January 29 - February 27, 2025 New Zealand February 16

We continue on to Saint Arnaud, Tasman to Lake Rotoiti, then further to Picton, where we will visit Charlotte Sound.

The town is located about 25 km north of Blenheim at Picton Harbour, a sea arm of Queen Charlotte Sound. Nestled between mountains rising up to 727 m high in the west and up to 970 m high in the east, the town lies in an open valley to the north, where the Waitahi River winds through the town to the north and flows into the Picton near the ferry terminal.

The town is situated on the land of the Māori tribe of Te Āti Awa, whose Pā (village) was named Waitohi. At some point between 1844 and 1850, Governor George Edward Grey and Francis Dillon Bell, a representative of the New Zealand Company, bought the land from the Māori who were willing to relocate their village to Waikawa Bay. Once the town planning was completed, the new place was named Newton by the New Zealand Company, but when the province of Marlborough was established in 1859, the place was renamed Picton and made the seat of the provincial government. Disputes and power struggles ultimately led to the seat of the provincial government being moved to Blenheim in 1865.

When gold was found in the area around Wakamarina in 1864, the population of Picton temporarily surged to over 3000 residents but quickly declined as the resources were exhausted just two years later.