Now on the South Island, Carsten and I have about 10 days to explore before his flight back to Canada and I will need to find my next “home base” in New Zealand.
We arrived in Picton on the ferry pretty late at night and all the places to eat are closed. Luckily, I keep some snacks and spare cans of tuna in the car just in case we encountered such a situation. Unluckily for Carsten, he hates tuna more than anything else in the world (except maybe salmon). The free food shelf at this hostel though doesn’t leave him with many options. He cringes and bites down in to the wraps I’ve made for us to eat. He survives to wake up the next morning, excited about the freshly baked scones provided at our hostel.
The focal point of our time on the South Island is another hike: one of New Zealand’s Great Walks, the Abel Tasman Coast Track. We are doing this hike over four days, starting tomorrow. For tonight, we have found an amazing hostel, definitely one of the nicest I’ve ever stayed at and, after two great hostels, I think Carsten’s faith in shared accommodation is restored.
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Post Hike
After 4 days and three nights of trekking, Carsten and I are now back into civilisation. Other than a few sandfly bites and spending the last day trekking in pouring rain, we had a pretty awesome time.
My top three highlights of the Abel Tasman were:
1. The amazing natural beauty (I realise I’m sounding like a broken record on this, but New Zealand really is that stunning).
The Abel Tasman was a nice mix of walking through forest, on beaches, over bridges, and up mountains. With that came all the rewards: breathtaking lookouts, rewarding swims, and lush green canopies to shade us from the sun. Check it out for yourself:
2. The people we got to meet along the way.
The Abel Tasman is set up so hikers can either spend their nights at campsites or bunk in one of the cabins along the way. Trying to keep our packs light and not sure about the rain, Carsten and I opted for the cabin option. Our decision had this amazing upside in that we got to meet other campers along the route because the cabins were quite social places. Every evening we would share stories about our day and, for people who were hiking the trail in the opposite direction, trade tips for what lies ahead.
The main downside to the cabins was that you didn’t know who was going to end up in your dorm and so, for the first two nights, Carsten and I got stuck in the same room as the dude who snored like a train engine. I think that was his nickname. Sometimes the hike felt like a reality TV show or something because we had nicknames for the other hikers. On the last night, Carsten and I were among the early arrivals at the cabin and, much like a reality TV show, we scored the reward of having a small dorm to ourselves so snoring dude didn’t keep us up all night.
Overall though, we made some great new friends and shared some special moments together like beach walking, camping games, and freeze-dried dinners.
3. A perfect way to spend my birthday.
As the dates worked out, our second day on the trail was actually our easiest day of hiking and it was my birthday. Right around lunch we stumbled upon a pizza place in the middle of the trek (it’s sort of like Chez Monique’s–the famed burger joint–on the West Coast Trail). Later that night at the cabin, when word leaked out that it was my birthday, everyone was wishing me a happy birthday and, though there was no cake, I got to blow out a birthday candle.
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Now at the northern end of the South Island, Carsten and I have a choice: either venture down the East Coast and see some of the famed New Zealand vineyards, Christchurch, and Dunedin or head for the West Coast with some natural wonders including the pancake rocks, glaciers, and Queenstown. I let Carsten pick because I plan to see the rest when I head back North. Carsten opted for the latter- I think drawn in by the Queenstown mountains- and my next post will be about the journey there.
Impermanent Establishments 