Sea kayaking, seals and blow holes oh and some steamy rocks

Oceania » New Zealand » South Island
June 14th 2007

Published: August 7th 2007

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Jon and Mich RTW

West coast

Pancake rocks, so called because they look like big fat pancakes layered on top of each other.

South Island continued....

Well we have had another fantastic week, we are now working our way up North. We went to Punakaiki where they have rocks that look like pancakes, they are weird as they are all really regular in size and shape, there are also blow holes there where holes have formed underneath the surface so with a big wave water comes shooting out of the top! Further up the coast we went to the seal colony at touranga bay where there were about 100 new zealand fur seals, there were lots of small seals there too, they were noisy little things but quite cute.
Later we drove on past the buller gorge which was gorgeous lots of forests and winding roads.
Nelson

We stayed here on route to the abel tasman national park where Jon wanted to do some sea kayaking. Nelson is very small by english standards but a nice arty kind of place, with several nice parks. From here we went up to Marahau where we did some sea kayaking which was cold but really good. I wasnt impressed at first but after a few minutes I stopped complainign and started to
enjoy myself. The

West coast

Blowhole

are area is really beautiful and in summer I bet it would be amazing. We saw lots of bird but not seals unfortunately!Further down the coast we tramped(kiwi talk for hiking) to split apple rock which is a weird rock split erfectly in the middle- weird! That evening we got the ferry from Picton over to Wellington, we were afraid a bumpy ride because of the bad seas in Australia but it was absolutely fine.

North Island

Wellington

Very nice city with loads of shops cafes restaurants and bars. We went to the national museum of nz called Te papa it huge we could have stayed in there all day- the best bit was the earthquake simulator. After a couple of days we drove up the desert road (looks a bit like a desert made of grass)towards taupo past the tongariro nat park which is where they filmed mount doom for lord of the rings (mt ruapehu I think its called)

Taupo

Well what a bizarre place this is. The biggest lake in New Zealand in the crater of a volcanoe! There are lots of thermal pools and things all around, our camp site even had a thermal

West coast

Cape foulwind, seal colony. It was a fowl wind as well.

pool. There are hot water falls and a whole thermal park too. There was also a place called craters of the moon where the hot gas bubbles up through the mud- v strange to see Jon enjoyed some mountainbiking around the lakes and huka falls. The huka falls were really fierce, no wonder they use it to make electricity. We had fun on a jumping pillow, Jon thought he was seven again!!

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