Day 74. Today we head out onto the water with the appropriately named “Abel Tasman Kayaks”. After packing our gear and preparing our kayaks, we caught a water taxi to North End of the Abel Tasman.
Factoid: The Abel Tasman is a world renowned marine reserve, all round beauty spot, and a great place to explore by sea kayak. Abel Tasman was a Dutchman who discovered and named New Zealand. Captain Cook also discovered New Zealand, after it had already been discovered and named by Abel Tasman. Finally, the Mauris also discovered New Zealand many hundreds of years before the Europeans. (They named it Aotearoa).
We set off a little unsteadily in our group of six led by our expert guide and World Traveller, Mikey. Mikey is a New Zealander whose family owns a vineyard in the Waipara region. He spent some time in the Shetlands in Scotland and we had a bit of a giggle when he told us this because we didn’t think it was that bad. (Try saying “Shetlands” in a New Zealand accent!)
The start of our journey down the Abel Tasman
We quickly got the hang of handling our kayaks and got into a good rhythm with our oars. Soon we were out on the open waves exploring the coastline. Mikey had organised the trip according to the tides and we were able to venture into several lagoons which are only accessible when the tide is high. There was a real treat waiting for us in Shag Bay (so called because of its single Cormorant inhabitant). Mikey tried to play it cool when he realised what was waiting for us but we could see the excitement on his face. Every Spring the lagoon briefly becomes a nursery for seal pups when they’re old enough to leave their mums but not yet old enough to brave the perils of the ocean. There were countless seal pups playing and showing off in the shallow water and they were as curious about us as we were about them. Their favourite trick was to appear beside our kayaks to have a good stare at us then flare their nostrils before doing a few handstands and waggling their flippery toes at us in the air.
Factoid: Did you know that baby seals have the funniest ears of any animal second only to Yoda?
Yoda lookalike
After further exploring the coastline, we reached Mosquito Bay, our camp site for the night which is only accessible by sea. We were glad there we no mosquitos but unfortunately we were eaten alive by sandflies instead! After struggling to assemble our tent with bent poles, we all set about preparing a hearty and much deserved evening feast of gourmet stir-fry chicken with rice followd by jam rolly-polly.
Annie inspects the inside of our tent at Mosquito Bay
Safe, Annie and Mikey guard the tucker
After dinner we wandered along the beach and watch the moon rise from the horizon. The tide had receded enough for us to explore a rather large and dark cave. We entered it to find that it was inhabited by a large community of glow worms scattered around the walls. Looking at the roof of the cave was like looking up at the stars. Mikey had heard that singing to them could make them glow more brightly. He gently sang “Silent Night” aided by Safe humming descant. Further into the cave we found penguin burrows and a cave spider. Our kayaking companion Steve was getting claustrophic following a bad cave experience in Thailand which left him with his chest squashed to the roof of the cave and water rushing round him so he decided not to follow us. When we found the cave spider (the largest spider in New Zealand), our kayaking companion Tracey decided to call it a night too!
The inside of the cave at night
We returned to our tents and slept soundly until the morning.
Happy Birthday, Rachel!