The Queen Charlotte Drive, Nelson, and Motueka

Leaving Picton and heading west, you jump right into a curvy but scenic stretch of highway called the Queen Charlotte Drive. It winds along the coast with great views of the sounds. We took our time on the road - not that you can go fast with all the hairpin curves on it - and enjoyed the views. 

Some views from the road

 

Last overlook before Havelock

   

  The drive to the first major town, Nelson, isn't that far in distance - about 100 kilometers - but it takes a while because of all the curves and mountainous turns. So by time we got to Nelson, we were ready to stop and rest for a while. Lucky for us, Nelson was getting ready for their Christmas parade, so there was plenty going on in the town.   

Everyone had holiday spirit!    

We walked to the end of the city center and found the main city steps, which we learned have been a gathering place in the town ever since they were built. This day wasn't any different, because people were staring to get their spots there for the Christmas parade. At the top there was a beautiful church building, and Mass was just letting out.   

The town steps

 

   

The Anzac statue

  We stopped by the Nelson harbour on our way out of town. 

After a quick lunch in the next town of Richmond, we pressed on to our final destination of Motueka. Motueka is the last major town before the Abel Tasman Nationa Park, so I'd booked us an Airbnb outside the town. This Airbnb was a little farmhouse, nestled in amongst wineries, cattle farms, and fruit trees. It sounded quaint on the site and I really like staying at places that give you a feel for  every day life in a place. But this place maybe bordered on a bit too quaint for my tastes! We decided to skip the second night there, and try our luck farther north.  

View from our farmhouse

 

The farmhouse

  Slightly disappointing Airbnb aside, Motueka was an interesting place to explore. Even though it was the biggest dot on the map for miles, it's not a very big town. It has one main strip, which is the road going through town, with a few restaurants and shops on it. It also had a Woolworths, which I think must be the mark of a major township here! We found our way down to the shore. It was windy, windy, windy! I haven't felt wind like that since I was in Sweden. It was so fierce, the sand was just blasting into us and you really had to lean into it to walk.  

    Wind aside, the beach was cool. It was a bit unusual - the sand was very gray, and the beach was really wide.   

Needless to say, we didn't spend much time on the beach! We did drive a bit farther down to the central beach area, where to our surprise, we found this old shipwreck. In true New Zealand style, there were no signs about it, but we looked it up that night and learned that it was the Janie Seddon, a ship built back in 1900. It was used in both World Wars and then as a fishing boat before it was grounded off Motueka. It's been there for years and years, and has rusted and decayed through in most places. But the town loves it and loves having it as a distinctive landmark - plus they don't have the money to remove it - so there it sits.   

  Our day in Motueka ended with one of the few restaurants open in town at the late hour of 5:30. We got takeaway pizza from "Pizza Plus," which was an interesting place. For one, the eating area was stockpiled with sacks of beans and rice - neither of which were ingredients for menu items. Also, there was a loft above the kitchen where either the owners live, or they just stow old matresses in. I'm not sure which is worse! Finally, our pizzas were a bit unusual: Dad's had ham, BBQ sauce, and mayo, and Mom and I split a veggie pizza (hold the onion please!) which oddly had just pineapple, peppers and definitely onion. But we weren't about to complan about getting a warm meal when so many places were shut! Plus, they were actually really tasty - Pizza Plus is on to something. =)  

Mmmmm! Pizzas and mattresses!

 

Happy to have a warm dinner