Takaka, Golden Bay and Abel Tasman

Hello. I know it's been a while, and I don't have much excuse apart from I've been enjoying not being connected to the internet for a while and having fun. I'm in a bit of a scramble at the moment looking for work for accomodation, but I'll explain about that in the next post!  

So this post will cover just after Shambhala, the two other weeks I spent in Golden Bay and the couple of days at Abel Tasman National Park.

Two weeks in Takaka, and I only have 46 photos. Hmmm.....

 Ok, so I didn't take that many, and my camera decided to randomly delete some. It's nice like that. You might have to put up with more words than pictures to tell you about the last couple of weeks. I'll try to give you nice word pictures.

 So I was once again working for accomodation in a lovely little hostel called Barefoot Backpackers (you could wear shoes!), doing some gardening, painting, lawn mowing, general outside stuff, and on the odd occasion checking someone in. This is probably my favourite hostel so far, because it felt like a home. I say a home because it's obviously not my home, but I felt like it could have been:

The Kitchen. That's Henrietta by the window, one of the owners

The Lounge, and Jono, Henrietta's husband and the other owner

Fife, the tamest and most gentle dog you'll ever meet.  Took her for some walks,  didn't really need the lead.

The deck area

The view from the deck one way...

... and the other way

 So working for 4 hours a day, 5 days a week took up alot of my time, with some little trips inbetween.  I mostly enjoyed being lazy and relaxing, and enjoying the chilled out atmosphere of Takaka. It's a beautiful little town, with some amazing cafes. Be warned. There's one called the Dangerous Kitchen, which does amazing food (best pizza in NZ so far). I think it's called dangerous because you can spend so much money there!
 
  So the little trips. Like I said my camera did delete some photos, including the Wainui falls walk which was really beautiful. Half hour bush walk over loads of different terrain, including this awesome bridge;


 
 Very bouncy and fun to walk over! Then it was a scramble up and down some river banks then through some more trees to the falls. The waterfall itself wasn't that impressive, but it was worth the trip for the walk alone!
 The Falls were about half an hour outside of town (I borrowed one of the other wwoofer's car), and on the way back I raced the rain and did a few other stops as well;

Tata beach before it started raining (See it does rain!)

Abel Tasman memorial (I'll explain about him later)

The view from the memorial

  On another day off, I went to the Puru Springs, the largest freshwater Spring in Australasia, if not the Southern hemisphere:

The ripples on the right hand side are where the spring bubbles up.

It was quite murky water though....

  In my last week I spent a lot of time at the workshop of Mr. Chris Bones, a bone and wood carver carving my own little piece out of some cow bone. It was brilliant just spending time in the workshop to be honest, as Chris is a Character. Loads of people would come in and out throughout the day, and he told me loads of stories about the area and the people in it, as well as his history of carving worldwide.
 While he did some of the cutting and fine engraving work, the following is my own design, and a hell of a lot of my filing and sanding!

 I was pleased with the end result!

So I had a great few weeks in Golden Bay, and met some awesome people. I was sad to leave, and have promised myself that I will be heading back there at some point in my life.

 A trip back over a big hill to Nelson, a night in the same hostel I was at last time, and then back on the Stray bus (With a driver from Wrexham!), and then we headed to....

 Abel Tasman National Park

 This is one of the smallest national parks in New Zealand, but apparently one of the most beautiful. Abel Tasman was a Dutch explorer who discovered the Golden Bay area, but he orignally called it Murderer's Bay. When they first landed, the Maori tribes attacked and ate some of his men, which Mr. Tasman wasn't best pleased with!
 The reason that it's called Abel Tasman national park is hilarious though (I've heard the same story a few times, so I'm going to believe it). The New Zealand government were going to develop and cut down alot of the bush area (this has happened to so much of the country; it used to be about 85% bush, it's now 20%ish). A woman whose name I can't remember decided this was not the best plan, so wrote a letter to the Dutch government pretending to be the New Zealand government, along the lines of;

 Dear Dutch Government,

 It's the New Zealand government here. We are creating a national parkland up near Golden Bay (The name changed to make it more appealing), and we would love to name it after the honourable Abel Tasman, in recognition of his discovery of the area. Please let us know if you support this desicion,

 Yours Sincerely,

 The New Zealand Government.

 The Dutch government of course loved the idea, and wrote to the actual Kiwi government to give their support, leaving them with no other option! After doing some walks, I think it was the best decision. I'll let the photos give my side of the argument;

Baby Quail (Kiwi Quail)

That's all for this time, I'm starting a bar job for a couple of months tonight, so when I figure out what my kind of schedule is, I'll update you some more!

