Where we’re staying has a coffee machine so we get to have a nice coffee before getting up and out

To try and get on with our day, which is set to be a high mileage one, we drive straight to Arrowtown

Here, we park and walk up and down the three main streets of the town and then go to Kahwah Cafe to have a couple of coffees and share a chicken harissa sandwich

We also notice that Arrowtown Bakery is very busy and go for one of their reasonably priced and huge breakfast butties while we roam the Historic Arrowtown Chinese Settlement

This is the renovated remnants of the original Chinese settlers who came in the gold rush period back in 1860s – 1880s

We stroll in the Bush Creek Recreation Reserve to get back to the car and then pop by Ground Control Coffee Roasters before continuing our day

It’s about an hour to Wānaka which we’ve come to because of a famous tree that is in the Wānaka Lake, called #ThatWanakaTree

Because it’s around lunch time, we grab a coffee from Kai Whakapai Eatery & Craft Beer Bar before grabbing a meatball melt sub to share from Subway

We eat this lakeside and then head onwards

Now is for the several hundred kilometre drive which we’re breaking up with grabbing some fuel and passing through somewhere we stayed before: Otematata

It’s over three hours and we land into Timaru – we passed through here on our initial drive south and were sad to miss observing the penguins so decided to make it a stop on the way back up

We check into our Airbnb, freshen up and then walk into the town to find one of the only things open at the moment

Speight’s Ale House serves us a couple of hoki burgers

We wait it out here until 9 pm and then venture towards the sea – we get to see the pretty colours of the sunset, finally (see the featured image)

When we first set off on this roadtrip, we visited Caroline Bay here and this is where a small colony of little blue penguins live

It’s about an hour before any are spotted but we do get to see several!

After, we wander back to our accommodation and get some rest