After we'd picked up our hire car in Picton, we didn't really have a clear idea as to where we were heading next, which is the beauty of a road trip! We'd just see where the wind takes us. Our only plan is to get right down to the bottom of the South Island as far as Bluff and we'd stop at as many places take our fancy along the way. As soon as we left the port, I noticed the difference between the North and the South islands, the south appeared to be more rugged and seems like it has a more laid back vibe.

Kaikoura - fish and chips

We used our camping app and I was looking for places of interest and first one that came up was Kaikoura . The app has gps so it flags up most of the tourist hot spots nearby. Kaikoura is famous in New Zealand to go whale and dolphin spotting, so we though we'd come and check it out. We drove for around 2 hours before we reached our destination. It was roughly 160km. It was around lunchtime and we were both hungry so we pulled up and parked up near the beach to find somewhere to have a bite to eat. There seemed to be a few fish and chip shops dotted about, so us being traditionally English though what a better place to stop for fish and chips than by the sea! It's what us Brits are known for. The smell of them was tempting us in. I don't even eat fish and chips that much at home- honestly, but boy did they taste good! We sat outside on some picnic benches and for all we knew, we could have been in England.

Whale not watching

After lunch, we had a wander down to the beach and walked up towards where you can go whale and dolphin spotting . We saw a helicopter on the beach, perhaps they hover up in the air spotting all the whales and dolphins. We visited the centre where you book tickets and I though the tickets would be expensive, but I didn't realise that it would be $150 dollars! As we'd seen the whales last month in Argentina, we decided to give it a miss. It's a bit expensive for our budget! The dolphin tours were nearly $200 if you wanted to swim with dolphins. I guess it depends how much you really want to do something which is once in a lifetime, but after John's encounter with a dolphin, we decided to give that a miss too!

Sea lions

Instead, we decided to have a drive around. At another beach in Kaikoura our app told us of a place where you can see some sea lions for free- now that's what we like! As we were driving towards that part of the beach, we saw a beautiful area which had some cool rock formations. We parked up for a bit and wandered down on to the beach . John scrambled across the rocks and was off exploring. He thought he saw something moving in the distance, so beckoned me over and we saw some cute little sea-lions there in the distance. We watched them for a bit then decided to head off to wherever our next destination would take us.

Hanmer Springs

We weren't sure where that would be, but after a little research on the camping app, we came across a place called Hanmer Springs, Thermal Pools and Spa - a stunning complex of natural thermal pools and a massage pool. Just what we need for a bit of relaxation time! We drove from Kaikoura to Hanmer and it was a pleasant drive of around 130km, which took us around two hours. By the time we got there, it was early evening so we needed to find somewhere to stay close to the springs. We couldn't find any free campsites nearby, so just chanced it by parking up somewhere away from the main road. We saw a camper van parked there, so we thought we'd be ok parking up there too. It was an added touch to find out that there were some public toilets in the vicinity.

An unexpected visitor!

So after finding our spot for the night we started preparing our dinner and got our little camp stove out next to the car. If anyone was passing us while we were cooking they would have probably wondered what the hell we were doing . But once we'd prepared our gourmet meal we sat eating it in the car. We'd just finished when we noticed another car driving in, by now it was nearly dark so the headlights were beaming in on us. The car pulled up next to us and a guy got out of the car and tapped on the drivers window. John wound it down and we realised it was a policeman. He was asking us why we pulled up here. We told him we'd just arrived and were stopping for a rest and he said as long as we didn't cause any trouble we could stay there. So knowing that a cop had agreed we could stay for the night, we settled down for a nigh camping out in our car!

We'd had a pretty decent nights sleep considering we'd slept in the car overnight, well it did feel a bit cool to be sleeping out in the tent anyhow. We had our breakfast, got ready and then drove into the village of Hanmer. There's lots of forests here and you can do cycling and walking trails, but as we're only here for a couple of days, we decided to just do a bit of walking in the forest and then we'd visit the springs the next day . Hanmer is a small village which seemed fairly laid back, there are lots of hiking and cycling shops around. We had a wander about and found out where the springs were and decided we'd go there tomorrow.

Forest walk and a picnic

For the rest of the afternoon we went back to where we stayed and took a walk through the woods. There was a short trail and a longer one, we decided upon the lazy short trail. We wandered around and there were lots of signs to name the types of trees in the forest, but no Californian redwoods to be found here. There were lots of dog walkers and we came across some ducks in a pond. It was peaceful around here. Once we'd completed the circuit we decided to have a picnic in the woods. We'd found a nice spot by a bench and there was also a big tree to shade us from the sun. We got our camp stove out and cooked up some food. We stayed here for a couple of hours watching the world go by then went for a drive . We parked up in the same spot as last night ready to visit the springs in the morning.

Hanmer Springs- sulphur pools

We went to the thermal pools the next morning stored our things in a locker and went to enjoy the pools in the sunshine. There are lots of different pools, all of varying temperatures, including three sulphur pools ranging from 40-42 degrees Celsius. The water is completely natural coming straight from the nearby thermal bore with no chlorine added. These pools sit above the ground in recognisable volcanic rock cladding and offer great views over the complex. We got in these pools and they were boiling hot- you couldn't stay in there for too long! After the hot pools, we went into some with a much more moderate temperature to cool right down.

Aqua Therapy massage pools

We then went to the Aqua therapy pools which originated in Europe and is a new form of water relaxation and massage to benefit the body . It is credited with increasing flexibility and strengthening muscles, improving balance and agility, decreasing joint swelling and pain and helping with a number of medical conditions. Each of these pools have different features one includes a waterfall, the second has a series of water jets to massage your body and the third has powerful water and air jets. The water flows between the three pools via waterfall creating a relaxing, bubbling sound that adds to the sense of escape. Needless to say we spent quite a while in these pools relaxing and enjoying the massaging air jets!

After these pools we decided to take a break from the water and grab some lunch. It's quite expensive here, but you can't really take in your own food so you are tied to their prices. I felt like having an ice cream and John had a smoothie to rehydrate, then we laid on the grass to soak up the sun for a while. Once we'd refreshed ourselves we decided to get back in the water to make the most of our day. We went into some of the rock pools . These pools are an incredible place to soak up the goodness of Hanmer's natural thermal waters. Then we went into the hexagonal hot pools, where there are huge umbrellas to shade you from the sun. We also went to the freshwater pool and the rainbow pools. It was good to just relax and watch the world go by.

We must have spent a good 3-4 hours in the pools but by now, our skin was starting to shrivel up, so we knew it was time to get out and get showered. We both took a nice hot shower and then sat out on the picnic benches for a while before leaving. We've had an enjoyable day visiting and relaxing in the pools and I would say it's well worth stopping off on route to somewhere else. We stopped in Hanmer for one more night before continuing our road trip the next day.