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Published: March 23rd 2009
Abel Tasman
Our breakfast stop on the first day.Day 46 - Wellington - Nelson
Today was not the most exciting day ever as it started off with a 3 and a half hour ferry across the cook straight back to the south island and then a 3 hour drive to Nelson. Once we got to Nelson it was all go, mainly because we wanted to get out to the Abel Tasman National Park first thing in the morning and it is about 2 hours out of town. The national park is quite famous and covers a massive area but the main attraction is the 50 km coastal track which we had decided to tackle 30 km of. We went straight to the tourist office to book our transport/campsite for the next couple of days, then to the to the outdoor shop to hire some camping gear and then to the supermarket to buy food for 2 days. By this time it was 5.30pm so we started getting ready for our trip. At some point we got fed up and had a cheap roast lamb dinner (which was very
Abel Tasman
Me stood in a stream during an estuary crossing. tasty and I am ashamed to admit that it was our first lamb - over 3 weeks in!). We carried on the process of unpacking everything in our rucksacks into other bags to leave at the hostel and putting everything we needed back into our rucksacks. This was all finished by about 9.30pm and we headed to the bar to say goodbye to a few people we were unlikely to see again.
Day 47 - Nelson- Abel Tasman NP
It was an early start to get the 7 o'clock bus out of town with all our gear and I think we both slept for most of the journey; occasionally waking to hear a crap joke or odd comment from our rather eager yet eccentric bus driver.
We got to the start of the trail and a rather muddy estuary lay in front of us with a narrow wooden walkway and some unpleasant grey clouds. As you can maybe ascertain from the blog title the track wasn't like this for long. We decided we should make some ground before stopping for breakfast and waited until we got to the first little cove. By this time we were about 1
Abel Tasman
View of a lagoon from the track. hour in and the bags were already starting to hurt.
Just before lunch time we had to get our skates on as we needed to get to the first estuary before our “tide window” had expired. As the track is a coastal walk there are some sections which can only be done within a certain period around low-tide. With this particular crossing if we got there in time then it would save an extra 2km or so on the high tide track. We did the crossing and then stopped for lunch on the other side. As we were eating the sky cleared up and we got glorious blue skies (which didn't break until the following evening). We carried on walking and every now and again you would come across a nice lagoon - as you can see from the pictures. Once we were getting near our destination we came across a suspension bridge which was quite long and high and much to Sarah's displeasure I bounced my way along making it rather unstable.
By the time we reached our camp site at Bark's Bay we were both quite knackered and had a sit/lie on the beach for a while before
Abel Tasman
Me on a really cool suspension bridge. we (or rather I) set up camp. I did also attempt to go swimming but the water was so cold and the cool temperature of the Autumn sun was not enough to entice me the whole way in - a little lame. It was here that we also got acquainted with the New Zealand Sand Fly for the first time. They look like little midges but they have a nasty bite. We did buy some insect repellent but were a little late applying it and we got attacked. I think we didn't really respect the NZ bugs after being in Thailand but they are actually quite nasty. We now both have loads of bites on our feet and lower legs which have come up worse than mosquito bites!
Once the temperature had cooled right off we had some tea and chatted to some people in the camp including a really annoying Californian girl. She had already annoyed me for some reason but then preceded to tell me to avoid Crunchies (as in Cadburys) as they are disgusting - what an idiot; how can you not like them?
Unfortunately we didn't have much to do and I couldn't face reading anymore
Abel Tasman
Sarah is looking so happy as we are about 300m from the camp site! of
“Twilight” - I'm stuck around page 350, it is just too girly. Luckily we did go to bed early as we didn't get much sleep; the tent was tiny especially with all our gear in there. We just couldn't get comfortable and kept waking and moaning at each other plus playing the don't look at the watch/guess the time game.
Day 48 - Abel Tasman NP - Nelson
By 7.30am we had had enough of the tent and decided it was time to emerge. I had been waiting for this time all night! We were so lucky again, waking up to clear blue skies (this made getting up just that little bit easier!). We had quite a relaxed pack-up of the tent as we had no time constraints except that I wanted to get to the final beach to sunbathe! We left the Bark Bay campsite at about 9.00am and headed off on our much shorter 11 km walk for the day, to where we were catching the water taxi back to the start of the track in the afternoon.
