Friday 27th April. Nelson to Kaikoura.

View from my bed in the morning.

Raining very heavily this morning, first real rain we have had. Sadly had to leave our beautiful view over Nelson. But more adventures await!The weather over the past two weeks has been abnormally dry and calm, so the locals say.  We headed out along an extremely windy coastal road along the Marlborough Sound, such a big area of deep water and huge, heavily vegetated islands dropping steeply into the sound.  Our journey took us through Havelock (Mussel capital of NZ ) then through Picton.  

We finally made it to Bleihem, wine capital of NZ, and had a divine lunch of blue cheese soufflé with pear and pecan salad at Wairau River Winery . The boys gorged on really delicious wood fired pizzas.  We then of course enjoyed some wine tasting, and they really were all good.

Hard to see but there are about 40 pups
swimming in the pool!

Our travels then took  us on to Kaikoura on the East coast. Along the way some locals told us we had to visit a waterfall close to the coast road. We stopped and headed up the walkway which ran along a creek, which ran from the sea up to a waterfall. All along the way we kept seeing all these baby seals making their way either upsteam or downstream. At the waterfall the pool was literally boiling with pups jumping all over the place. We estimated there were at least 40-50 in the pool let alone all the others we saw on the way up. It really was one of the most amazing experiences – I have never seen anything like it. They mums have them up there so the pups are safe and they stay up there until they are weaned. The mums are all on the roacks by the sea and the pups travel down the creek to them every few days for a feed then back up to their waterfall.

Our accomm in Kaikoura was a great two storey, 2 bedroom apartment right on the beach. The mountains that overlook Kaikoura even had some snow. Weird standing on a beach and looking at snow.  David cooked up some fresh mussels we got in Havelock with a local sav blanc and they really were delicious. First time i have actually enjoyed mussels. We are still having a ball. Got tired about halfway through the trip, but we are now in the zone and really not ready to stop our travels at all!!!