You could tell we were further south – it had got decidedly more chilly. Only four of us (Tom, me, Margaret and Molly) were brave enough when we reached Arthurs Pass to go for a walk to see the Devils Punchbowl waterfall.

It was a cold and windy, steep walk, but after half an hour or so we made it.

The afternoon grew sunnier as we descended to Lake Pearson and eventually arrived in gentle Geraldine, possibly our favourite campsite of the trip.

The playground equipment was made of tyres and wood and the girls soon made friends.

Even Grandad had a go down the slide!

I had a glorious run through the Talbot Valley, laughing when I found a recipe for elderflower cordial tacked to an elderflower tree – perhaps the ultimate sign of a civilised society.

The next morning, we visited a pleasant Farmers market at St Mary’s Church (very popular Charlie and Chocolate Factory and new Hairy Maclary books were purchased as early Christmas presents from Grandma and Grandad).

It didn’t seem possible, but the scenery through the Mackenzie region was even more mesmerising that what we had witnessed further north.

Arriving at the startling blue waters of Lake Tekapo was astonishing, with snow-capped Mount Cook in the distance and various shades of purple lupins around the shore.

The Church of the Good Shepherd is perfectly situated, the quotation: “The land and the people are woven together as one” most fitting.

It was slightly odd to see hoards of Asian tourists eating salmon sashimi however! MoJo also had a badly timed meltdown. We went onto quieter Lake Pukaki for our lunch stop, but we were definitely back on the tourist trail.

We had three nights in Queenstown, our campsite located out of town near the Shotover River, a dramatic landscape where quarrying and mining had been a vital part of the first settlers experience. It was the first time we were completely hit by rain.

It gave us an excuse for a lazy morning, getting out mid-afternoon to walk through Queenstown Gardens on the shore of Lake Wakatipu, watching frisbee golf, eating mince pies, admiring oak trees and even finding a patch of ice to play with.

We ate an early steak dinner and watched a bizarre Swedish street performer, juggling lamps with spinning meatballs on his helmet, standing on a microwave balanced on upturned tables.

The next day goes down for Molly as her best day ever on our travels. We kicked off at the Skyline Gondola, scaling 450m up Bob’s Peak.

Tom, MoJo and I went on up a chairlift to the Skyline luge, hurtling down two courses running over 800m, great fun.

We stopped off at Ferg Burger on the high street which was constantly busy – which it is pretty consistently for 21 hours a day, seven days a week. Alex, a friend of Toms from Westminster Kingsway College runs it. They had a good catch up.

The main reason for us to make sure we included Queentown on our tour, the adventure capital that it is – is because friends Danny, Amanda, Shane and Corina had given us as a leaving Dubai gift tickets for a ride on the famous Shotover Jet riverboat.

Joanna was too small so it was lucky we had Peter and Margaret with us to join her in watching Tom, Molly and I gripping on and being flung through 360-degree spins, whizzing through the Shotover canyons at speeds of up to 90kmh, skimming around boulders and coming to sudden, surprising stops. It was fantastic.

What we didn’t know was that our fun-loving friends had purchased a second ride, but unfortunately it was all booked up the rest of the day and the next morning, our last, it was closed due to bad weather. Shucks.

Due to the rain we had to cancel plans to visit Wanaka, instead enjoying some time in Arrowtown. With one foot in the past, its Avenue of Trees and high street is full of period cottages and shops. We had a good morning coffee stop at quaint Provisions Café and enjoyed quite some time in the Lakes District Museum & Gallery. The girls were given an odd one out and reindeer trail to keep them busy, a highlight probably being the recreations of a bakery, blacksmith’s forge, schoolroom and even a man on the dunny! It gave a comprehensive history of gold mining and the region.

We enjoyed a temporary exhibition of fantastical, highly-detailed drawings by collaborative couple Luigi and Kate Angnelli, artists-in-residence at the museum. Some were depictions of Italian citadels, others New Zealand bush scenes.

For our night in Omarama – really the only stop which felt like it was just a place-in-between others – we ate at the Heritage Hotel buffet, served by a lovely Scottish waitress getting ready to fly home for Christmas for the first time in five years. The girls paid their age, so had a slap up meal for 4 and 6 $ so good value! We sadly failed to find any sheepshearing demonstrations but did feed some salmon.

A highlight of our camper times was playing family games – our favourites being Uno of course which has been played in every country on our tour, but also Quirkle, happy familes and bananagram. Often after the kids had gone to bed….

After a return to Geraldine it was time to get the camper back to Christchurch, fly to Wellington and say goodbye to Peter and Margaret who were taking a flight a similar time back to Melbourne. What a great, exhausting adventure we had had together.