My back was not very happy to be re-united with my bag in the morning and we
Abel Tasman
Some time after sunrise Sarah emerged from our rather "cosy" tent. definitely did not feel as fresh as the day before, so it was nice to know that we only has a 3/4 hour hike with the bags and that we only had to get to Awaroa beach by 3.00pm. We arrived at Awaroa beach at about midday so we had plenty of time to relax on the beach (and to once again find that we had been eaten alive by sand flies - they are my new enemy). We had a extra little bonus when we found there to be a privately owned lodge and bar on the beach. Of course Rob could not resist a Macs beer after the clock hit 12.00. It continued to be a gorgeous day and it was a beautiful beach that like all the other beaches we had passed was pretty much empty and would rival Thailand beaches any day. I think Rob must have got fed up with me going on and on about the incredible colour of the sea and the contrast between the colours of the sea, sand and forest but I was literally could not believe what we were seeing. I am sure that the colours are exaggerated when the
Abel Tasman
Sarah on day 2 with the "one up, one down" style gangster trousers. sun is out and if so we were very very lucky! I think Abel Tasman is my favorite place on earth!
We managed to get on the slightly earlier water-taxi which arrived back in Marahau at 3.30pm, just in time to catch a coach back to Nelson. It was really nice to be able to see the Abel Tasman coastline from the sea after seeing it from the land. They had a very novel way of getting the boat back onto land, they use tractors to carry the boat back through the shallow waters up a ramp before driving the tractor along the road to drop us off at the bus stop. It was a funny little experience.
We arrived back at our hostel in Nelson at about 5.30pm and after sorting out our bags, which involved a lot of unpacking and packing again, and dropping the camping gear back at the shop we decided that we deserved our first proper meal out. The pressure was on to find a good place to eat!! We settled for a little Italian restaurant and it did not disappoint. Like everything else in New Zealand, Rob had the "best lasagna he has ever
Abel Tasman
Me at our final destination. had" and although I don't agree with his statement the lasagna, garlic bread, salad, ice-cream and wine all went down very well! We finished the day with a few drinks in a few different pubs in town....what a couple of days!!
Day 49 - Nelson - Westport
Today was the first of two long days on the coach so it was not particularly exciting. The highlight was a lunch stop at Nelson Lakes National park for a short walk in the bush followed by a picnic by the lake. However, although supposedly you usually have the park to yourself we arrived to a man at the entrance demanding that everyone on the coach pays $10 to enter as there was a speed boat meeting on the lake. Our driver may as well have given him the finger as we drove straight past him muttering under his breathe that you cannot charge anyone to enter a National Park. Although the speed boats gave us something to watch it well and truly ruined the atmosphere of the beautiful lakes and mountains.
We arrived at Westport, our destination for the day, in the late afternoon and I can safely say I
will not be going back there again. It was a real ghost town, with barely a person to be found. When we ventured out to explore in the evening before almost giving up on finding a cafe or pub that was open for a quick drink with some of the people on our bus. We found the one and only open bar and stopped for a drink before bed. It was a very eerie little place by the Buller river.
Day 50 - Westport - Franz Josef
Another long day on the coach, this time aiming for Franz Josef Glacier, a much more pristine little town than Westport. We decided to pay for an Inter City bus (the New Zealand National Express) rather than take the Kiwi Exp bus as they take 2 days to make this journey. For our troubles we did get (another) eccentric bus driver who drove like a mad man on some of the cliffs making me fear for my life for the first time since Thailand. On the way we made two stops; the first was to see the Punakaika rocks, where we took a short loop track to see the "pancake rocks"
Punakaika
Sarah at the pancake rocks and a view north up the coast. off the coast. They are pretty cool and I think they would have looked even more amazing if we had been there at high tide to see the sea come up through the blow hole. It was also really nice to be able to get off the bus and stop to take in the west coastal scenery, which is amazing in itself. The second stop was at Hokitika, where we hopped off to take a look at the Jade factories/shops. If I had loads of money to spend I would definitely be coming back with a Jade ornament, the green stone is beautiful and the way that they carve it is very skillfully done.
We arrived at Franz Josef in the late afternoon and I am very happy that we are staying here for 3 nights, it is in a stunning location with snow capped mountains around you and the glacier in full view from the village. I succumbed to Robs plee for fish and chips so we had our fish and chips sitting outside in the sun this evening and I think we will be getting an early night before our full day glacier hike tomorrow.
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Rachel
non-member comment
Good memories
Hey guys, you are definitely bring back lots of good memories for me. Abel Tasman is def one of the most stunning placing I've been. I have to say we weren't brave enough to sleep in tents so we were in the huts. Love the pic of the suspension bridge - we got pretty excited about it too! Enjoy Franz Josef (bet you had the same fish and chips I had with my family! - they were good!) Make sure you got to Lake Matheson. xxxxxx