The Adventures of Caro and Blake: Abel Tasman

I sit here writing having just finished the most delicious bowl of ramen and peas I’ve ever eaten. No, that is not sarcasm. After three long days of backpacking we are exhausted and ramen seemed to help our condition a bit. We had an absolutely amazing time on the track, but let me go back and tell you about our previous few days first.

We stayed our last two nights on the south island with Mike and Ivan (friends of the family we did our workaway with) in the most adorable little place called Greytown. We’ve found that a lot of tiny towns here, just like tiny towns back home, are often outdated and sorta’ rundown. Greytown on the other hand was full of upscale boutiques and cute little cafés all built in resorted colonial style homes. Mike and Ivan’s villa style house was also adorable and they even had a separate cottage in the back for us to stay. We loved the fresh salad and lamb Ivan made us and especially their chocolate lab, Monty (I think Blake wanted to steal him). Greytown is just over an hour from Wellington, so we decided we needed to spend a day seeing the windy city. We spent a few hours at Te Papa museum looking at the Māori exhibits, giant squid and my favorite, Shrek the sheep who had 27 kgs of wool on him before the shearers finally found him. Afterwards, we walked down Cuba street with its unique shops and took a walk along the waterfront after the wind finally died down.

Walking along the Wellington waterfront

It was really hard getting out of bed Saturday morning, because I knew it would be the last time I would be sleeping in a real bed for a while, but we had a ferry to the south island to catch! The Interislander Ferry runs three or four times a day from Wellington to Picton and takes about three hours. This massive ferry was probably three times as big as the Seattle ferries. It holds semi trucks, has a theater, cafés, and several viewing decks. Although it was super windy on the observation decks, we braved them for a few minutes to get some pictures of the beautiful Marlborough Sounds. The only downside was that I learned I can get very seasick even on a massive boat. We arrived in Picton that evening and picked up some fish and chips to avoid getting hungry on the hour drive to our campsite at Pelorus Bridge. It was a beautiful campsite right on the river, but we met our nemesis of the south island: sand flies. Think mosquitos but even more annoying. The little black bugs hover around your legs and leave the tiniest, but itchiest bites. After leaving the attacking sand flies the next morning, we drove west to Nelson and visited the local I-site (info sites most every town has) for advice on the Abel Tasman. A helpful lady helped us book our water taxi and campsites for our trip which we would be starting the next morning.

View of the Marlborough Sounds from the ferry

Picton Harbor

The Abel Tasman Track is one of nine “Great Walks” they have in New Zealand. These are basically anywhere from 3-6 day hikes through areas they have deemed really pretty and have therefore spent a lot of money on maintaining really nice trails. All of the great walks have backcountry huts (basically lots of bunks to sleep, a basic kitchen and toilets) as well as camping sites to choose from. Even though the huts are nice, we thought it was kind of silly you pay more for a hut per night than you would for a hostel, so we chose to camp for half the price.

An example of a hut you can stay in. This one was by far the nicest one we've seen. Most look like old school log cabins.

After dropping our car off at the water taxi base, we set out to Marahau beach where our journey would begin. We had a long day ahead of us since we had to walk 22k from Marahau to our camp for the night at Bark Bay. Immediately we were struck by how beautiful the coast was. The beaches are golden orange and the water is a brilliant turquoise color. We walked for about three hours before stopping for lunch at what we decided was the prettiest beach of the trip, Anchorage Bay. After wolfing down our pb and j and admiring the views, we had to keep going. The trail continued winding back into the bush for a few kilometers and then bringing us back to the ocean views. About three more hours later, we made it to Bark Bay. We spent awhile lounging on the beach until the wind picked up and we decided it was dinner time anyways.

Views from the track day one`

Anchorage Bay

Bark Bay beach where we camped the first night

Blake woke up early to catch the first morning sunrise

Day two was a bit of a challenge since our legs were really tired and sore from the day before and our packs had rubbed our hips raw. We sucked it up knowing we had a shorter day (17k) and started walking. About an hour in, Blake realized he dropped his sunglasses somewhere on the trail. Reluctantly, we head back up the big hill at which point Blake drops his pack with me and starts running to find them. Miraculously, he runs up the hill out of breath and dripping sweat, but has his glasses in hand. Although the trail is still awesome, we start to get really tired right before lunch the second day and start talking about how we wished there was a Red Robin and symphony bar brownies waiting for us at our lunch stop. Unfortunately, lunch was half of a pb and j and some trail mix, but just being able to take our packs off was bliss for us as our bodies were so tired at this point. Luckily, we had an hour to rest, because the next part of the track was an estuary that couldn’t be crossed until low tide. We staggered to our camp and set up our tent just in time to avoid the sandfly fest that would plague us for the night. Our last day on the track we woke up really early so we could catch the sunrise over the beach. I realized I had never intentionally gotten up to watch a sunrise before, but after watching this one, I think it is something I will do more often. Despite our pain and exhaustion, I can’t even begin to describe how beautiful and definitely worth it this hike was. I think it was my favorite thing I’ve done since we’ve been here and would recommend at least doing part of it to anyone who comes to NZ. Now time for some rest, because tomorrow is hopefully a tour of Pic’s Peanut Butter factory!!