“Lovely property with sea views.” The house was great. The view not so much — unless you like a sprawling, dried up valley. Needless to say, we were disappointed. But alas, a few hours later, we looked out again — a marvelous sea view! And so it went, our view went in and out with a truly remarkable tide. Although I had seen beaches shrink and grow within several yards, none of us had ever seen such a dramatic (and quick!) metamorphosis! Even when Jenny and I would go to Tahanui, the Nelson beach, we’d laugh because our “stuff” would start out close to the water’s edge. Then we’d read for a while, look up and realize we’d have to take a relatively long walk to go cool off!

Aside from the beach, the Nelson area had much more to offer. The city is convenient to Abel Tasman (New Zealand’s most famous park) and to Golden Bay. We took a day and drove to the area, which was very beautiful. We planned on visiting the wine area of Blenheim but after realizing we’d have to drive two hours back through a dizzying mountain pass after drinking, we were happy to discover that Nelson has almost three dozen wineries right in the area! We also found a few good restaurants and since we had a very well-equipped kitchen, we were able to enjoy some of Jenny’s wonderful home cooking. Two nights we had fresh fish (local blue cod and tarkhini) and our host brought over his special marinade(!) for our leg of lamb dinner.

All in all, sunny Nelson was the perfect destination for our final days in New Zealand.