Journey to Abel Tasman

I hope that regular readers noted that there were two postings uploaded when I was last on line as we’d not had access for a few days.... (we’d hate you to miss one!).

Sunday 21st November started grey and showery but we stuck to the plan (version goodness knows what, date 20th November late pm!) and headed a little further west from Carters Beach to the wonderfully named Cape Foulwind Seal Colony.

It was a short walk to view the seals with waterproofs and woolly hats being needed. The path meandered round the head giving good views of the stormy Tasman Sea and then of the seal colony. There was quite a bit of activity with some youngsters clearly being put in place by their parents. Can you spot the seals? (The ‘Number Spotted’ competition can be entered by posting your answer via a ‘comment’!)

After about half an hour’s seal watching we walked back to what was now becoming a busy car park and headed back to visit Westport. We noted a number of bikes on cars here and wondered what was going on as they were clearly racing machines.

Having drifted through Westport to the quay we headed out to pick up Route 6, picking up the Buller River. The road follows the river, twisting and turning, dipping up and down as the road follows the contour of the land while the river follows the gorge that it has carved over time.

Along this road we were passed by a number of cars with bikes on racks, and passed a tandem too – the time of day seemed too early for the return from a race and a bit late for people meeting up to ride somewhere. Further along we stopped for coffee at a bar which was well populated by cyclists and the tandem caught us up. It turned out that the previous day there had been a 160km Source to Sea race along the road that follows the Buller River finishing in Westport and these people were now heading back – including the tandem pair who had won their category in 4hr 15mins and were now returning at a more leisurely pace!

While at the cafe we also watched some kayakers on the river, these were finishing their morning race which had been of about 3 hours duration (there was much awe at a guy who finished in 2hr 45). All this activity made me feel lazy!

By this time it was sunny and warm, the grey wet stuff having been left behind on the west coast.
We continued our scenic drive through Lyell shortly after which we met up with a swarm of bees flying along the road towards us – some hit the windscreen but hopefully little damage was done – certainly one flew off the wiper quite promptly and we were not going fast.

At Kawatiri we swung north and stopped for lunch at the Kawatiri ‘historic’ railway. This was due to be the railway which would link Nelson with the south, but with various funding issues, the war, and the development of road transport the final link was never completed. However there is now a pleasant walk along part of the railway route and back via woodland and we used this for some gentle exercise post-lunch.

It was then on through the Golden Downs Forest, stopping at Tapawera for ice creams and a cup of tea (it was now very warm and sunny!), through Woodstock and Motueka where we met up with the northern coast of South Island just short of Abel Tasman National Park.

By this time Heather had identified a campsite for the night – Old McDonald’s, which promised sheep, llamas, alpacas, Kunekune pigs and deer. Getting to this entailed an interesting journey along a narrow twisty lane to Kaiteriteri which appears to be something of the Riviera of South Island with golden sand, rich boys’ boats, kayaks, sunbathers, swimmers, and a water taxi.

The road then got narrower and twistyer(?) with incredibly tight bends, a long drop on one side and a sheer rock face on the other as we crossed from one bay to the next. We then arrived in Marahau (which was similar to Kaiteriteri but not quite as ‘classy’) which we drove through to find our campsite at the end of a fairly long drive through woodland. It was almost all it promised to be, though the pigs are no longer in residence. We got parked up and were having a cuppa when a single duck turned up to say hello; shortly afterwards it made a few squeaking noises and another adult duck returned, along with four ducklings who are clearly very used to human beings!

There are fuchsias in flower around our plot, along with grapefruit trees in flower and fruit, and what appears to be an orange tree also in fruit and flower, this latter one giving a lovely scent.

After our tea we took a stroll around the site, though the grounds are huge so we only covered a small part. We did however see llama, alpacas, sheep, cows, chickens and a few more (less tame) ducks, as well as the usual bird life.