Abel Tasman National Park - Sun, Sand and Rainforest

April 1, 2010


Woke up this morning to a superb sunrise the moon was still full in the sky and the clouds were tangerine and cerise coloured. We headed inland today (East then North) up the Buller River Valley. This river is famous for its size, the century of coal mining associated with it and the gold mined from it in the interior. This is a winding up and down drive along the edge of Victoria Park Forest. Just past Murchison we stopped to visit a small private park dedicated to preserving old gold mining workings and natural wildlife. The park is on an island in the middle of the Buller River and the only way to it is over the 160 meter swing bridge (4 steel cables, 2 for handholds and 2 for the bridge) – great fun! After a short visit and walk around the island we pushed on, had a picnic lunch and turned North at Kohatu. This 50 km of the drive was through prime fruit country, not unlike our Okanagen Valley. They grow berries, kiwi fruit, apples, pears and huge fields of hops. We stopped for the day in Motueka, our gateway into Abel Tasman National Park tomorrow. We catch an early ride to our water taxi which will drop us off for a day of hiking and bathing then pick us up at another bay and ferry us home.

April 2, 2010

Beautiful sunny day, we were picked up by bus at 8:00 for our ride to Kaiteriteri. This is the end of the road and the start of the water taxi access into Abel Tasman Park. The park itself is one of the smallest in the South Island yet has the highest visitor count due to its ease of access and stunningly beautiful tramps. The park itself is old rolling granite hills, cut through by numerous streams and waterfalls and covered with temperate rainforest. The granite is quite rotted and has tumbled into the sea, there are many interesting islets and coves and in between…. beautiful golden sand beaches! There is a 4 day trek that you can do from one end of the park to the other however you can take a water taxi into any of the bays and hike any portion you like which is just what we did. We took the water taxi all the way to the North end of the park which took two hours as it makes a half dozen stops dropping off and picking up as it goes. We got a bit of local history, the park used to be farm land however was lousy for farming so the government took it over in the 40’s and has been trying to restore it to native flora and fauna. There are still some homes in several of the bays (holiday homes) but with no road access or water/power so they are supplied by the water taxi service. We also visited one of the two NZ Fur Seal colonies in the park and watched the lazy things roll around in the surf and sun.

After riding the taxi all the way up the coast we rode it back to Bark Bay situated in the middle of the park. Here we started our seven km hike south to Torrent Bay where we were picked up later that afternoon. The trail is literally cut into the side of the mountains with beautiful views of the sea from high up (the seas by the way are an amazing emerald green colour due to the underlying golden sand bottom). The forest is quite Jurassic Park with lush undergrowth, towering ferns (some over 15 meters high) and gnarly odd looking coniferous and deciduous trees, it was quite beautiful and strange at the same time. We had lunch on a beautiful lookout and made it to Torrent bay in just a couple of hours. We had some time to kill before pickup so we donned out swim togs and plunged into the Tasman Sea. It was cold (most people thought we were nuts) but not as cold as Georgian Bay in October and we had a good dip swimming out to an offshore sandbar.

We returned to our campsite sunburned, smiling and ravenous. By a fortuitous coincidence parked right behind our camper there was a van with an attached trailer containing a huge oven shaped like a giant clove of garlic. The couple apologized but explained they were here for the evening to cook wood fired fresh pizza for the Easter crowd. Wellll we ordered four different kinds of pizza from them and thought we had died and gone to heaven. I am sitting under the stars as I write this, the sun has just set and I’m waiting for the Southern Cross to rise. This has been a great day in a trip full of wonderful days. Tomorrow it is off to Picton to catch the ferry across to the North Island. A whole new series of adventures await us!