Wednesday 05/12/2007 - NEW-ZEALAND (South Island), Picton "Queen Charlotte track"

We could not do the full Queen Charlotte walk as it takes 4 days and we have plenty of other things to visit during our short stay in the South Island, so we decided to do part of the track in 1 day. It was hard to decide which part to do as neither the Lonely planet or the tourist office can tell which part is the best. We decided to walk from Ship Cove to Furneaux Lodge as part of it goes through a well preserved native forest (we have been told afterwards by other travellers that did the all track that this is the best part of the walk). We booked a tour with Beachcombe for NZ$66 that combined the boat trips from Picton to Ship Cove and from Furneaux Lodge to Picton with a visit to Motuara Island. We are very happy with our choice as we had a great day. Motuara island is very pretty and is a bird sanctuary where you can observe native birds.There are nesting boxes for Little Blue Penguins, all of them but one were empty....we have been lucky to see two very cute penguins, we also saw and heard lots of other birds (singing better than they look!). From the highest point of the island you have a great view and as the weather was clear we could see the North Island. The walk along Queen Charlotte track was great. We loved the part through the native forest at the beginning and really enjoyed the views on the Malborough sound. We also were very lucky with the weather which was great.