desperate flurry of activity to suitably adjust my attire to drive the van, this turned out to be a little quip on Sue's part, which at this stage, didn't go down to well with me!

Our ferry crossing started out travelling through Marlborough Sound with fantastic scenery on both sides.

After about an hour we headed out into the Cook Strait, which was blowing a bit and had some white horses, but it did not live up to its appalling reputation, thank goodness.

Ali, we had checked out all life rafts and how to operate them!

This was a later ferry than we originally intended, so we will head to our campsite when we land and will not get to see much of Wellington. We may have to come back to New Zealand some day and take in its large cities, as we seem to keep missing them. To be honest the rural areas are so spectacular we don't really feel we are missing out too much.

We are now in North Island, so will start uploading pictures to our North Island Photo Album. We would love to get your comments.

Lots of love,

Sue and Trev xx