Abel Tasman and the West Coast

Last off we were in Nelson. We finished working at the hostel and continued on to do the Abel Tasman backpacking trek. We arranged to kayak the first day beginning at 8:30 am. We left in plenty of time-but then missed the turn off for Marahau! Luckily we still made the original kayaking tour and set off for the day. We kayaked out to Adele Island to have a freezing cold and wet lunch and then kayaked over to view a couple sea lions and little pups on the shores of the Island-so cute! Our end goal for the day was to hit Anchorage Bay by 4 pm and we were on above pace so we stopped at one of the beaches along the way for a nice nap. We made it to Anchorage around 4 and hung out on the beautiful beach with the water so blue and the sky nice and sunny and had a nice relaxing afternoon. The sun doesn't set in the South Island until about 10 pm so you can really enjoy all of your day! We also have yet to really appreciate the stars as we have not stayed up late enough.

The next day we headed out with the end destination of Awaroa Bay, which we did not realize was quiet as far as it was- we think we ended up doing about 15 miles that day. We had a nice leisurely lunch and nap on the beach and then hit our next mileage marker around 3 pm which let us know we still had 8 miles to go! :/ We made it to Awaroa just short of 7pm- not too bad.

Awaroa has a low tide crossing which we had to cross in the early morning and walked the rest of the way to the final DOC camping site- only a couple miles, 7 or so, and had another nice relaxing evening with lots of reading, tanning, and swimming. The final day we walked out to another beach then backtracked to arrive at the location of our water taxi pickup. Another relaxing day.

Overall, we had really amazing weather on the Abel Tasman and such a relaxing (but I promise we walked about a total of 40 miles) and beautiful experience here. It was a blast.

Low tide crossing

Our tent location at Mutton Cove-favorite!

The next day we headed over to Westport to do a brewery tour where we learned the ins and outs of brewing beer- and got to try a bunch as well :) Not much else to report here as it was more of a stopover on our road trip- we hit the Pancake Rocks along the way.

We spent the next couple of days driving and exploring to and throughout the Franz Josef and Fox glaciers. We did an overarching hike of the Franz Josef Glacier that allowed us to get a good overall view of the ice. My first glacier!! It was raining this day and the trek was a little slippery so we had to be extremely careful. We got extremely lucky with the weather as there was no cloud cover of the glacier when we arrived-but complete cover within 20 minutes of our arrival. We also walked to the base of the Fox Glacier which did not provide us with as great of a view, but still pretty cool. I also saw one of the coolest and most intense sunsets of my life here-the sky was on fire!

This one of for Megan-one of our longest bridge crossings!

Franz Josef Glacier

Ecstatic about first glacier

Fox Glacier

We then made our way to Lake Wanaka- still raining. We did a winery tour here and then hiked to the top of one of the surrounding mountains to get a good overall view of Lake Wanaka. Really beautiful :) Next day we headed out to the Matukituki Valley-which required me driving on a gravel road for about 20 miles and crossing 10 streams in our car which has proven pretty sturdy so far. We did a hike here called the Rob Roy Glacier hike-one of my favorite hikes so far. We ended up doing the hike with a 60 year old Canadian woman who was very interesting. We made it to the end of the hike to a beautiful scene of two glaciers with waterfalls running down the sides of the mountains. Another amazing view :) The Matukituki Valley itself was a site to see and appeared very iconic NZ scenery to me.

Rain goddess of NZ

Wanaka

Beginning of Rob Roy

We briefly passed through Queenstown on our way to our next farm which we have been on for a couple days now. We are helping the owner build an ecolodge out in the country. The property is really beautiful with a view of the Eyre Mountains in the background. He recently slaughtered one of his lambs so we have been having some amazing food while we have been here - lamb shanks and ribs etc. so delicious. We hiked one day throughout the Eyre Mountains on a track that I think no one has been on for about 20 years- a lot of overgrown plants and bush whacking which results in a couple tumbles in the river and in mud.

Queenstown

Remarkable Mountains in the background-Queenstown

Lamb!!!

Ecolodge

Eyre Mountains hike through local farmland

We think we will stay here until about mid-February!

Nelson Lakes

Tessa and I headed to the Nelson Lakes area and camped at Lake Rotoiti. The only one negative part of New Zealand I have found so far is the sand flies! They are everywhere and their bites itch like crazy! Unfortunately there are a ton of sand flies at Nelson Lakes but it was still beautiful! Since the sun goes down only around 9 pm here, it gets dark later than 10 so we have yet to really see the stars out while we are camping. That night we did a twilight walk around the lake.

The next morning we woke up and did a hike up the mountain and decided we wanted to make our hike a little longer and head to Lake Angelus but decided to turn back around halfway there as there were some ominous clouds and we were not that well prepared as this was not a part of our original plan. We walked on the ridgeline of the mountain and saw very beautiful rock formations formed by glaciers.

We headed back to Nelson around four and went out to our first Mexican food tonight. We were having some cravings. We are just working in Nelson for two more days and then headed to Abel Tasman for 4 days and then taking a week to head to the south of NZ.