New Zealand: Abel Tasman, Nelson & Wellington: 11-15 Feb

After Kaikoura I was on a real high thanks to my new friends the dolphins. I was also happy to be going to AbelTasman, when I was researching where to go in NZ that came up as one of the places I really wanted to see because it’s another untouched paradise being a national park.  I had to go a little out of my way to get there as I needed to end up back in Picton which we were passing through, to get the ferry back to Wellington on the North island.

It was also time to leave Snowflake’s bus and get on another; this time the driver was a girl whose nickname was Motors. She got the nickname because she’s got whopping great boobs and once, as legend has it, got everyone on the bus to motorboat them as they left the bus! Haha. She actually was really fun and nice. It was also good to get off the bus I’d been on and see what the others were like. Motors’ bus was a totally different vibe. Equal split girls to guys, and more solo travelers so they were friendlier. I breathed a huge sigh of relief and felt happy to find a normal group of travellers.

The busses usually stop on the way to the destinations to look at some interesting sites dotted around the countryside, and this day there were more than usual so it took most of the day to reach Abel Tasman. At one of the stops there was a river with a deep pool in the rocks that was so clear you could see every grain of sand on the bottom. It was 6-8m deep and was a beautiful emerald green colour. I climbed down to dip my feet in it, and someone from the bus came over for a chat. I had a funny feeling that he looked familiar, but thought nothing of it. It was only after he recognised my SA accent and told me he grew up in Zimbabwe that it clicked. This was Martin, the son of very close friends of my parents - his dad Phil was a priest for a time at the church we went to growing up. Unbelievable coincidence, seeing as I was on a bus in a remote part of NZ as far away from London as possible. Small world huh? We both had our socks knocked off with surprise. It was so nice for me to see a friendly familiar face too.

We passed Picton and then Nelson, this is supposed to be the sunniest region of NZ. There were lots of apple farms dotted around, and some of the trees had white netting over them. Motors told us these were the apples that were exported; they were covered in white netting to keep them crunchier and less blemished. The uncovered ones they sell in NZ, she said with a hint of irony. A very strange thing about this country is that all the best local produce; wine, fruit, even stuff like bread is cheaper overseas than it is here. The wine especially, it comes from down the road but its way more expensive than buying it in the UK. I just don’t understand why. The bus took a sharp right turn into the windy, steep road to Abel Tasman. It twisted and weaved up the mountain pass, struggling and heaving as it was an old bus this time. The hills became very lush and green with cicadas screeching happily in the trees with warm, humid air floating in the bus. So different to the harsher light and eery emptiness of the mountains further South.

We reached our destination within the national park, a place called Marahau, which only exists to service the park. It’s a couple of camping and kayaking shops, a cluster of little restaurants just at the park’s entrance and some backpacker hostels. The one we were staying at was Old Macdonald’s Farm, and it was more like a caravan park/camping site than a backpackers. I had already chosen to stay in a tent, one of those big one’s with camper beds, as it was $20 a night instead of $27. As we drove our bus up to our area though I noticed that the ‘cabins’ were seriously minimal, tiny little sheds crammed with a bunk bed and a single bed with hardly room to move and all the portaloos and showers were outside like a campsite anyway, so not really sure what the extra $7 was for.

Motors bought tons of food for a barbecue courtesy of the Stray Bus which was nice, for all 40 of us. We all helped in the cabin kitchen, and the gas stove/barbecue griddle was my duty to get started. After the German guy who was helping me ran out of ideas on how to start it, I went around to the back through the bushes to twiddle with some gas knobs. I turned one lever, and he gave it a go and the gas lit. I turned the other lever, and nothing. After a few attemps lighting matches and failing to ignite it, he gave it one more go and then a huge gas fireball exploded out the cooker and took all the hairs of my right forearm and singed a nice little halo around his hair and eyebrows. ‘My hair, my hair! Is it still there??’ He was wide eyed with shock. And it was mostly, thank goodness! Haha, poor guy. I swiftly turned that gas lever off.

