Having spent more time in wine country drinking beer than drinking wine, we thought it best to stop and visit at least one winery before we headed up to Nelson (widely reputed to be one of New Zealand's havens for craft beer). There are so many wineries in Marlborough it is hard to pick which to visit, so we went to Allan Scott, which is the winery owned by the father of the Moa brewer. We had been impressed with Moa the day before, so were hoping that Allan Scott wouldn't disappoint.
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| Looking good so far... |
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| As nice on the inside as it was on the outside. |
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| It's not ideal to take a vehicle wine touring, but the Spaceship takes us in style. |
Lucky us, the wine was delicious and the hostess in the cellar door was very friendly. We ended up walking away with a bottle of their fantastic 2012 Sauvignon Blanc. By this point, the Spaceship was getting weighty under the weight of beer and wine from the Allan Scott family, so we hightailed it out of Blenheim towards Nelson. Some lovely views along the way:
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| Lovely despite the clearcut in the top centre of the shot. |
Nelson is one of the bigger towns on the north of the south island, and we thought it was great.
This church sits atop the hill (yes, the one hill) in downtown Nelson. It was supposed to be a lot taller, but the top wasn't ever constructed. The view back to town from the top of the hill:
Nelson is also known for its coffee. We stopped at a place called Kush, where Chad enjoyed a flat white and I had a hot chocolate to warm me up when it suddenly started raining!
After that we headed up into the hills to the campsite we had chosen for the night. Only $6 each for a spot, and it had a kitchen, hot showers, and sounded promising. Little did we know that you get what you pay for... to get to the bathrooms we had to climb over a sheep fence, ours were the ghetto bathrooms stocked with plastic toilet paper, and the place was rife with signs telling patrons how to behave (e.g., "Keep the kitchen! Tidy!!! Clean!!!"). All good for a laugh, but rather than sitting around reading signs ("$6 campers: Please cook in the kitchen and then take your food back to your [picnic-table-less] sites") we headed back downtown to the Nelson Freehouse, known for its craft beer selection.
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| It's in an old church - the perfect place for the worship of craft beer :) |
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| A tasty pint beside the Nelson Craft Beer Trail pamphlet - not quite as set up as the Bend Ale Trail, but appreciated nonetheless! |
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| Out front is an "event yurt". Much fancier than the one we camped in earlier this summer. They often have live music playing in there. |
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| Doesn't this picture look like we hardly know each other? Taken by a friendly Irish couple that we met and with whom we chatted away the evening. |
In the McFrothys' opinion, Nelson is well worth the rave reviews!
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