Abel Tasman, Nelson, Queen Charlotte Trekk, Picton, Christ Church, Akarao

First stop on the South Island was for Abel Tasman -one of New Zealand's coastal National park.

Andrea and I decided to give Sea Kayaking around the park a go as we were told one of the best ways to see Abel Tasman was from the water it was go fun and beautiful scenery.

Many of the beaches are only accessible by boat/kayak - unless of course you can fly like this seagull who decided to stop by and steal someones lunch!!

One of the many beaches we passed.

The view from inside one of the caves on the beach.

Chom Poo Moo decided she wanted a shot of controlling the kayak as well.....

After spending the night in the Backpacker House Boat at Anchorage Beach we walked the next part of the route along the Abel Tasman. This is a family of Oyster Catchers we spotted on the way....you always see the adults in pairs but it was nice to see these one's with their chicks.

You see a lot of these birds around New Zealand as well - I think they are some kind of Shag....this one was enjoying the views...whilst the one above is cooling of in the stream....

Some of the beautiful views we saw along the way....

Of course we couldn't pass the tree swing without having a go......

Andrea admires the views over the beach.....

At the end of the day we jumped a water taxi back to the start point to pick up our transport back to Nelson......the water taxi's is the main way to get around out here and transport just about everything - we even saw one getting a washing machine loaded onto it.....

Next stop was Nelson a smallish town with a few quirky things around it like this strange clock tower!!

The Nelson Cathedral has some beautiful and fairly modern stain glass windows.

There was a couple of streets of these old style houses in the middle of the town centre.

Nelson also claims to be the official 'Centre Point' of New Zealand.

I found these funny drawings in the toilet at the hostel - well they made me laugh....;-)

The hostel where we stayed in Nelson is probably one of the nicest I have been in - it is called 'The Bug' - and as well as picking guests up in town in a V/W Bug they have loads of 'Bug' memorabilia and pictures around the place -we got a free upgrade to small room rather than a dorm as they were overbooked, home made bread for breakfast and free use of the bikes - love it.....

Next we went on the 3 day trek along the Queen Charlotte Trek - the full trek is about 71km long but we cheated and missed out a section by jumping a water taxi about 10km so we could cover it in 3 rather than 4 days. First day the weather wasn't so nice but thankfully it cleared up and we got some stunning scenery.

A Paradise duck - beautiful colours.

Our first sighting of a Weka bird - they certainly are not shy.....

Some of the beautiful views we saw on the first day of our trek.

A 'help yourself trust shop' that we found on the track - certainly couldn't do this in one of the popular walks at home where they would probably steal the barrell as well as the jewellery and money box!!!

A bug - just because I haven't added any insect photo's for a while....

Noeline and Tuppance wave us off for our 2nd days trekk - she is the hoast at our homestay and what a character she was - 78 years old stays out in the middle of nowhere on her own (no direct road access to her house) and she obviously loves telling all her own travel tales to all her visitors - ahving started travelling at 68 she has now been to 44 countries and her next is to Malawi - so no excuses to you lot get out there and do it......

So many nice views on day 2 of the trekk I struggled to decide which photo's to add to the blog - and believe it or not this is only a few of the one's I actually took....

This cheeky Weka (which we had been warned were quite inquisitive) was trying to sneak up on Andrea as she grabbed a snack out of her bag - then we read in the comments book at this stopping point to watch out for them as they had stolen someone's sock!!!

Apart of the trakk - which runs over private property - was closed on day 2 due to some ongoing issue with a new land owner who is doing some hunting!! So we had to head down and come along the road for a bit - but still a few interesting sites - like watching the bee man change over the hives....

And of course the unusual things that people use for a post box - like this microwave - well I suppose it is a form of recycling....

Another bug.....

Some views on day 3 before we again finished up and jumped a water taxi back to Picton. Loved this walk - especailly as the water taxi fare included a free baggage transfer between your accomodation stops (yeahh......).

With a little time to kill in Picton and not too much to do - probably took a full 15 mins to walk around the town centre we went to the Edwin Fox Maritime museun which was basically the story behind this old ship - the 9th oldest ship in the world.

Then we couldn't miss the excitement of a ride on the world famous Picton Train service - especially at a cost of 20cents and that was for two full circuits of the entire route!!

We couldn't pass the Ohau Seal Colony without stopping and ended up spending ages here taking photo's of the seals and the pups - very cute....

Cast your mind back a few months ago to when I was in Laos and met up with that mS German lady Silke - well we met up again in Christ Church (she's the one on the left!!). we have kept in touch and turned out we were able to meet up in Christ Church which was great, Here we are in Cathedral Square with Andrea and Adam (who we met on our previous trekk).

The Buskers festival which was on in Christ Church - comedians/acrobats etc - it was a fun way to spend the afternoon.

Our next adventure was to drive out to Akarao and pick up the camper van that Silke had bought.

Silke explores the camper van to make sure it is fit for purpose for her 6 months of New Zealand adventures and finds that her friend whom she bought it from has also left her lots of goodies. And bonus for Andrea and I is that it is big enough to squeeze us in as well and we make a rough plan for the next few weeks when we will be travelling together.

Andrea tries to shove Silke and Chom Poo Moo into the old Whaling pots at Akarao - think her plan was to steal the camper van!!

Chom Poo Moo and I decide to get our portrait done.

Could this be the recruitment poster for some of the departments/offices you have worked in????

One of the things that Silke and I have in common is the amount of photographs we both take - not sure Andrea knew what she was letting herself in for when she signed up to travel with both of us!!

A trip out to Flea Bay just outsie Akarao was a necessity for the wildlife - and no I don't mean the fleas!!!

What we did see was these very cute White Flipper Penguins - they are a protected species and the local farm who owns this land has turned it into a conservation project. They have built these little wooden nests to encourage the penguins to breed and it has been pretty succesful so far. The one in the top photo was a rescue bird that will not be fit enough to be released into the wild so they are looking for a new home for him...

So off we went in the camper and thought we better fill up - only problem was we couldn't get the petrol cap off as it had got a bit stiff as the van hadn't been used for a couple of months - ooopps - so we did what 3 girls in that position would do - find a hunky New Zealand bloke to help out :-)


And there's more.......