A small group of us decided to take a sailing boat in the morning to one of the bays 13km away from our camp in the morning, and then walk back in the afternoon. The kayaking people and the sailing people were in disarray because someone was getting married that weekend and had closed offices, but they all managed to get everyone in the right direction eventually in the laid back, easy way of people working outdoors. Our sailing boat skipper was another pure man of the sea, long blonde scruffy locks and leather soles to his feet which probably never saw shoes. He cracked some good jokes too; ‘So welcome on board for your trip to Fiji, it only takes somewhere between 10-14 days. You brought enough food to last that long right?’ He also let me steer the boat while he got the sails ready. I asked which direction to go in. ‘Over there’ he gestured vaguely to the horizon. Er, okay. I just tried to go straight, and at least we didn’t end up in Fiji.

The day started out cloudy and windy, 

and we crossed fingers and toes for sunshine because that is when these golden beaches are at their best. It was so chilly on the boat to start off with that I had to wrap my hoodie around my ears. We sailed up to some of the bays, looking at the tiny bushy islands dotted around which got incredibly loud with insects and birds as you got closer. 

We were also taken to some rocks around one island where lots of seals were lazing with their fat little babies, see if you can spot them here.

We were told that they are thriving in the area. We sailed lazily around until we came into a bay protected by some islands. In low tide you could walk across it but in high tide it was 4m deep and you could see the bottom clearly as the boat sailed over the clean clear water. The water was a beautiful blue turquoise colour, and the sand golden. You could not Photoshop more vivid colours. Totally different to the East coast and inland on the South island where everything is grey pebbles. We pulled onto a golden beach for lunch as the clouds completely disappeared and the big warm yellow sun broke out and belted down on the sand. I jumped straight out the boat and spread myself out in the warm sand like a starfish for some full body sun worship. We ate the sandwiches I had made for lunch; wholemeal rolls with pesto, tomato and cucumber with some bananas and peanuts from the food stash. Some funny fat NZ beach ducks came to eat the bread out of Martin’s hand. After I had heated up to boiling point I went straight into the turquoise crystal clean water. It was so clean I could open my eyes and see meters ahead of me – as if I was looking at a blue sky of water above with white sand for grass below - and my eyes didn’t sting at all. It was cold but I spent a long time holding my breath and doing dolphin dives, so refreshing I wanted to breathe the water in. THIS IS THE LIFE.

Martin realised that he left his shoes on the boat just as it pulled away from the beach, but wasn’t bothered in the slightest. He was going to do the whole walk back on the path through the thick park bush barefoot. I didn’t bat an eyelid, I knew he had a childhood in Zimbabwe and was an outdoors adventurer, but the people with us were totally shocked. 13km in no shoes, when they had their best walking boots on! Haha. I had my trusty Crocs, which I used to mock people for wearing but are the most ridiculously practical shoe for travelling near water on the planet. Big heavy shoes with socks that get soaked every time you have to walk through water and then stink and are covered in mud the rest of the time? Um, no thanks.

Our group walked through the well worn path through the think ferns, trees and indigenous plants that make up the park. Every time you turned a corner there’d be huge turquoise blue view of the sea with dark green islands and golden sand beaches spread out below. 

Every now and again Martin would stop and explain something interesting to us about the birds or bugs that live there, at one point putting one bug in his mouth (but not chewing, making it like a cave) to demonstrate how this type of bug only makes a noise when it can see light. Definitely a Zimbabwean at heart! I really wanted to see a Kiwi bird but they only come out in the dark. They are such weird looking things, they look like this. No wonder they are nearly extinct, poor little weird birdy. 

We walked all 13km (about 3.5 hours), stopping at some of the beaches to snack on dates and chorizo that Martin had in his pockets, to the park’s entrance and were very hot and had sunburnt noses. Conveniently at the end was a rustic restaurant that sold gourmet pizzas and yummy NZ beer. I only had the beer, have to watch the pennies! But we went back to the crazy caravan park that was our hostel and had left over sweet potatoes and onions from the barbecue the night before, and some avocado and tomato salad with corn on the cob. We drank some wine and got bitten by sandflies and mosquitos while Martin told me about his insane exploits while travelling, which including him almost dying in the outback in Australia trying to escape a madman he was working for!

