BIRTHDAY and beyond!!!!

We spent the last day  in the Waiarapa  up in the Eketahuna area, in the Pukaha Mt Bruce National Wildlife Centre.  The highlight of there being the Kaka birds, who although wild, are super friendly, these ones easily within arms length!

Luca was up the next morning at 5am for his birthday!  All his presents were wrapped in what I had on hand, real estate magazine papers!  🙂

His first present a block of Gouda cheese!  His favorite!  We have a thing in our home of giving food to each other, that is expensive or hard to find.  Gouda cheese in Costa Rica super expensive so we did not have it there at all, Luca savored this 🙂

Sent covertly with us by our friends in Canada, was this wall hanging that Luca had coveted in Costa Rica.  They had brought it for him when they visited us, he was so surprised and very happy to get it ,(thanks Tara, he really loved it!!! )

We gave him a pair of binoculars for bird watching, his old pair not great at all, none of us can use them properly, these new ones apparently fantastic! 🙂

On the way to catch the ferry we stopped at another reserve, ( Kaitoke Regional Park  ), some of the Lord of the Rings was filmed there.  This bridge was in it!

On the ferry across to the South Island we saw dolphins, lots of them swimming next to us, having a wonderful time! So cool for Luca on his birthday!  Luca is enjoying getting to know more about the Maori culture, this is a Tiki he and Rich made on the way across using a kit set of cutouts.  Nice way to spend the 3 and 1/2 hour trip, watching dolphins and building stuff!  🙂

We arrived in Picton early evening and went straight to our accommodation for the night.  A very cute tiny home, (very tiny!!!).  It was great, but the shared bathroom and kitchen facilities not so much!!!!!!!  REALLY needed cleaning, none of us could face the shower and we are a pretty hardy bunch!

The next morning we were up early and onto our next accommodation, it more than made up for the last experience, and we were staying for a few days, wahoo!!!!

The city of Nelson has grown so much since I was last there that I hardly recognize it!  But it is still so pretty and has a lovely feel to it.

We stayed nearer Motueka, about 50km from Nelson.  We truly were out in the country, our perfect situation  🙂  .  Motueka township has grown but still has the same alternative laid back vibe, we all liked it a lot.  

We spent our days exploring, hiking, swimming, picnicking on the beaches and generally falling in love with the Tasman area.  We went as far up as Collingwood.  The Takaka hill quite the drive but the views from there incredible!

On the last day as we were driving home 2 small dogs ran out and along the road almost getting hit by traffic, (it was a busy, main road).  We and another car stopped, (a family), and we spend ages trying to catch them.  After almost giving up, Luca and the child from the other family managed to catch them.  Very scared, but lucky dogs!!!!  The other family lived nearby and took them home to meet animal control who were in contact with their owners.  Luca was reluctant to leave them but was finally convinced they were going to be fine  🙂

It had been a day for animals, this wild Weka ,(one of NZ’s flightless birds), a cheeky little fellow appeared out of the bush while we were walking and went up to Luca, needless to say he was pretty happy about it  🙂

Then it was time to say a reluctant goodbye and go explore the west coast, off to Reefton we headed…..