New Zealand - Day Five

Day 5 - Wednesday 5th May 2010 Time to wake up and enjoy the view........

We stayed off the side of a road at a lookout in Nelson. It took us a while to find but was well worth it! Today we had to get to Collingwood so that we could take the Farewell Spit tour tomorrow morning. Motueka was a lovely little town along the way and we enjoyed wandering through.

The Gothic Restaurant was interesting and I loved the scale of their outdoor table!

I had to include some sheep! This is on the way up Takaka Hill.

WH had been to NZ the year before we got married as his parents lived in Collingwood for six months so he was somewhat familiar with the area. I had been warned that we would be travelling over Takaka Hill, climbing almost 791 metres from sea level and back down again. This was also the first place we had visited so far where the Lord of the Rings Trilogy had been filmed. We took the three movies with us and watched a bit on the laptop each night as we travelled!

Takaka itself is on the other side of the hill and the countryside is beautiful. It was one of my favourite areas that we went through.

The town was so pretty; I loved how all of the shops had hanging baskets full of gorgeous flowers!

After lunch we made our way to PuPu Springs. The water is amazingly clear! It is estimated that 14,000 litres of water are produced per second, approximately enough to fill 40 bathtubs. You are not allowed to touch the water as any contact could contaminate it.

We arrived in Collingwood with enough daylight left to grab an ice cream and have a walk around. Collingwood is a very pretty little town right on the water.

Nelson to Collingwood (133 klms)

Thank you to everyone who has been reading about our travels, it is really lovely to read your comments! xx