Abel Tasman National Park

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Abel Tasman National Park is a stretch of beautiful coastline near the north-west end of South Island. To really appreciate it you can do a four or five day hiking tour along all its bays. But with time limited we stayed a night near Totaranui Bay, did a days hike toward a view point, and stayed another night. During the hike we saw several wonderful coves, many animals, including strange birds (I felt a bit like in the world of "Riven: Sequel to Myst", for those who enjoyed this computer game) and seals. We also found out how the locals enjoy a trip to this paradise. We met a whole lot of them on the beach. Most of them were pretty drunk since they had arrived by motor boat instead of walking and brought lots of cold beer. They were friendly though and offered us a ride back to Totaranui. Sure we had to have some beer before we were allowed to enter their boat!

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Photos

Totaranui Bay
With a car you can't get no further, from here we started exploring. Six pictures were used to produce fish-eye view.

Inlet
This kind of inlets you have to cross when hiking along the coast. Some places can only be passed during low tide.

Beach Dream
If it didn't have the roughter climate and the different plants you could easily imagine to be in the tropics.

Seals
A seal family was hiding in a small rocky cove. The small ones were swiming in the tidal pools.