Abel Tasman National Park

We found the jewel in the South Island crown!

Abel Tasman National Park is a postcard-perfect spot close to the very northwest corner of the Island. When I first bought my Lonely Planet guide, it was my one "must see," and I wasn't disappointed. Much of the park is not accessible by car, so I chose a holiday park at the western end, where many of the trails begin. We were at Pohara Beach in Golden Bay.

There wasn't much to do there other than enjoy the scenery and the weather -- both were lovely. Our first night, we booked a sea taxi for the next morning to take us from Totaranui to a beach about an hour's ride down the coast. The drive to Totaranui was as dangerous as any other NZ ride, but it was gravel. Yikes!! It took 50 minutes to drive just 11 km. That's how bad it was!

We made it just in time to catch the sea taxi. The ride was fast and splashy and Brody hated it as much as I loved it!

After a brief detour to catch a look at a group of seals, we arrived at our beach at low tide, and a huge bay of sand was exposed. The sand was golden and smooth. We walked and walked on the sand, up over a dune, and then we found some beached sailboats resting upon their keels. It was a bit of a shocker to see boats sitting in the middle of a beach! Eventually we found the trailhead marker and we were off.

As always, the DOC hike did not disappoint. I can't imagine the labour that goes into maintaining these Great Walks. The path was pristine, practically wheelchair accessible (but not really). As we hiked through the bush, we caught glimpses of beautiful beach to the north, and lush tropical tree-covered mountains to the north. It was warm and sunny. Within a couple hours we arrived at what we thought would be our halfway stop, but realized that we wouldn't have time to make it to the next beach before our sea taxi pick up, so we had lunch and stayed put. I'm glad we did.

The beach was very quiet; just a few resting sea-kayakers and trampers passing through. Jack and Bill went snorkelling and returned with reports of seeing several different varieties of fish. My snorkel was broken, so when they returned I convinced Jack to come out again with me. The water was crystal clear turquoise and I couldn't wait to get out there!

I saw several snapper right away, then a large brown and white speckled fish that Bill thinks was a lion fish, but I didn't actually look it up yet. My eyes were glued to the bottom, looking for flounders when all of a sudden I spotted a huge manta ray right in front of us! At that time, I didn't know if it was a manta or a stinger, so I was a little nervous. I know stingrays won't sting unless provoked, but I didn't want a Steve Irwin situation happening with my 12 year old in tow. I let out a squeal to get Jack's attention while frantically pointing to it. Needless to say, Jack was also delighted and a little nervous too. We could have easily touched it, bit gave it some room as it swam leisurely past. It didn't at all seem concerned about us! It was about my size with my arms spread wide.

We had a chat about what we just witnessed and decided to head back in to tell Bill and Brody. On our way back, we spotted yet another manta! It was about the same size as the first, but the colouring was different. So exciting!! Again, we met at the surface to exchange adjectives and noticed Bill waving us ashore. It was time to catch our taxi.

The ride home was a little tamer than the first ride. We had a short stop to take pictures of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle rock. An Austrian guy sharing our ride was thrilled because he had a TMNT tattoo (among others; he and his friends also had horrible BO, but that's another story).

TMNT rock!

Back at our holiday park, we made dinner and ended our day with a walk on our golden and pretty deserted beach which was just in front of our cabin. Really, everything about this place was perfect.

The next day we went for another great day hike to see a beautiful waterfall. The real highlight of this trip, though, was the single person suspension bridge over a river. Too much fun!

Later, at Brody's request, we went to a salmon farm to catch some fish. There was no charge to fish, and you paid by the kilo for what you caught. They would then prepare your salmon however you liked. Though not quite "shooting fish in a barrel", it was pretty close. The boys had a lot of fun, and both caught fish which we had smoked. Delish! It was actually pretty interesting to see the whole operation -- how they bred and housed the fish throughout their life cycle. It was a lovely location with a cafe where we enjoyed a bevvie while the fish smoked. There we met a Kiwi and a Dutch man who had both worked in Ottawa for a couple of years. This was the day of the hockey GOLD, so we chatted a lot about the Olympics, living in Canada, and driving in NZ.

Unfortunately, Bill had to work the next day so I took the boys on a hike to see the Rawhiti cave. Using a map that had no street names in a town with no signage presented a bit of a challenge, but we found the trailhead eventually. It began in a farmer's field, as is oftentimes the cased. The public is allowed access as long as they leave things as they found them. We arrived just as the calves were changing fields. So, we had a bunch of cows in front of us and a bunch of cows behind us. We dodged the cow pies, slid under a fence, and started the hike.

The boys were thrilled the hike was only 2km each way; however they had not yet learned that distance means nothing. The first kilometre was pretty easy going, but the second was straight up and steep! We ran into only two other hikers, an elderly couple on their way down. The woman was struggling because she had had her knees replaced and climbing down was presenting a challenge. I thought going up was tough!

As we've come to expect, the hike was totally worth it. The cave was magnificent. Truly breathtaking. The stalactites hung from the roof like saliva-dripping, devilish teeth. The back of the gaping mouth was mostly pink, and as your gaze travelled to the outside green became the prevalent colour. We were lucky to have the place entirely to ourselves, and spent lots of time making echoes and soaking in the awesomeness of the cave. It really was one on nature's wonders.