Crossing From New Zealand’s North Island To South Island

by | Jan 12, 2018 | How Did You Do That?, New Zealand, Public Transportation, Winter 2017: Australia & New Zealand | 0 comments

Last night we befriended a fellow New Yorker (and certified sommelier!) named Elif last night while dining at Ortega Restaurant, where she then joined us for a shisha session and a dance party that lasted into the wee hours of the night. Thanks for making us all complicit in enabling you to delay your bedtime by nearly 7 hours. Oops! Totally worth it.

 

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Therefore we only got in 3-4 hours of sleep today, waking up 7:30am in a tired attempt to make an 8:15am check-in at the Interislander Ferry Terminal for our 9am ferry to the South Island.

 

 

We quickly dropped off our bags at check-in and boarded our ferry.

 

 

This ship is fully stocked as if we were going on a 1 month cruise around the world. It has EVERYTHING, including a café/bar:

 

 

An 3-floor indoor viewing deck:

 

 

Multiple lounges, souvenir shops, restaurants/cafeterias and cafés:

 

 

And a kid’s play area with 2 cinemas ($10 NZD for adults, $5 for kids) on the 2nd floor. They were playing Thor’s Ragnarok!

 

 

Or you can enjoy the views from the 10th floor observation deck;

 

 

The ride took about 3.5 hours to reach Picton from Wellington.

 

 

We then promptly disembarked at 12:30pm:

 

 

It was at this point where we collectively decided to change our itinerary. The original plan was to stay overnight in Picton, catch a morning Intercity Bus to Christchurch, stay overnight in Christchurch, and take another Intercity bus to Queenstown the morning after, arriving on the 14th. However, knowing that there’s nothing much to do in Picton, the group collectively agreed to cancel the Intercity buses, rent a car, and drive to Christchurch immediately after arriving into Picton, pushing up our stay a night earlier and getting to Queenstown on the 13th.

This would allow us an extra day in Queenstown to go skydiving among other outdoorsy activities in the self-proclaimed “adventure capital of the world”!

So once we arrived into Picton’s Interislander Ferry Terminal, Taylan and Mary hired this 8 seater minivan for our roadtrip!

 

 

We then made a pitstop at the local Makana Confections/Chocolate Factory briefly to pickup some decadence. . . .

 

 

. . . before being redirected by roadworkers from driving to Christchurch on an original 6 hour route to an alternative 8.5 hour one due to “some rock that fell on and now is blocking the road.” Right

So we booked it and actually arrived in Christchurch on time at 8:30pm.

 

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- At time of posting in Picton, New Zealand, it was 15 °C - Humidity: 100% | Wind Speed: 11km/hr | Cloud Cover: foggy

 

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