Campervan Day 12

Historic South Street

Tasting at Founder's Brewery in Nelson

Today the craziest, strongest wind ever woke us up!  We’d planned to get up around 6:30am anyway to start our drive north to Nelson, but we woke up even earlier because our campervan was shaking side to side almost like it going to tip right over!  We noticed some huge trucks driving down the winding roads and cars as well so we decided we’d try making the drive.  Turns out driving was okay, just a few huge gusts of wind off the Tasman as we came around corners.  It was also raining pretty steadily the whole way.  So we were greeted by rain in the South Island and then sent off with rain!  In Nelson, we visited Founders Brewery and did a tasting, I actually liked a couple of them.  The Long Black, which had a hint of coffee and chocolate, the darkest of the 5, and also The Long White Cloud, a wheat beer, the lightest in color.  From there we headed into the city center for a little walk around, checking out some of the cafes and the oldest preserved street in NZ, South St, from the 1860s.  After having a look down the main streets we got back in the van and headed to Picton where we’d spend our last night on the South Island before taking the ferry at 6:30am, final check-in at 5:30!  We pulled into our site, finally at a reasonable hour, and then walked into town to have some dinner.  The place was dead!  Such a complete change from when we first arrived!  I suppose the Christmas-New Year holiday is over so most people have returned home!