South Island Holiday - We'll Finish It Up, Finally!

We left Hanmer Springs Wednesday morning and took off for Nelson. The drive took us through the mountains. It was a beautiful drive even though it was foggy and drizzling. We stopped and took a family picture at the southern most point we have ever been.



About an hour outside of Nelson near the town of Murchison, we stopped at Buller Gorge. Buller Gorge boasts New Zealand's longest swing bridge, so of course we had to check it out. The bridge was about 100 ft. in the air, above a rocky, shallow river...scary!





Luckily, we made it across without any incidents, and decided to check out some of the trails on the other side. Many of these trails were made by miners back when this area was a gold mining hotspot.



Jonathan & Harrison's favorite part was the abandoned, rusted-out excavator that was left by the side of the trail. We had to pry them away when it was time to move on for the rest of the hike. But for a brief moment they were in little boy heaven.





On our way back across the gorge, we did our mandatory "New Zealand Extreme Adventure"...at least for us! We took the zip cord back to the other side. They buckled us into two seats, with the kids on our laps (we're not sure this was the most responsible moment of our parenting career, but the operators were the ones to suggest it and we figured that if we went down, at least we wouldn't leave our children orphaned and alone in a foreign country). Well, we made it to the other side safe and sound. Jonathan LOVED it and wanted to go again. We're not sure how Harrison felt about the whole experience...He was pretty quiet. But after a bit, he did say he wanted to go back to the other side, so it must not have traumatized him too much. We don't currently have any pictures of this available, but hopefully we'll have them soon, to share with all of you.

After we left Buller Gorge we made our way to Nelson, where we spent the night. The next morning we got up and headed west towards Able Tasman National Park. I made the unfortunate mistake of telling the boys we were going to a national park . Of course, they conjured up in their minds a wonderful playground full of swings, slides, ropes and all sorts of other wonderful contraptions you would find at a park. They were sorely disappointed when we told them it wasn't that kind of park. Luckily, as we were driving along, we came to a beautiful beach and directly across the street was a playground! So our first stop of the day was at a playground...check out the amazing pictures below! (absolutely stunning, isn't it!?)





When we finally convinced the boys to venture away from the playground, we made our way to the beach. It was situated on a beautiful little cove, filled with people kayaking, sailing and tubing.





We decided to do a bit of exploring on a small outcropping of rocks. As we made our way over the treacherous, slippery rocks, I mentioned to Brad that we needed to make sure the tide didn't come up too far while we were out there. Of course, he scoffed at me for worrying about such a thing (But when we got back his shoes and shorts were soaked!).



We checked out a bunch of little tide pools among the rocks and explored little caves along the edges of the large rocks. The boys had a great time wandering around the area, which was absolutely stunning!







After we made our way back, we had a picnic lunch in a secluded area at the edge of the beach and then played in the sand for a while. By this time the boys were getting tired and cranky, so we headed back to the hotel for naps.



Friday morning we had to get up early and make our way to Picton to catch our ferry back to the North Island. The following two pictures are of the harbor at Picton. It's a beautiful harbor tucked in amongst the green hills surrounding the area.





The first part of the ferry trip was through the Queen Charlotte Sound, which is shown in the following pictures. It was a great chance to see some stunning scenery.






We made it to Wellington around 1:15 in the afternoon and Brad was in the mood to drive the seven hours home to Gisborne, so we took off. Luckily, the boys were exhausted and slept for quite a while, they did a great job traveling and we only had to stop once for supper. We made it home around 9:00 in the evening and everyone was glad to sleep in their own beds.