After checking out my new camera for a while we drove on to the pancake-rocks, Punakaiki. It is limestone-rocks that is in layers. Very fascinating, and impressive.
It was raining a bit, but we went out to take photos anyways. We did buy rain-clothes in Auckland before starting our tour, so we need to use them as well. :p
We parked outside of Punakaiki to spend the night there and after a few hours it rained like never before. Well at least the weather had been good for quite a while, so no complaints from me.
In the morning we drove back to the rocks to get some more pictures in daylight.
http://www.richard-seaman.com/Wallpaper/NewZealand/SouthIsland/Punakaiki.jpg
After this we drove further on at the coast-line to Westport, which wasn’t a very fun town so we left quite quickly. :p
We drove along the Buller Gorge which is a big river running through the mountains. Very beautiful.
We arrived in Murchison and there we parked for the night.
In the morning we continued to drive along the Gorge and we stopped at the longest swing-bridge in New Zeeland. It is 110 meters long and went to an island where there was a earthquake in 1929 or so.
After wandering about for a bit together with the thousands of sand flies we continued our trip to Motueka where we did some errands.
We drove to Marahau which is the start of the Abel Tasman National Park. Abel Tasman was the first European to come to Aotearoa – Maori for New Zealand and he was a dutch seafarer. It was in 1642 and he set foot inGolden Bay, which is north of the national park.
In Marahau we changed DVDs and took a shower at Old McDonalds Farm (a camper-place).
On Tuesday we drove to Tanaka and at the information-center we met a really nice person. Brian helped us with all the sights we should see in Golden Bay, and they were all free. We like him. 🙂
We started with Collingwood and there we stayed that day doing some sunbathing and relaxing (like we aren’t relaxed enough :p).
Before it got dark we drove towards Farewell Spit and parked on the side of the beach.
On Wednesday we visited the visitor-center at Farewell Spit (which by the way is the worlds longest natural sandbar and is 35 km) and there we got some more information about the places to visit.
We went to Wharariki Beach parking lot and took the 20 min walk down to the beach itself.
The tide was getting low and we could see some amazing caves in the rocks surrounding the beach.
http://www.momentuos.co.nz/displayimage.php?album=random&cat=0&pos=-132
When we went back to go to the trail we saw lots of fur-seals in the water, playing around. We also saw a older seal laying on a cliff a bit from us. We decided to wade through the water to go there and take some photos. When we came to the cliff there was a younger seal there and he swam through the water and then up on the cliff opposite to us. He decided that he didn’t want us there so he approached us and darn was he fast! I panicked and went the opposite way I should. He came closer and I was forced to jump in the water, which was kind of deep. Well I am still alive but my jeans were all wet and A-M couldn’t stop laughing. Nor me after the shock was settling down. At least I got a nice video and some nice pictures of the creature. :p
This is the second time I’ve been chased by a seal on NZ so I think I have to keep way from them from now on. 🙂
We drove to Cape Farewell and took a short walk to see a nice cliff-formation and then we went back to the visitor-center. We had some coffee and cake there and wrote diary’s in the sun.
After the cake we decided to walk it off and went up to Pillar Point. It’s a steep walk up to the ugliest lighthouse I seen but the view over Farewell Spit was amazing. We could see the whole thing and got some photos of it. To take a tour out on the Spit costs about 70$ so this was much better. 🙂
After that hard walk we needed a shower so we stopped at a camp-site to take a shower. The lady said it was for free. How nice! Some people are just too sweet here.
We also could do our laundry there so we stayed the whole evening and then drove to the same place as the night before to sleep.
On Thursday we drove to a fresh-water lake, called Te Waikoropupu Spring, and it’s the clearest fresh-water spring in the world. It was like an aquarium! Unfortunately it wasn’t allowed to swim there, but we could at least stick our feet in there and it was cold. Brrrr…
The currents come from underneath nad they seem to be very strong. It is possible to dive there but not commercially.
We went back to Brian at the information-center and booked a boat-trip on the Abel Tasman-coast for Saturday and then we drove to a place called the Grove which almost reminded me of Ankor Wat. There is big boulders with trees growing on top of them. It was really impressive.
After driving to Totaranui, which was both very windy and no people around, I went down to the beach. It was golden yellow and when i looked out in the water I saw a seal swimming around. No, i didn’t go near it. :p
We went to Wainui River and walked to a waterfall. It took us about 20 minutes and we went over a swing bridge on the way. The waterfall was really impressive. Not as high as the one on Bali but still good.
We decided to park there for the night.
More to come!
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