Day 6 a boat to wine country
A 6 am wake up brought the cold wellington wind, and the
colder realization that it was Saturday in America not Sunday and therefore I
would not be having my first ever nautical Cleveland Brown-out with the sweet
free wifi on “the Bluebridge” inter island ferry (the single largest
wifi-hotspot in NZ). This turned out to be a blessing however because after we
parked the Diwali on board and logged on we realized that it must be dial-up
and that you could hear the early 90’s sreeeechhh-brrrrrammmmm-shreeech-beeeeep-chhhhhhsssss
sound over the engine noise. Tash almost got facebook loaded by the time we
reached Picton on the south Island. No matter though, as I’ve indicated before
we’re Deiters, and so I took in the sights from the top deck before catching a
nap and tash got some sweet tips on where to go in the south Island from local
lady who does bike tours of New Zealand. When we off loaded 3.5 hrs later we
decided to take the “Queen Charlotte scenic route” to Blenheim in NZ wine
county because it’s a fairly bold claim when a road is called “scenic” in NZ.
The road was paved in gold and the prime minister was there riding a winged sheep
with rainbow wool and he was handing out $100 bills….Kidding, it was a
beautiful road up a mountain that led to a peak where you had an almost 360
degree view of the valleys (Picton where we came from and Marlborough where we
were headed). You have to stop yourself from being spoiled here (oh its just another
beautiful snow capped mountain lava-glacier with a river running into a valley,
yawn) because you can’t overstate the casual beauty of this place. It’s so in
your face all the time that it can almost slip into the background. We took
some pics and soaked it in before heading down into the wine capital of NZ. After the obligatory stop at the “pack-n-save” We checked into a
“holliday park” which in NZ campsite terms means a spot with power for all of
our gadgets in the Diwali, hot showers, a real deal kitchen, and possibly
Internet. We lucked out with this one because it was beautiful (it had a river
with a bunch of ducks and was very clean and well kept), it had the sweetest
Internet access we’ve seen in NZ (hence all the pic’s and vids the other day) and the owner
spent about 25 minutes outlining where we should go on our wine country tour
the next day. Dinner was lamb shoulder and veggies before one bottle of wine
got us prepped for our tour tomorrow (It’s like stretching before a marathon)
wish us luck.
So today began with the realization that my North Face
fleece that I accidentally left in the holiday park kitchen had been stolen.
Super beat I know but lets’ be honest, my mom will tell you that she’s proud I
held onto it this long, and it’s probably karmic revenge for all of the looks
she and my dad got when 8 year old Sean “didn’t need” a jacket going to church
in December when it was 14 degrees “cause I’m not cold.” (Random “free” coats
kept showing up in our pew). Anywho, we’re still Deiter’s and its not like
we’re going to a glacier next week….oh wait…but while we’re on the subject it’s
a black north face fleece so if you see somebody wearing one, call the cops
cause its probably mine. Now that the
bad news is out of the way let’s get in to the best day of the trip so far.
