Marlborough Sounds
The Marlborough Sounds in New Zealand manage to cram 1500km of shoreline into an area of land and sea some 60 by 50 miles across. The Queen Charlotte Drive in New Zealand will give you a magnificent view of the two main sounds, Pelorus Sound and Queen Charlotte Sound, which are separated by no more than a few hundred metres at historic Portage Bay - and yet it is a 70 mile voyage to sail a boat from one side of the low saddle to the other. Queen Charlotte Drive in New Zealand starts at Havelock and takes you right up to Picton, New Zealand.
Driving the Queen Charlotte Drive to Picton (about a 2h drive from Nelson)
The hills are steep and the water deep. Boats have always been a popular form of transport around the Marlborough Sounds, New Zealand, but today there are few areas that can not be reached by car, albeit on very long, very windy roads that are best negotiated at leisure. Frequent stops are well worth while, and there are magnificent views to be enjoyed at almost every turn.
The whole area of the Marlborough Sounds, New Zealand is rich in history. From isolated concrete gun emplacements that date back to the Russian scares at the turn of the century to pre-European Maori pa sites with their occupant's descendants still living nearby. Captain James Cook, the first European to thoroughly explore NZ, spent a lot of time in the Sounds, and there are jettisoned cannons to be seen. The isolation and need to make-do has allowed ingenuity and creativity to flourish, and all manner of unusual people and homes can be found around the edges of the sounds.
For those wishing to get closer to the water, kayaks can be hired from Picton or Havelock, and arrangements made for them to be delivered and collected from all sorts of exotic locations - giving you the chance of getting to know some wonderfully remote parts of the country. There are huge opportunities for walks too - from the famous Queen Charlotte Walkway - an easy 3 day hike, on which your pack can be carried from camp to camp by boat, to challenging tramps around the mighty d'Urville Island.
Accessing the Marlborough Sounds
Access to the Sounds is from two main points - Havelock and Picton, New Zealand. Havelock can be considered the Sound's back porch. It is here that the mussel boats unload their hefty woolsacks full of mussels, and a fine new marina is home to hundreds of boats - owned largely by Christchurch residents. Any number of charter services, kayak hire and taxi boats work out of Havelock, and the whole place has an easy, "on holiday" feeling about it.
Picton, as the terminal for Interisland ferry services, is a busier place, with the ferries bustling in and out and commercial docks exporting logs from the huge areas of Radiata forest that are just now coming on stream. They are magical places to visit. The roads are largely unsealed, meaning few visitors get to make their way out there. It is well worth becoming one of them.