Monday – Wednesday 9-11 February 2026

We are sitting at Christchurch Airport ready for our departure to Sydney in a couple of hours. How fast did that go!

Our last few days have been lovely, and actually, really the world ‘lovely’ sums up our whole trip. We’ve had lots of fun, seen a lot of great scenery and sights, had plenty of rest and relaxation, and of course, eaten lots of delicious food!

We had booked the motel in Blenheim for two nights, so it was nice to not need to pack up our things before heading out on Monday morning. We had spotted the Omaka Heritage Aviation Museum on our way into town on Sunday, so this was our first stop on Monday morning. The Museum was hugely impressive. It was broken up into two huge hangers – one with WW1 aircraft and the other with WW2, and we decided to concentrate on the WW2 planes as that’s what Dave is most interested in.

The Museum is run by a charitable trust, with most of the aircraft and memorabilia on loan from private individuals. As well as lots of rare aircraft, there were also smaller items to look at – letters, logbooks, clothing, medals, photographs and one of the best dioramas I have ever seen! All well worth the look if you are ever in these parts, and even if plane museums usually don’t interest you that much (like me!)

We’d booked a boat trip on the Queen Charlotte Sound mail run, which leaves from Picton at 2pm each day. We arrived in town around 1pm, so after walking past a very decent looking second-hand bookshop, we found a cafe where Dave had a toasted cheese sandwich and I had another bowl of Seafood Chowder. This one was bigger than the last, but not quite as tasty, although the toasted garlic bread on the side was particularly good. Since we still had 30 mins before boarding, we headed back to the bookshop we had passed, where Dave found a couple of books he’d been looking for. His bag started at less that 10kg but is rapidly increasing in weight!

Boarding the ferry was easy, with around 25 others joining us on the trip. Nestled at the head of Queen Charlotte Sound, Picton serves as the vital link between New Zealand’s North and South Islands and a couple of large ferries service the route, taking passengers, vehicles and goods from one island to the other. The town is quite charming, blending maritime heritage with stunning natural landscapes. The waterways in this area are home to a number of islands and remote bays where people live in a quite isolated environment. Mail is delivered a couple of times a week and the mail ferry also serves as a tourist venture – showing people like us around the beautiful area.

The ride around the bays and islands took about 3.5 hours with eight or nine stops, including one where two gorgeous dogs greeted us warmly and enjoyed their dog treats which apparently, they get each time the mail arrives. The dogs now know to head to the wharf as soon as they hear the faint sounds of the ferry approaching!

By the time we got back to Picton it was nearly time for dinner, so after a walk around we settled on a pub that had a good-looking menu and quite a few people inside. The service was fabulous right from the beginning with a lovely woman finding us a seat and serving us promptly. While in the Marlborough region I thought it best to have a local glass of Sauvignon Blanc. Dave ordered a steak, and I ordered an entree sized mussels (yes, again!) and a side of vegetables. Everything was incredibly good, but my favourite was the vegetables, a mix of charry broccolini and corn ribs tossed in a roasted garlic butter! We may have also taken the waiters recommendation to try the apple crumble 😉 Yum!

TV and reading took up the rest of the evening, apart from a quick bedtime snack. Sometimes I even amaze myself on how much I can eat! We had seen lots and lots of corn crops along our drives and had bought a single ear of corn ($1) – which I microwaved (complete with husk) for three minutes – peeled and then sprinkled with the seasoning we found in the motel room. No butter, but actually it was really good without it. So fresh, sweet and yummy. Yet another example of the simple things often being the best!

Tuesday involved a 150km drive south down Highway 1 to Kaikoura. With a population of just over 2,000 it’s a small but pretty town, that thrives on a good tourism economy. Kaikoura is famous for a few things none less than Lobsters with it known as ‘the home of crayfish.’ What better reason to enjoy a lobster for lunch, which we did sitting on a wooden table beside the Kaikoura Seafood BBQ shack where they cooked my half lobster and 1/2 dozen scallops with garlic butter on their primitive BBQ grill. Oh, my goodness – I cannot tell you how good this was… fresh, flavoursome, salty, messy and very, very delicious. And very simply prepared and cooked – who needs fuss and bother when the basic ingredients taste this good!

You wouldn’t think the day could get much better, but it did!

I decided to look at the Get Your Guide app to see if there were any fun activities we could do for the afternoon. A last-minute discount on whale-watching from a plane was listed – and I immediately jumped at the chance. Dave decided to watch from the ground while I boarded the 10-seater light plane and headed over the ocean with the pilot and four other passengers in search of the local sperm whale. We saw three in the end – and wow, it was just unreal. The pilot flew low around and around over the top of the gigantic whales. We even got to see a pod of a few hundred dolphins on the way back to base. What a privilege! Definitely the highlight of this holiday!

We haven’t actually had fish and chips since we arrived here which just didn’t seem right, so that’s what we had for dinner on our last night in NZ. It was pretty good – not the best ever but a lovely crisp batter and the accompanying salad which had julienne beetroot and walnut was particularly good. So often side salads are dull and boring!

Last thing eaten in NZ by Dave was this – a pink lamington, served with tea for two in a roadside diner a few hours ago as we drove back to Christchurch. Again, simple but delicious, and basic roadside diners here seem to get it right!

Who agrees that the simplest things are often the best?

Signing off for now – our next big trip planned is Africa in June. Watch this space!