South Island Road Trip Adventure: Wellington to Kaikoura

About 2 hours - 157 kms

Hi everyone , this is my google maps of all the places we stopped at when we went to the South Island. I will be breaking our trip down into sections and posting about each stage of our trip. Here's the first!

Getting there : Wellington to Picton

1st of all on Christmas Day we boarded the Interislander ferry to cross in to the South Island. The best ferry for accessibility is the Kaitaki as it has easy access to the lifts. When we drove our van onto the ferry, the staff directed us to a car park located right out side the lift. When we booked, we let the ferry company know that we were travelling in a disability van and needed lift access. Inside the ferry, we had no problem wheeling around. We had a beautiful calm day for the sailing and the passage through Queen Charlotte Sound was spectacular. The staff on board were lovely. They greeted us and informed us that if we wanted anything, we only had to ask.

Ohau Point Stephens Lookout: Seal Colony

When we arrived in Picton, we had a brief stop in Blenheim at the Golden Arches drive through for Christmas lunch(!) before driving on to Kaikoura. However, en route, we stopped at the Point Stevens lookout in Ohau , where there was a very cute seal colony. The Mum and Dad seals lazily sunned themselves on the rocks while the babies frolicked in the rock pools or clambered over their parents. The accessibly was pretty good as I could see the seals fairly easily although I had to back up a bit to peer through the railings as the fence post was at eye height - a common problem for wheelchair users. It would be good to have a panel of glass or perspex so that A wheelchair user could have an uninterrupted view.

Accessibly rating was an 8/10

Whale watching: Kaikoura

When we got to Kaikoura, mum and myself went on a whale watch tour. Everyone meets at Whale Watching headquarters to issue tickets and receive instructions. The whale watchers are then loaded onto a coach to travel to the boat in Kaikoura Harbour. We drove around to the harbour in our van as you can't get a wheelchair on the bus. On the boat, the staff were brilliant. As we boarded the boat, there was 2 steps to get down and if you had a power chair it would be very hard to get down them. An easy fix would be mobile ramps to navigate those steps. But for myself I didn't find it too bad as the crew were more than happy to lift me and my chair down the steps. We sat at the back of the cabin and that gave us easy access to the deck when we made stops to look for whales. The whale watch was a fun thing to do. It was a pity we didn't see any whales - they were obviously recovering from Christmas dinner! We were refunded 80% of our money because we didn't spot any whales.

Accessibly rating was a 7.5/10

Staff at whale watching

The staff were incredibly helpful and accommodating. They helped carry my wheelchair on to the boat and were willing to help as much as needed.

staff rating was a 10/10

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