Wow, wow, wow!!! The South island of NZ is absolutely amazing, stunningly diverse, full of beautiful National Parks, filled withevery high adrenaline outdoor activity possible... and EVERYTHING is extremely well organized!!!
We spent 3 weeks (not enough) in this picturesque beauty and what the busy weeks they were! We've driven almost 4000 km (it's the best wayto explore the country!) and we slept almost every night in different hostel. I'm a big fan of hostels - they're many of them even inplaces you wouldn't think so, they're very clean (apart from the one we've been to) and very affordable. Some of them have the mostfantastic views or sauna or spa or free bike rents or huge DVD collection or book swap! All of them give you clean bed to sleep in,plenty of "living room space both in and outdoors, kitchen to your disposal and always good advice on nearby attractions!
Our most favorite places are:
Milford Sound (including the 119km road that connects Te Anau with Milford Sound!).
We loved Christchurch - a city with a tramway, beautiful Botanical Garden and river Avon running through. Nelson is another town thatwarmed our hearts although we didn't linger there, it had a great atmosphere. And we would love to go back to Lake Te Anau too.
The above mentioned list would be much longer if we spent more time in the South Island! We know that we definetely are going back there, oneday!
We're back on Pointzero, trying to do jobs that should be done before our next season in the Pacific islands.For example, serviceing of the liferaft was due some months ago. Today we were able to see what's inside of our life raft; some things has tobe replaced, some just need to be checked that they are in good working order...
We'll update you on the list once completed!
Hopefully, we leave the marina by the end of February and then we'll let you know about sailing in the Haruaki Golf!