After we called off the search for the jacket we went up and picked out our
bikes, or more specifically after we promised Yevette and Murry (the super nice
couple who run the holiday park) that we would call them if it got too windy
(100k gusts and stern/concerned looks from Murry, were in the forecast). We got
on our tandem bike and headed out. I’ll say now that this bike is a classic
example of a terrible idea of mine that my wife will indulge (knowing its
terrible) because she loves me. Tandem it seems is latin for heavy as heck and
this thing had our legs aching before we reached our first winery. We were wobbling down a gravel road arguing
about which one of us wasn’t peddling before we arrived at rows upon rows of
grape vines and a beautiful winery straight out of central casting. The man
taking us through the tasting was so nice and even had the class to act
surprised when we told him this was our first ever wine tasting. (my Cleveland
browns t-shirt may have given that away) He took us through about 10 different
wines, which we later learned that we were supposed to taste and spit out
rather that taste and swallow (so that’s why he kept telling us where the
spittoon was). We got a bottle and walked around a bit before heading down the
road to our next spot. So if you picture this place its vineyard after vineyard
with neat rows of grapes stretching out in all directions. Some are ringed with rose bushes, others are lined
with orange or lemon trees and because its New Zealand they threw in beautiful
mountains in the background everywhere. Just over the top beautiful. Some
vineyards market and sell their own product right off the farm and others sell
their grapes to be processed elsewhere by commercial brands you may have heard
of. The largest vineyard in the region produces 3million cases per year (8-12 bottles
per case) but our second stop was by far the smallest in the region, a husband
and wife operation doing 2000 cases per year, that’s been open for 9 years
chasing a dream, focusing on one type of grape and handpicked quality. We went
in and got the presentation from the wife Julie who was super nice and spoke in
a way that made you understand the passion they have for their product and for
each other. We had another 7 tastes before we were laughing and joking like
family. At this point the husband Howard comes out of the back and asks tash “are you a
typist love,” we translated it with the same strange look that you have on your
face right now and she said “I think so” so next thing you know were in the
back office (where I discover they have been hiding a puppy this whole time, a
purebred weimaraner no less) and tash is on the computer bolding type for an add
that was going into a brochure they were putting out. Fantastic. PS in addition
to being nice the wine was some of the best we had all day. From there we
peddled on down the road to the Giesen Winery and tash must have worked up some appetite
sleeping with her feet up on the back of the bike because after the next
tasting we worked our way through what amounts to an antipasta platter with
many different meats and treats that was out of this world. From here we picked
up some Irishmen who recognized tash from Ireland (they all know each other
there) and set off as a foursome to a spot that focuses on champagne. A couple
of sips of free bubbly later and were floating to the only sort of downer of
the day. Hanz Herzog where sort-a drunk foursomes are apparently looked down
upon. (sorry I remembered my helmet and forgot my pants hanz) It was fine but
pricy wine (the only $10 tasting of the day, most were free) but the beautiful
back patio was closed and that was a bummer. At this point out we realize our
pallets had taken all the punishment they could handle and decided to wash it
all down with a trip to “moa Brewery” the only brewery in the region. They are
a craft brewery that is on the way up and they are super pumped about securing
a deal to be the official beer of team New Zealand for the next Olympics. One
beer and one super awesome tandom bike burnout from an Irishman later we turned
our chariot (now loaded up with wine bottles) into the wind and headed home.
After what felt like a tour de France stage later we gave the bike back a
clearly relieved Yevette and Murray and finished the day with fine wine,
hamburgers on the grill and a free tape delay of the Cleveland Browns getting pounded
by the packers on NFL.com. I was so happy I couldn’t even get mad.
Today stumbled out of the gate with our latest departure to
date 12noon, which can be expected/forgiven after the herculean effort we put
in yesterday. We ate a leisurely breakfast and set off on what turned into an
epic day of seal watching. (quick go put on “kissed by a rose” before reading
the rest of this) So we ran our favorite play (load up at the pack-n-save and
then go for a ridiculously beautiful drive) and ended up in Kaikora on the east
coast, 2.5 hrs south of wine country. Our first stop was a forest stream with a
waterfall where seal pups safely frolic like 2 feet from you while their moms
go feed at sea. Did your head just explode? So it’s a real place as you will see
from the video and it is an overdose of cuteness. You don’t even notice the
pretty good waterfall as the pups chase each other, toss sticks around and
otherwise make you wonder what the fine is for snatching one and taking it with
you on a world tour. Hey Duke cancer clinic 3-2, have you considered the
therapeutic effect of a seal pup waterfall area? I bet MD Anderson (a top
cancer facility in texas for those who don’t know) doesn’t have one of those. After
we pried ourselves away from the seal pups we visited two more seal colonies
with at least 200 more seals and you don’t have to be Heidi klum to know that’s
a lot of seals. The second area was a rocky beach that you could walk out
amongst the blubbery beasts as long as you stayed 10meters away (does that mean
arms length? Who’s got time to learn the metric system with all these seals
around) It also featured a sea gull nesting area with thousands of hugely
annoying birds (yeah we get it CAW CAW CAW, take it down a notch buddy) . From
there we drove to a campsite that had free wifi (or at least wifi that we didn’t
pay anyone for) which really sealed it for us. It was another great day in the Diwali
I'll happily change careers to be in charge of the seal pup waterfall area! Sounds like you two are having a great time! Love the updates!
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