The next day I was to leave Abel Tasman and go back on myself to Nelson and then Picton, where I was catching a ferry to Wellington on the North island. Motors gave me a lift as far as Montueka where I bid farewell to the Stray Bus and headed for a cafe with internet so I could figure out how to get back to Nelson. Well, there were two buses. One at 7.30am (it was 10.30 now) or at 5.30pm. Very sorry to the White’s if you are reading this, I know I said I wouldn’t hitchhike after being warned! But during my entire South island trip I saw tons of hitchhiking backpackers including solo girls, and after speaking to my bus drivers and people working in the area I was told that this was probably the safest place in the entire world to hitch a ride. Also it was only 46km to Nelson, so I promised myself that I’d only get into a car with a couple or a female. I placed myself strategically at the exit of the big supermarket at the edge of town and on the road to Nelson, and within 7 minutes a very sweet British couple picked me up. Perfect! They were travelling around NZ in their hired car, and were going to stop in a village not far for lunch and then go on to Nelson. I told them I wasn’t in a hurry and I went to the little village with them, which turned out to just be a collection of shops and galleries and a fish and chips restaurant on the bay so we didn’t stay long. We passed about 30 young backpackers hitching on the way there, so I had chosen the best position in town.

We got to Nelson and they told me about the backpackers they were staying in, so I just went along to see if there were any dorm beds left there. It was a great little place but totally full, so I bid them farewell after apologising profusely for leaking half a bottle of pesto from my shopping bag on their car floor, and went off to find another hostel. The closest one on the map was called The Palace but it took around 25min in the afternoon heat to find it. When I did I saw that it was on a very busy road next to a petrol station, great. The entrance on the road led you up a very windy and impossible stairway when you’re carrying a heavy bag, up through some ferns and there perched on the hill was a very unexpectedly pretty big old house that was The Palace.

I was very happy to be somewhere that wasn’t with a bus full of travellers on the main tourist trail, and it was leafy and quirky and one of the oldest buildings I had seen in NZ so far. It had a big old kitchen and dining room, and a nice TV room with comfy sofas next to big open windows, so I breathed a sigh of relief and plugged in all my gear. There were no plugs, internet or anything vaguely practical for travellers in the tent in Abel Tasman. My room was in another building tucked down some more stairs on the property, and it was its own small house with its own kitchen and bathroom and proper beds, for the 6 or so people staying there which was nice.

I made some lunch and bedded down in the TV room, and no one came in so I had it to myself. Even though the hostel was supposedly full that day, there was hardly anyone around except the people that worked there. It was actually a really weird place, because even that evening I only saw one or two people. There were lots of little rooms and cabins dotted around, and at around 8pm I heard some people laughing and chatting and found a little room outside decked out with trippy wallpaper and psychedelic wall hangings. All the people working there and one or two guests were crammed in smoking pot and playing a game, ‘everything must die’ or something like that. It’s when you draw a picture, of say cowboy. Then the next person has to draw something killing that, like an Indian. It was handed to me, and I had to kill a toaster that had just killed a knight in metal armour by electrocuting him (?). So I drew a bathtub with the toasters wire going in it and passed it on. Still confused about where all the guests were and feeling this was a strange little hostel, I went off to bed laughing at their weird game and funny drawers.

Nelson is a strange place. Its population is only 70k but it felt like a much bigger town, all industrial with huge warehouse-like supermarkets on one long street. There is a beach somewhere apparently but I never saw it, I think I stayed in the bum part.

The next day I dragged my bag a few blocks to the bus station where I was getting a bus to Picton. It was the most comfortable bus I’d ever been on, but you weren’t allowed to eat and it was a 2 hour drive. I sneaked some grapes in anyway. The drive was pretty and green to Picton. My ferry was at 1.15pm and I got there at 12pm, enough time to mooch around the ferry terminal and a teeny bit of the town. It’s quite small and seems that its full purpose is to be the gateway to the South. Even the ferry terminal was spotless, with no rubbish near the water which was still sparkling clean with birds and wildlife.

The ferry was massive, 8 floors! I think it’s the biggest ship I’ve been on. I was nervous about seasickness but it was so big that I didn’t feel it. The ferry was 4 hours or so, I thought it was only 2 hours but it was a very nice ride. You could sit up on the deck and watch the South island slip away from you, with its many jagged islands and peninsulas with boats and birds galore. As we got near the North island and Wellington, there were even dolphins jumping alongside the ship!

