Saturday 23 February

Elaine Bay, Marlborough Sounds
The superlatives have all been surpassed today. We are back in the fiords, but this time in the top north east part of the South Island, so it's warm, it isn't raining and so far there aren't so many sandflies.
We spent last night on a Holiday Park Campsite in Nelson and the least said the better. Definitely our worst camping experience so far. The site was vast, the facilities excellent, but there were so many 'Don't do this' and 'Don't do that' notices I did wonder what you could do. It was in the flight path of the airport. We camped fairly close to the amenities complex as there was a BBQ there we wanted to use. The floodlights in and around it were kept on all night, shining straight into the back of our van. The volume of the radio station which was on permanently, like Musac, in the toilet block, seemed to be turned up after 10 p.m., rather than down.
We drove once again through beautiful forests and then branched off on the long road out to French Pass, at the tip of one of the peninsulas. I don't really know how to describe them, the whole area is a mass of waterways, inlets, small islands. French Pass is the most remote one and when we got there the campsite was full. It's a DoC site and you are advised to book during holiday periods. We hadn't really appreciated that it was a weekend, with a good weather forecast, so obviously it filled up with weekenders yesterday evening. There was just one very small pitch left, it sloped in two different corrections and we couldn't have got the van onto it comfortably. So we had an ice-cream and decided to go back to another DoC site we had passed on the way out, also tucked into a bay off a side road. We parked on the top of a headland as we left to finish our ice-creams and look back at the view. When we tried to pull away the wheels spun and sunk us even deeper into loose gravel. After many valiant attempts by John to get us out it was obvious we would need help, so I started walking back to the campsite to see if I could find a couple of strong blokes to give us a push. I soon flagged down a young couple in a truck and told them what had happened, they agreed to help and I jumped in the back of the truck. They managed to lift the back of the car while John drove it out. We waved our farewells and thanked them profusely.
So we didn't get to stay at French Pass, which was a lovely spot, but very crowded on this weekend. However the journey there and back was enough compensation. The road, partly sealed but mostly gravel, was cut out of a cliff side and hung precariously over a vertical drop into the sea, with no vegetation which would hinder a fall. I feel I am achieving quite a lot this trip. A few years ago I just couldn't have sat through the trip without 'ooing' and 'aahing' at every twist and turn. The scenery reached heights we haven't seen before, green forested mountains plunging into deep blue sea, bright sunlight flickering on ripples in the water and reflecting back the many shapes and forms. Every where we looked there were branches in the network of interconnected waterways.
Elaine Bay was not so crowded when we arrived, although it has filled up this evening, but still not as packed as French Pass. We walked around the headland, through forests which had a definite tropical feel to them, to another bay, called Pikawakawa. The Maori names here also lend a magical property to places. Now we are sitting quietly by the van, the sun has disappeared behind the mountains but across the bay the last rays are picking out the colours in the headland, the waves are lapping on the shore a few metres away. This is good, really really good.