After checking out of the hostel in Wellington Thursday morning, I did a brief driving tour of the city, passing The Beehive (NZ’s columnar parliament building that looks exactly like a beehive) and through the central business district.  I found a place to park, grabbed a cup of coffee, and walked to the Museum of Wellington, another free museum on the waterfront.

The exhibits here covered Wellington specifically, and there was a detailed, room-sized timeline of the past 100 years of the city’s history, which I found to be surprisingly interesting.  Especially the part that said that until 1967, all pubs in the city closed at 6PM, and that the country narrowly missed entering a Prohibition at about the same time the US did (one vote away, I believe).  Also interesting was the list of people who have swam across the Cook Strait (the youngest being just 11 years old), the fact that Wellington had city-wide fibre-optic laid in 1996, and a prosthetic hairy Hobbit foot from The Lord of the Rings. Upstairs, there was a great exhibit about the Wahine disaster of 1968, in which a passenger/vehicle ferry (very similar to the one I’d be taking that afternoon) got caught in a storm in the Cook Strait, hit bottom, and slowly sank, claiming 51 lives.

Unfortunately, I had a ferry to catch so I didn’t get to see everything I’d hoped to see in the museum…another place to spend some time when I come back to Wellington.  I was only in the city for 24 hours, but I truly enjoyed it.  If I ever finish my wandering and decide to settle down somewhere before I come back to the US, Wellington is my first choice so far.  It is a great little city.

While checking in for the ferry, I was informed that it was running over an hour late so I sat in line in my car, made arrangements for a place to stay that evening,  and read for a bit.  Once on the ferry, I was surprised at the level of comfort aboard.  There was a café/restaurant, bar, kiddie play center, souvenir shop and even a movie theater.  I spent the 3.5 hour ride soaking in the views on deck and then having a few beers while reading before going back on deck to watch as the boat entered The Marlborough Sounds.

This region, at the very northern end of the South Island is littered with picturesque islands and protected bays, with mountains rising thousands of feet out of the sparkling blue sea.  The South Island certainly welcomes you with beauty as you cruise through the sounds.

We landed in the small port town of Picton, and at 7:05PM I touched foot (or wheel, really) on the South Island for the first time. I made my way to Blenheim, where I had reservations at a hostel.  The Marlborough region of the country is the heart of NZ’s wine production, and there are a number of casual/temporary jobs working in the vineyards.  The hostel I checked into has connections with a recruitment agency that finds jobs for backpackers, and I was told that I would be able to start working as soon as Monday.  This is awesome…Tim needs cash.

I spent the evening getting to know some of the other travelers at the hostel, almost all of whom were working either in the vineyards rubbing buds or in the factory bottling wine.  I was told I’d have a choice of which I’d rather do…both pay about $13/hour and provide 40-60 hours of work a week.  And I was told it would be no problem to work for just three weeks.  Perfect.

The next morning, I woke up to a completely empty hostel (everyone was at work) and decided to spend the first half of the day exploring the Queen Charlotte scenic drive and walkway, which meanders along a part of the Marlborough Sounds coastline.  The scenery was stunning, and I had a blast driving my car on impossibly narrow and winding roads that hugged the steep mountains above the sea.  I got out and walked for a few hours and had some spectacular views.

When I got back to the hostel, I went food shopping, did some laundry, and made plans with a few other guests to go wine tasting the next day.  The area is very similar to Napa/Sonoma Valleys in CA, and there are dozens of wineries within ten-minute drive of the hostel.  We plan to spend all day tasting wine…starting at 9:00 AM…a few hours earlier than I normally start drinking.  It should be a fun day…