The moment I was most excited for on our New Zealand trip was seeing the town where my mother was born and lived her early years. The south island houses Christchurch where she was born, and where we started this half of our trip! To see our tour of the north island, click here!
CHRISTCHURCH
We had the best tiki tour of Christchurch from my cousin Duncan (technically my mom’s cousin). We walked all over town and through the Botanical Gardens, had brunch at Vic’s cafe (which was amazing), drove to Sumner beach where my mom used to live, and even to one of my great grandmother’s resting places.
One of my very favorite moments of this trip was driving up to Sumner beach and then up the hill to where my mom’s first house used to be (it was destroyed in the earthquake). That view is the very scenic beach landscape below. I cannot believe I finally saw this place with my own eyes!
DRIVING THROUGH LAKE TEKAPO AND LAKE PUKAKI
The drive from Christchurch to Queenstown is SO Beautiful (and also not even close to being as windy as our north island drive)! The color of the water in New Zealand is unreal.
QUEENSTOWN
Our favorite memory from Queenstown was meeting my grand-father’s best friend and his wife, who own Hawkeshead Winery. I unfortunately have no photos from this because I just chose to be unplugged for that day. Anyways we had an amazing lunch at Kinross, tasted a few of their wines, and enjoyed their company. Emme also rolled from her back to tummy for the first time at their house! Which was very exciting. 🤗
Another thing we did in Queenstown which I would recommend to anyone was stop by a lavender farm. You could pay a little extra to enter the grounds where the animals were, and it was overall a really pretty (and nicely smelling) place! We also ran through Arrowtown and took a trip to Wanaka to see #thatwanakatree.
We ended the trip with one last stop in Auckland to visit more of my second cousins. They are much younger than me, and were so excited to meet Emme! It took us a while to figure out how to label our relation but it was so sweet to watch them with her. We took a stroll down Parnell street and the Brittomart and capped the day off with a swim! This trip will forever be one of my favorites. ❤️