Am I turning into an adventure nut?
Trip Start
Nov 07, 2005
1
9
75
Trip End
Nov 04, 2006
The Northern-and-probably-most-scenic route,
New Zealand
Tuesday, December 13, 2005
Then we found the haven that was the Laughing Kiwi hostel in Motueka. Except the Kiwi owner wasn't laughing cos he was apparently too hungover. I kind of wanted to poke him to see if that would make him laugh, but I also wanted to stay there and not get evicted.
Things seemed too good there, which proved to be right as another storm hit us the next night, and through into the morning whilst we tried to pack up the tent
Abel Tas-yum
.Oh yeah, and I jumped out of a place from 12,000 feet. I keep forgetting I actually skydived. A guy at the hostel asked what we'd done one day and I was like...nothing really. Until Simon reminded me I'd almost plummeted to my death. In a fun way though.
Abel Tasman national park is as good as it looks in the photos. One of my favourite places in New Zealand. We booked in to do a 2 day kayak and walk. A day of kayaking, an overnight stay on a boat and then walking back. It still baffles me why you have to pay to walk somewhere though. But then you have to pay to do everything in New Zealand. It wouldn't surprise me if someone tried to make you pay for having a wee at the side of the road.
The kayaking was fun but all new to me and I stupidly opted to sit in the back of the tandem kayak and do the steering whilst Simon was up the front doing (what I thought) was the hard work. Oh how wrong I was. When you're so little that the guide laughs at you in an adults life jacket and suggests you should've worn a kids one it should probably be a hint that your legs aren't long enough to reach the pedals. So we ended up doing twice the amount of paddling as everyone else cos I could only reach one pedal at a time which sent us lunging in zig-zags whilst everyone else cruised by comfortably. Needless to say we swapped round atfer lunch.
The walk back along the 'coastal' track the next day was nice, although a lot of the time your view was restricted to the rear of the person in front or lots of trees. Not that much coast to be seen apart from at the lookouts. And not much to hear apart from Simon cursing Abel Tasman cos the track was too long
After jumping out of a plane from a great height
.It did strike me after this, that for someone on holiday I was doing far too much exercise.
So we went further up the coast to Golden Bay and Farewell Spit so I could do a horse trek.
We knew we'd entered hippy land when there were yoga classes advertised everywhere and we stayed at an eco-lodge with solar power and outdoor toilets. It was pretty cool though but maybe a little too quiet for me. I like my electricity to run freely.
The next hostel was amazing though even if I did start off our stay there by fixing the owner's computer (for which I probably should've asked for a discount on our stay). We challeged (and totally thrased) an American father and son at scrabble as the son tried to desperately claw his way back by spelling words such as 'yute' and claiming it was an arabic instrument. It's not.
And so onto the horse trek. This has to be the best thing I've done in NZ. Despite the weather. Its always been an ambition of mine to ride a horse in the surf on the beach
Dream come true
. Why the hell go all the way to NZ to live out such a simple ambition? Stupid maybe, but I got to do it on probably the most amazing beach I've ever seen. Huge sand dunes, caves and seals posing as rocks round every corner. Shame my horse Sultan wasn't so keen and left me drudging along behind everyone else except when he cantered and tried to catapult me into the air.Nelson - A haven for Lord of the Rings fans, and THE ring was made here. Those guys must be making a packet now.
Blenheim - Simon's former 'home'. We spent an agonizing 2 days here waiting to get the W.O.F. (like M.O.T.) done on Nay-Nay so we could sell her onto to Simon's friend. It was actually pretty intense as we waited at the drive-thru service centre while they examined her. Simon compared it to taking your kid to the doctor. I think maybe he'd got a little too attached to the car.
But she passed! I think we actually high-fived we were so happy.
We also finally gave in and purchased out own little travel scrabble game. I think some people thought we were weird for constantly playing scrabble, but when they asked to play we obliterated them and they left us to it.
Blenheim was pretty nice - a good place to hang out - relaxing and made you feel like you'd been there forever. It also provided me with a possible new hobby - wine tasting. I'd been looking for a hobby for ages but for some reason I always thought you'd have to pay to do wine-tasting, like a tour. But you don't.
Possibly the only thing in NZ that is free.
