Nelson to Porirua

Sunday, November 11 – Nelson to Porirua

We had a leisurely breakfast in the room and then headed out around 9:00. We had heard some of the party goers leaving the bars around 3:45 last night. We drove through the Town Centre of Nelson and headed up the valley toward Picton. It was drizzling a bit, but that didn’t seem to bother the joggers out along the sea walk. We soon hit some narrow twisty roads over the mountain and we noticed that all the evergreens we saw were all in rows, so obviously were planted. We came into Rai Valley where we got some patchy sun and where the valley flattened out. There were large dairy farms on both sides of the road, and many were irrigating. We were watching for a turnoff of highway 6 to take us over the mountains directly to Picton. We saw a sign but not a turnoff, so we kept going south toward Blenheim, thinking the turnoff must be a couple kilometers out of town. We went a ways and couldn’t see a turnoff, so we turned around and went back. The road was much better marked going the other way and we found it with no trouble. It was very steep and twisty with 15 – 20 kmh curves most of the way. When we got to the top we found a Mahau Sound lookout, so pulled in to take a look and take some pictures. We took some beautiful shots.

"town of Haveloc taken from Mahau Sound lookout on way to Picton"

"Mahau Sound from lookout"

After we took our break, we headed back on the road which continued to be twisty and slow, but there were beautiful views of bays and coves along the way. We stopped a couple of places at turnouts to take a few pictures. One of the pictures was of the Picton/Wellington ferry coming into a bay on the other side of the one we were standing on. We continued on and came down the hills toward Picton and stopped at a lookout at Shakespeare’s Bay. There were a few boats moored in the bay and on the other side was a huge log storage area, where they load raw logs onto barges or boats.

"Bob at Shakespear Bay on road to Picton"

We went a bit further along the road and came to a turnout looking over Picton and a bit further on, there was another one that we pulled into, to watch the ferry back into the loading slip. We missed watching the ferry turn around in the bay, before backing in.

"Picton-Wellington Ferry backing into slip at Picton, NZ"

"City of Picton, NZ taken from lookout near Ferry slips"

We continued into Picton and found a parking spot near the Tourist info bureau. We wandered around a bit and got some info from the Tourism office, and then found a bench on the waterfront to have our lunch. After lunch we wandered around the town before heading over to the ferry check-in. We got into line and relaxed while we waited to board.

We got on the ferry and went upstairs to relax and enjoy the scenery. The boat sailed right on time at 14:25 and it was only about half full. When you pull on to the ferry, you come on one side and pull around the center pillars so you end up facing toward the back of the vessel again. The weather was now sunny and quite nice.

"Picton, NZ from stern of Wellington-Picton ferry, departing Picton"

"Scenery leaving Queen Charlotte Sound, New Zealand - on our way to Wellington"

"Ina relaxing on stern of ferry on trip from Picton on south Island to Wellington on north Island"

We headed out of the cove through Queen Charlotte Sound and through some passages before hitting the open sea on the way to Wellington. The sea got a bit rough and it was hot in the main cabin, so we went upstairs on the deck at the stern and sat there for the rest of the sailing. We killed time by looking at the tour book on accommodation for Wellington and area. We decided to go north of Wellington to stay the night, so we wouldn’t have to go through town on our way out on Monday. We pulled into Wellington right on time as well, at 17:45. Highway 1 went both north and south, but we took the north route. We drove about 18 km and came to Porirua and found one of the motels we had seen in the book. On the way we passed a large mall with a K-mart and a Denny’s, which is the first we had seen of the Denny’s here in New Zealand. We pulled into the motel and checked in and unpacked. The owners had recommended a restaurant about 100m up the dead end road the motel was on. They did say the meals were very large, so we went forewarned.

The restaurant was called Mungavin Blues and was very nice. It looked like a large old house converted to a restaurant and the room we were seated in, was a very large one that must have been enlarged by taking out other walls. It was very nicely done. The waitress confirmed that the meals were very large, so I ordered a bowl of Seafood Chowder, and Ina ordered Spana Kopita. We then ordered an order of garlic bread for 2 and a main course of crumbed (breaded) scallops. The main meal was huge and Ina and I could barely get through it. We also had some ginger beer. We walked back to the room and relaxed before turning in around 10:30.