Road to Nelson

Today, Saturday, we headed west from wine country to Nelson. Nelson is on the northwest coast of the South Island. A larger city than Blenheim with about 40-45,000 people.
The 110km drive took us about 4.5 hours. We made stops in the towns of Havelock and Canvastown and at Pelorus Bridge. From Canvastown we went back on a narrow side road for about 20km.
Havelock is a small one street town with a marina on Kenepuru Sound. A City Hall, Post Office, one room Police Station, a "bakery" and a beautiful '55 BelAir with right hand drive. Nice little town though.
Canvastown has one building, a church and a logging road. We took the logging road back about 20km from the major highway, past farms, horses, cattle and of course sheep and lamb.
The scenery was spectacular (pic), driving down a narrow valley above a river.
After Canvastown we stopped at the Pelorus River Bridge which is a bridge over you guessed it the Pelorus River along with some parks and trails. We took a short walk down a trail that went "down by the river" through a forest of ferns, ground ferns, tree ferns (pic). Ferns everywhere. The river was of course crystal clear.
From the Pelorus River we headed for Nelson and our home for the next 5 nights, Ruby Bay Lodge and Vineyard.
Ruby Bay is in a beautiful setting in the hills, with the vineyards spreading out in front of us, followed by duck ponds, green hillsides filled with sheep and the bay and Nelson in the distance (pic).
Our hosts, Sam and Audrey, are originally from Scotland and invited us to a tasting from their vineyard and prepared a large plate of meat, cheese and fruit. The wine included a delicious Sauvignon Blanc and a Riesling. Both were excellent and both differed significantly from what we had in Marlborough and at home.

Today's observations:

Coffee Talk. No Vente bolds with room, but flat whites and long blacks. Each cup brewed individually, not a coffee pot in sight.

Haven't seen a traffic light since we left Wellington 4 days ago.