Kaiteriteri

After Nelson for a couple of days, off to Kaiteriteri for 3 days and of course, it had to be during the Easter weekend with lots of other campers (we have been lucky and motorcamping has been a quiet affair up until now). Never mind, an awesome location anyway. A beautiful and picturesque bay with many delights. The motorcamp is just opposite the beach/bay (there is another one along the estuary and can be seen as you come down the hill into Kaiteriteri) with the golden (OK, a little bit of an apricot colour) sands, a huge playground a short 1 minute walk from the camping grounds, plenty of eating places and touristy attractions on offer. We explored plenty of rocks and small caves at low tide, saw penguins hiding inside some of these, took a neat boat ride and even went walking (my body needed a lot of exercise by this stage of our holiday) along forest tracks. A highlight of our trip was to go on yet another flying fox but this time, this one was on what looked like a shuttle-plane on a huge wire with a tractor winding the shuttle-plane up a big hill and then releases so you are shot forward back down the hill. What slows us down??? A small pond of water...way cool! Straight after this, we take a lovely horse ride with Mr Hone Ma Heke and his cool horse. Yes, a place to go back to when caravaning it this way again!

Blenheim and then Nelson

Blenheim was a lovely town (and the Montana winery can be found there!). Nice people and nice shops. Getting to Nelson was very scenic and once there, what a busy place! Quaint buildings and again, lovely to look at (and there were loads to see). We had fun at the Skywire adventure set up with taking a quick 20 minute ride in a 4WD van to the top of a hill, sitting on a chair (this was actually a wide flying fox) for 4 people that was attached to a wire and then shot across to another hill and then back again. Fun??? You betcha! The guide we had was informative and only too happy to show us sights on the way down the hill (we also got to feed ducks...lots of them!).

We stayed at the Tahunanui Motorcamp that backs onto the estuary in Nelson. This motorcamp has a lot of neat activities and toys to keep children busy and happy and there a loads of neat sights to see while visiting Nelson. Richmond was an area close to Nelson and so was the area of Stoke, which we visited. While there, we went to the Isel house, an historic house and grounds beautifully taken care of. Wandering around this beautiful house was encouraged. Information everywhere you look and presented well.

The Arahura

After waiting on the Wellington Port for about an hour, we began to creep forwards towards the ship. Kids all excited because the lights, the workers looking busy with 'hi-viz' outfits on , the noise and the huge underbelly of the ship were just 'the bomb'! Once aboard, we could choose what to do... movies, loads to have a feed, things to buy, buy, buy at the souvenir shop, places to walk inside and out and a playground for the children (not to mention the sleeping bunks for the children if tired - for under 6 or 7 year olds). What could we do? Well, the children played at the playground, watched tv and had loads to eat while I watched them. The big Matt spent a lot of time outside sucking in that fresh sea air!!! We finally pulled in to Picton and wow...people didn't waste any time getting things together and getting to parked cars or doors ready to get off the ship!

To Wellington

After leaving Masterton, we headed to Wellington going past Carterton, Greytown, Featherston, the Rimutaka Hill Ranges, a cafe in the middle of the ranges, Kaitoke, Te Marua and finally Upperhutt. We stopped here for about an hour and a half to rest up a bit. The places just mentioned before make us really want to come back to Masterton! Travelling through all these towns only took about 40-50 minutes and they were gorgeous! The Rimutaka Hills remind us how we need to buy a better truck! 1/2 way down, we could smell our brakes so we needed to stop for a 'brake'! I would have loved to have stopped at the cafe at the top but that was on the right hand side of the road so on we went! After stopping at Upperhutt for a rest, we carried on with the flow of the traffic to the Wellington ferry port and there were cars everywhere! We finally get to our port and as we finish checking in and pull up to our place in the cue, we see some 'well-knowns' from Kawerau also heading to the South Island for a break!

To Masterton

We continued on our journey with Masterton with our goal for the second night stay. We passed through these towns... Tikokino, Ongaonga, Norsewood (you don't actually go through here, we just saw a shopping opportunity), Matamau, Piripiri, Dannevirke (there was a cool viking ship cut in half and spread out a little with a playground in between! The town was pretty cool too!), Tahoraiti, Oringi, Waiaruhe, Papatawa, Woodville (there was a prep school here...well I think it was here), Ngawapunrua and we stopped at Mangatainoka. Does this name sound familiar??? Well it should! That's the place that the Tui's Brewery can be found in and everything (like every other town and city in NZ) has Mangatainoka displayed on its shop billboard. Why does this sound so amazing??? All the shop signs (there aren't many) and place signs in this small town, start with Mangatainoka and they are all black and orange! (It only means more since we know the ads so well with those girls on it looking like they are working). On a bit further we hit the lovely town of Pahiatua and the first thing that you see is a huge yellow plane with the rest of the playground behind it. Right opposite the playground is the Police Station. A sign that graces this playground is "...This playground is for persons ages 14 and below. You will be prosecuted..." you can think of the rest.. WOW! This playground has it (you are probably thinking that we only stop at playgrounds...well yes. We had two boys that can only be good for so long, so the option of 'being good and you can play in the next town's playground' sounds pretty A.O.K to me!). Pahiatua looks like a lovely town that was bigger than I thought it would have been. We continued onto Masterton and right from the word 'go', we knew we'd come back to this town for future holidays! An awesome play park (I mean 'way big' and 'loads to do'). We stayed at the Mawley's Motorcamp and we loved it here. Quiet, playground and a short walk into town.

Napier

We're at Napier on our first night stay and we didn't quite make it to the motorcamp we were actually heading to (its in Napier and has 4 Qualmark stars). After travelling so far with a 6 year old that insists on singing the same line over and over aagain and doesn't want to sleep, we've decided to pull into the first available motorcamp because we don't care anymore about stars!!!! Its called the Affordable Westshore Holiday Park and we loved it here. Lovely and tidy, 2 playgrounds (one right outside our site with a tramp with a net and other cool objects like a tractor and the other out the back with a flying fox and balancing swing for 2). We had no need to go into town and just across the road is a bar and cafe and something else. We only stayed here one night and we loved it!!! The patrons were very lovely and very helpful. Can you tell we liked it here!?!

Hi. We began our trip with heading towards Napier for our first night stay. We stopped at the Rangitaiki Cafe just 20mins outside Napier (we actually stopped here about 3 years ago after almost being wiped out by a forestry truck...and yes, it was in the forest). They have lovely old pics of yester year and they're very nice people (the service is lovely and a little bit slower). Anyway, on to Napier past many fine scenes of country and I had a kick out of going past the Tarawera Farm Station (I live outside Kawerau and we have many areas with the first name being 'Tarawera...' and we have a Rangitaiki River!). Nice wineries and I know there are more to come!!!

whanau2tikitour

Hi there Campers
Welcome to this blogspot. My family and I are touring around the top part of the South Island at the mo (sorry, we haven't got the time to view the middle and the bottom...another holiday). Check out the places we go to.