Wander & Nest

Wylie’s parents and aunt and uncle make the long trips from Virginia and Bangkok to come visit us for two weeks near the end of our stay in New Zealand. We had been talking about their visit for a while so Mara was very excited to see her grandparents. It was the first time she met her grandpa in person.

We planned a big NZ trip for their visit, we had been looking forward to it for months and it did not disappoint! Of course it didn’t, it’s New Zealand 🙂

We started in Christchurch and took the scenic Tranzalpine train across the southern island to a small town called Greymouth. As expected the scenery on the 5 hour train was stunning. Even though we missed out on the snow covered mountains and hills because lots of it has melted by now, we had a beautiful clear day with gorgeous green hills, towering mountains, blue-rivers, waterfalls, bridges, and of course sheep. Mara did so great on the train, she’s clearly on track to be a lover of public transit like her parents.

On the West Coast of the South Island we hopped in our rented (hired) 12 seater minibus to continue along on our journey. Our first stop was in Pt Elizabeth for 2 nights at an Airbnb on the water. I feel like it’s getting old at this point to talk about how incredible the views were, but it’s really just amazing. Mara made friends with the weka birds, not a kiwi bird but another NZ flightless bird. They were super friendly and funny, clearly they lived there and we were in their space.

We went down to the town of Hokitika and did the short Hokitika Gorge hike. So many hikes in NZ have pedestrian swing bridges over huge rivers and gorges. They are very cool, but probably not for you if you have a fear of heights!

After a couple of nice days on the west coast we loaded into the minibus and headed for Nelson. Another beautiful drive this time along the wild West coast. We stopped at the Punakaiki (pancake rocks) for a quick walk around the super interesting rock formations. Mara loved the big roar of the powerful ocean against the rocks! Every time we’ve stopped at a super touristy destination like this we are surprised at how they’re never that crowded. Even if it’s busy by NZ standards, it’s always possible to park, easily walk around, and not feel clustered with hundreds of people.

We had a nice few days in Nelson, including a day at Abel Tasman national park, then Picton and finally the coastal pacific train back to Christchurch, but more on all of that in the next post.