Back to Picton

Monday 21st February, the afternoon after the 'not such a good idea' whale watch trip, we headed back up the scenic highway to Picton (gateway to the south island). Hugo was keen to check out a miniature railway that was closed when we had previously arrived .... we duely drove back to the railway again, to find it still closed. Even this is still 'summer' we have found a lot of attractions only to be open at weekends.
We checked in to our campsite and found the swimming pool, which quickly cheered the children up.
Next day we awoke to the sound of rain and saw very low cloud (or fog, same thing?) out of the windows. Shame because today we had planned to do the Queen Charlotte Drive, a scenic drive from which can be seen the sounds from great high up view points! ....Pictures to follow ....

Where is the sun?

The drive is incredibly winding and narrow, but it was worth it despite the lack of good weather to make it look even more stunning.
We stopped in Havelock for lunch at a well known spot called 'The Mussell Pot'. It was here that I had a text from my brother in the UK asking if we had experienced any 6.3 earthquakes recently? That text came 40 minutes after the quake had happened. He had noticed the end of a news bulletin before going to bed at half past midnight. During the day we gathered more information of the quake and its devastating effect. That night we ended up camping at Cable Bay. A beautiful, quiet and remote part of the coast. But unfortunately we had no internet access or mobile signal to make contact home or to read any news. It also gave us our first experience of the dreaded 'sand fly'. Worse than mosquitoes.

Lunch time in Havelock

Remote in Cable Bay

Wednesday 23rd February we left Cable bay and headed for Nelson. As we approached the town a barrage of text messages came through both our phones from friends and family checking that we were not near the devastation in Christchurch.....