Tomorrow we continue our journey on the South Island and leave Nelson for Kaikoura. Though we are both excited to continue on the journey and to go to Kaikoura, where Ted proposed to me 16 years ago, it is with mixed emotions.
We always maintained we wanted to have a break from the every 5 day rule and we chose Nelson because we had such a great time here in 2023. Great idea and our 3 weeks here confirmed that …
We met wonderful people; Aly and Robin who own the apartment motel we stayed at; CJ our wine tour guide, who shared so much about himself and Nelson and New Zealand that we felt like friends by the end of our day; Beth, who ran the pop up outfitter store (where Ted bought his Kaka Tshirt), whose son returned recently from Toronto after he and his partner ended their relationship (mom was hoping he’d get married in Canada because ‘you can do that in Canada’); Paul Stephanie, and Leah who worked at NZ Post (yes, I was there so often I got to know the three staff and Ted even thought that was funny). We just seemed to click with so many people and we had our daily routine - it was great!
But we also saw great things in and around Nelson; Queen Charlotte Sound for our weekend away; Abel Tasman for a beach day and also for a super hike day; Ted went to Farewell Spit out by Collingwood, NZ to see birds and nesting sites and had a fantastic day; we did the wine tour with CJ and it was awesome; we did our epic 68km bike to Mapua and back and Ted was a trooper and finished with time to spare (we had to drop the bikes off by 5pm and we got there are 4:45pm); we did numerous walks around Nelson, and we did visit the beach (Tahunanui) quite often - including today!
Nelson, truly was a great spot to spend our 3 weeks and we will miss ‘living’ here as we continue our journey, but I suspect we will miss it when we are home too.
Tomorrow is a new day,
Wishing everyone a great day …
Robert and Ted
Ps a farewell pic of each of us, as well as the resident dog Poppy, who would just amble into our apartment if the door was open - she was adorable!!!!!