I got off the ferry and collected my luggage, and then waited 25 mins for the ferry shuttle to take me into town, which turned out to be a 4 min drive to the train station. Tsk. By this time it was 5.30pm and I had been up and travelling since 8.30am so I did something very extravagant and got myself a taxi to my hostel which was $18! Eek. I thought that I might be meeting a friend that Carrina in London had emailed about me being in Wellington for one night, but it turned out that she was having a romantic Valentine’s Day dinner with her boyfriend. Yes, it was the universal day of love and I was all alone in Wellington so I was going to be even more extravagant and take myself out to dinner to cheer myself up.

I stayed at the Trek Global hostel and it was extremely new and institutional and felt like I was in a prison. I was in ‘the sanctuary’ on the top floor which was supposed to be an all girls floor. The hostel has about a million really heavy doors that you have to beep through with your door card, and after carrying heavy bags after a long day of slogging this is enough to make your blood boil. It turned out that I was in a teeny box room with a window the size of a handkerchief so high up you couldn’t see out of it, with one other girl in the lower bunk. This was the sanctuary? More like a low security prison for the mentally unhinged backpacker. At least the all girls bathroom had a hairdryer and a hair straightners, I could make myself look hot for date with my travelling cat Farigo at least.

Wellington is artsy and cute with trams and some pretty old buildings. It felt like the only place that really had any subculture since I’d been in NZ, with the exception of some hippies near Nelson. Cuba Street has all the dive bars, comedy clubs and quirky restaurants, so I took a walk to check it out and see if there was anywhere suitable on Valentines night for a lone backpacker and her wooden cat.

But it was all a little too public for me. I took a walk to another street that Carinna’s friend told me about which turned out to be a little alleyway tucked away, with a cosy gastro pub selling a good range of NZ beers and yummy looking gourmet pizzas. There also weren’t any couples being romantic in there which sold it to me. The pizza was indeed very yum, Cajun chicken with jalapenos and red onion. And the ale was good too, they brew some good beer over here.

The next day I took a short tram ride through this cute little city past the suburbs with the late Victorian terraced houses to the airport, where I boarded effortlessly and punctually (as is the NZ way) to Auckland. I like Wellington, it’s somewhere I could picture myself living.

I arrived in Auckland for my last night to see the newlywed Macfies and Te and Chris. I gave Bex a call and surprised her, she thought I was coming the next day, but she sweetly picked me up from the airport and took me to her cute retro house that belonged to her grandmother. That evening we met Te with some of her old work friends including Hayley from the wedding in a great little bar / eatery in the hipster area of town. This is where Bex and Te would love to live, but kind of like Dalston in London its way overpriced. The bar made me feel like I was in East London a little, but with some New Zealand hipster charm. The food was really bloody tasty, I had Welsh Rarebit and some delicious wine, so we drank and ate and smoked too many Vogues, I had such a nice time. Chris and Te came back to the Macfie’s pad and we drank some more citrus vodka that Te fished out her handbag, and chatted into the wee hours. Aw I’ll miss my darling fun NZ friends that I have to leave behind quite a bit! The next day Bex drove me back to the airport with our hangovers, it was time to say good bye and fly to Australia.

My overall impression of New Zealand is this: It’s exquisitely clean and has beautiful untouched nature and wildlife. It has the best seafood I’ve ever had, anywhere. It’s small but has majestic scenery and coastline which makes it feel less claustrophobic. Kiwi’s seem very proud of their country and their jobs and work with smiles and dedication for all the tourists which is so nice to witness. Even down to supermarket checkout attendants or bus drivers, who all make you feel like they’re your helpful aunties or uncles. Everything is on time, all the time. It’s the most punctual place on the planet, and everyone seems so law abiding. It seems quite 1950’s England, but the British descendents are proud of Maori culture and have sort of adopted it as their own. It feels like a happy, uncomplicated existence where everyone is friendly to each other with no class division (the only kind of division is with immigrants which is normal for any country), but may be a little lacking of subculture for someone interested in different things, although there is still a few things going on for people who are.  It’s really expensive, some things so much more expensive than even London.

Well, that’s my take on it I may be completely wrong! But I can definitely see why living there would be a happy existence.

I’d definitely recommend travelling there at least to see one of the least affected negatively by humans countries on earth, but if you want to steer clear of 18 year old Europeans maybe research tour bus options. Travelling on your own can be very lonely too as it seems 90% of people over 25 are in couples and not interested in talking to weird lone travellers like moi!