South Island North East coast and Christchurch

This is another story written by John-Paul, about a three day's trip to the South Island.

The intention of this trip was threefold: doing the ferry trip between Wellington and Picton at day light, doing the Tranz Scenic train ride from Picton to Christchurch and visiting friends in Christchurch. We'd decided that a long-weekend would be perfect to accomplish all this.


Very early Saturday morning we hopped on the Blue Bridge ferry for a clouded, but very quiet sailing to Picton. Three hours later, around ten in the morning, we arrived there and had a stroll through the small town centre and enjoyed a good coffee. Many tourists there, this time of the year. At one 'o clock we boarded the Tranz Coastal train. Approximately twenty minutes late it departed from Picton Station and with scheduled stops in Blenheim and Kaikoura and also a couple of "operational stops", we arrived at Christchurch station around seven in the evening. There, we were picked up by Deanne, a friend of us (a former Dutch colleague of Bea). She married a kiwi (Simon) and they have a nice place in a quiet suburb of Christchurch. That evening we had dinner at their home and could catch up about all kinds of things.





The train ride was an awesome experience, very much comparable with the Overlander train ride, we did last year, but this time of course travelling through a very different scenery. We tremendously enjoyed it, even though during the first half of the day it was completely clouded. After the first short stretch through the hills between Picton and the Marlborough County plains where Blenheim is situated, followed by the salt works and the hills South of Blenheim, the ride roughly then follows the Eastern coast line of the South Island, very often the alongside the road, with continuous views on the Pacific Ocean.



At two places the road and rail separate from each other. South of Kaikoura, the rail has a stretch land-inwards, while the road stays near the coast. This part of the South Island can be observed by rail only.Near Kaikoura, rail and road join again. The Kaikoura railroad station locally is called the "whale"-road station, because of Kaikoura's famous whale watching experiences.

North of Kaikoura the road goes land-inwards and the rail follows the coast line, thereby traversing through very many tunnels. Again a scenic part of the country than only can be enjoyed by rail travelling. Each curve in the route offers a new view on the rugged coast line.At some spot, even sea lions can be observed.




The train has one open carriage, without windows and also without seats. Since the windows of the other carriages are made of a rather reflecting glass, which keeps the heat of the sun outside but also sadly makes taking photos difficult, this open carriage offers a great opportunity to take interesting shots.Therefore, I spent the larger part of the journey at this windy and noisy place (taking many photos, especially during the afternoon when the weather had cleared), while Bea enjoyed the comfort of the couches in the "panorama" carriage, which offers great views too. Carrying both a mobile phone, we decadently kept in touch using SMS text messages :-)





Sunday morning, our friends, Bea and me had breakfast a small restaurant nearby. This place offers a marvellous view over the relative vastness of the city. After that, Bea and I got a personal "guided tour" by our friends to and through Lyttelton, which is the port of Christchurch.














Finally, we were dropped off at the city centre and we strolled through the arts and crafts market. Very many people were visiting there. The weather was sunny and warm: nearing 30 degrees; quite a change, compared with Windy Wellington. Then we walked to Cathedral Square and enjoyed a Starbucks coffee, while watching the crowd passing by. Christchurch for us holds memories of Bea's first encounter with New Zealand and my re-encounter with this beautiful country. So we very joyfully recalled those first days in Christchurch, we experienced during November and December 2004. At the end of the afternoon we were picked up by our friends and dropped off at Christchurch airport. This time not to catch a plane, but to pick up a rental car, for driving back to Picton, the next day. The car rental was a so-called "relocation". This means that a rental company needs to have a particular car transported from one place to another. For us this also meant that the rental of this car was free of charge; a very pleasant surprise. The model of the car turned out to be a large van, offering seats for seven persons. As one might guess, Bea and I had a ball, driving this large vehicle.


That evening, Bea and I together with our Christchurch friends enjoyed a typical New Zealand meal: meat cooked on the barbecue in the garden and consumed at the dinner table inside the house, with lettuce and boiled potatoes. We did not eat outside in the garden, since a cold front had passed, the temperature had dropped the odd ten degrees and the wind had picked up a bit. For dessert we had the in New Zealand famous Hokey Pokey ice cream. Very yummy.


The next day (it was Monday and in this case Wellington Anniversary Day, a regional public holiday) it was time to leave our Christchurch friends and head back to Picton. We left around ten in the morning and with our rented van we followed the road signs that led us out of Christchurch to highway 1. This arterial highway leads from South to North, connecting Bluff with Picton and all the other towns and cities in between. The weather had turned for the better, with blue skies and a sunny 30 degrees again. Turning North on Hwy 1, Bea and I enjoyed the scenery and tried to recognise places that we passed two days ago, when travelling South on the train.


Halfway, just after one in the afternoon, we arrived in Kaikoura. It still was very sunny. At the local bakery we had something to eat (a typical New Zealand snack, called a mince-cheese pie) and our usual caffe latte. Very many tourists in Kaikoura. Also very many camper vans, a favourite way of transportation in New Zealand during the holidays. We spent about three quarters of an hour in this nice little town, situated on a peninsula, and hit the road again around two in the afternoon. The only other stops we did were photo stops, capturing the azure blue Pacific with pebble beaches.





Around four in the afternoon we arrived at my cousin Jayne's place, in Blenheim. It still was very warm and we drank tea in her garden, catching up on things. We only could stay for an hour or so, because we had to be in Picton to catch the ferry. At five thirty we dropped off our van at the car rental agency near the ferry terminal and had a quick bite at a local food place. At six o' clock we boarded the Blue Bridge ferry, but there were delays so it departed three quarters of an hour late and because of fierce winds on the Cook Strait the crossing took another additional three quarters of an hour longer than normal.







Ferry crossings (both Blue Bridge and Interislander) between Wellington and Picton vice versa are very scenic. Roughly one hour is spent getting in to or coming out of the Wellington Harbour, with great views on Wellington and its surroundings. Roughly one hour is spent traversing the Cook Strait that separates the North from the South Island. And roughly one hour is spent in the beautiful Marlborough Sounds. This time, the traversal of the Sounds was a real treat, because of the awesome sunset colours in the sky.









It was already dark, when around eleven thirty in the evening we arrived in Wellington and - after a short walk along the waterfront - arrived home, very content with a great long-weekend on the Southern Island.