Well Christmas has come and gone in a blur so I figured, now things have settled down a bit, I’d run you through what was a pretty manic, but enjoyable, 2 weeks.
It all started on the 22 December when Steve and Jemma arrived and we all headed off to the Abel Tasman (the full story is below). After this little camping adventure we got home on the 24 December and settled in for a couple of days. Christmas morning started at Buster O’clock, as you would imagine, with him not even bothering with his usual snuggle. Instead he headed straight to see what Santa had brought. I won’t list things out but thanks to everyone who sent him something, he really does appreciate it and plays with everything.
Once Steve and Jemma had risen we had a fruit and chocolate fuelled breakfast before heading down to the beach for a walk. The weather wasn’t being too kind so we played around with rocks and sand for a couple of hours then headed home. After lunch Steve and I went out on the MTB’s for a couple of hours, which was fun, and that was about it.
A few days after Christmas, after Steve and Jemma had gone down the East coast to swim with dolphins and visit friends in Christchurch, we made our way over to the West coast and down through Graymouth to Hokitika – a really nice place on the sea with a campsite that accepted dogs. The waves on this coast are far better than back home so I got the bodyboard out and the wetsuit and went off to frolic in the waves for a bit whilst Lisa kept the coastguard on call in case of any emergencies. Luckily I wasn’t eaten by any sharks and had a laugh getting thrown about in the sea. Bodyboarding is undoubtedly the poorer cousin of surfing, but until I can get my mitts on a second hand surf board it’s a good filler that also lets you learn how to get out and get back in on the waves in the first place.
Hokitika is a big center for Jade (greenstone) which is a Maori treasure, so there were loads of shops selling stuff but whilst we were there the main draw for people was the Kayaking. On our campsite alone there must have been 50 kayakers all with these tiny little boats that you basically go and blast down white water rivers and waterfalls in. As Hokitika isn’t far from the Frans Joseph and Fox Glaciers the rivers around here are really raging in spring (real summer starts in mid January) so people come from all over the world for a week or so of rough river madness.
Moving on from Hokitika we headed down past the glaciers (we didn’t stop but Steve and Jemma came over to them for a helicopter ride to the top and a guided glacier walk – pretty magic they reckoned) and through the natural rain forests that form a big part of this coast. It was about 6hrs to Queenstown but we got there OK and passed some lovely looking places on the way.
Queenstown is a real alpine place, slap bang on the shore of lake Wakatipu, and is 100% geared up to take your money wherever possible. Jet boats’, skiing, skydives, bungee jumps, lugging, downhill MTB, waterskiing, climbing – etc etc – the list of activities you can do here to a real high level is never ending. Unfortunately for us we had chosen not to book ahead, or check if anywhere even accepted dogs, so with half of NZ seemingly arriving when we did we found Q Town to be FULL. Never mind (or words to that effect) – one of the great things about NZ is that there are literally hundreds of dept. of conservation (DOC) owned campsites that you can stay in anytime. There are few amenities but they are generally located in the most beautiful places imaginable.
So – we camped up at this DOC site for a couple of days and spent NY eve with S&J bombing down luge tracks and trying to stay out of the torrential rain that had decided to fall. NY eve was welcomed with fireworks over the lake and NY day dawned nice and early and clear. This last point was important as Steve had decided to throw himself off some very high bridge.
Once Steve had done his bungee (bravo – very good form throughout the fall and a good dunking in the river below) we all said a fond farewell – S&J heading to the airport to fly back to Kuwait, and us back in the car for the trip back up North.
So that’s it in a nut shell. We got back to Nelson and it felt like coming home – which was nice. Since then we haven’t left Nelson at all – the sun is here (25 degrees seems the norm) and we are spending most free days down at the beach, outdoor swimming pool, biking or generally lounging around. Summer should be here till the end of March at least so we will be making the most of that and soaking up the rays.
Pictures of all this lot can be found HERE
Normallyour good friends Steve and Jemma, who are currently residing in Kuwait (!), came over to NZ for a nosey around in December and graced us with their presence from the 22 December for a week or so before heading down to Queenstown. It was great to see them again so, to celebrate, we headed off with the boat to the Abel Tasman national park for an overnight camping trip. The gateway to the park (since there are no roads) is the beach town of Kaitiritiri about 45 mins from Nelson. We got there around 11am, loaded up the boat with Buster, Lisa, Jemma, Steve and I and set off round the coast. The Abel Park is pretty huge and covers most of the top North East of the South Island. It has a 3 day walk running through it that gets about 200 people a day starting out in high season, with government owned camp sites every 10 miles or so. The main draw is the crystal waters, golden sands, lack of any commercialization and its wildlife. The best bet if you want more info is to Google ‘Abel Tasman’.
The place we were heading was called Mosquito Bay – a small sandy bay about half way up the coast that can only be accessed by boat. There are loads of Kayakers around these parts, and plenty of places to hire them, so we definitely weren’t alone on the sea.
After pitching up we headed out to the marine reserve around Tonga Island, which is renowned for seals (and swimming with them). We saw some seals kicking around so Stevo jumped in with his flippers and mask and swam over to their spot. The next 20mins was like something out of a pantomime as the seals swam up behind Steve, within arm’s reach, only to disappear when he turned around. “It’s behind you”!
That evening Steve and I went out to catch some supper and, after a few hours happy fishing, came home with 3 decent sized fish. We actually caught a fair few fishes but put the majority back because they were either too small or too ugly. The ones we did catch though got trimmed up quick sharp and stuck on the BBQ – yum.
As the tide came in we were pretty much alone on this beach apart from a few other overnight Kayakers. At about 4 quid each to camp it was definitely a good cheap place to spend the night.
We only stopped the one night and came home on Christmas Eve – we had fun though, saw some of the national park and caught some sun. Not a bad way to kick off the Christmas week.
Check out Flickr for the pictures