Ta Moko Tattoo

Here at last (sorrry for the delay), is my new Tattoo.

   For brief explination, see the earlier blog about my week around Taupo. For those that didn't know, I got the sun done while I was out in Peru a couple of years ago.

A Small amount of Nelson, and then Golden Bay

Right, so as I said I'd tell you last time, Nelson!  (Might be worth getting a tea again for this one).

 So I got off the stray bus again, this time in Nelson where I stayed for a couple of days in the Palace backpackers. You can never starve here. Free Breakfast or cereals and breads, and at half 4 the delivery of the leftovers of  a bakery, however large or little that was. Never seemed to be enough though.... Morwen (another Aber connection) is working for accommodation at this hostel, so was nice to catch up as well.

 So what did I do? Relaxed things! It was nice to have a few days where I didn't have a busy schedule of getting around the country, and the hostel seemed to be full of  people doing the same; taking their time and enjoying slowly moving around New Zealand. Also they enjoyed the free food too.
   
  Now, I haven't been to the northen tip of the country, and I won't be getting to the southern end either. But I can proudly say I've been to;

 
Yeah, accomplishment. Well, a ten minute stoll up a hill really. Good views though;

 Nelson is a nice little place. Vibrant arts and music scene which is always good, and just a very good atmosphere. They also like to go to the beach here,  I'm not sure why.

There was also some Poker played, and a few general evenings in at the hostel. Excellent few days.

So over here, alot of places in the South Island are run on the work of volunteers, in exchange for accomodation and sometimes food (if you don't want to cook for yourself!) It's not suprising, as the country has 4.5 million people, and just under a million on the South Island. So stuff like fruit picking, gardening, cleaning hostels is pretty common and relatively easy to find. So of course I had a last minute panick!
 I was supposed to be going to a hostel in a little town in Golden Bay called Takaka, but when I called him up a week before it had  kind of fallen through. Great. No massive panick though, it didn't take me long to find another place, and I'm glad I did, as I went to Shambhala. Literally.

 Shambhala is an eco/buddhist backpackers right in the middle of Golden Bay:

About where the Red Circle is

There was literally nothing around, which was amazing. Private beach, beautiful garden (some parts even more beautiful after I left), and just so peaceful. My head did struggle though, with the journey that started three weeks ago or so in a city with 1.5 million people to here, with three others.
 My jobs included weeding, digging some of the base for a new Greenhouse, remaking a compost heap that had gone wild, and a couple of other bits and bobs. Work for two and a half hours in the morning, and then chill out!
 Now I can hear some crys of concern that I went to a hippy buddhist place...but no worries, I've not renounced all my wealth (ha!), this is still my laptop I'm typing on, and I still have my hair (if you haven't seen me with a bald head be grateful). I did join in with some of the guided meditation sessions though which was really interesting, and I'd recommend it to anyone if you get the chance (I'm on Karmic commission now...)
   It might sound boring, but for the most part, this week was about utter relaxation. Talking with the other two woofers, playing the odd game of chess, walking the beach searching for cool little shells, baking. It felt like heaven though. On Saturday and Sunday night we did walk the couple of ks to the highway though to go to the pub there called the Mussel Inn  (Yes they do Mussels, and yes they're great), and I hitched into town a  couple  of times.
 Hitching over here (at least in Golden Bay) is very easy and  absolutely fine (still got my Kidneys!).  Met some really interesting people doing it, including a digereedoo carver. They even have little designated hitching posts around  for people to wait at. So, photos of Shambhala:

The view I woke up to every morning

The main part of the backpackers

Teahouse on the left which had a little gas stove and cups

There are some photos of inside too, but they're on my camera, still need to upload them.

 And yes, as you can see by the constant blue sky in photos, I have more freckles and the farmer's tan in coming on nicely. Starting to think the beard was a mistake. Don't hate me too much!

National Park to Wellington, Over the Cook Straight, and to Nelson.

Ok, so having had a very chilled evening in National Park with some awesome food, I got about ten hours sleep to catch up, ready for the longest bus journey stage; National Park to Wellington, which took us about 6 hours including stops.

   We did have quite a few stops on the way, including getting out at a military museum to climb on the tank and get a photo (I didn't get one as my camera was stowed with the bags, but one is getting sent to me).
 Kiwi's like big things here. We drove through a town called Okahune which is famous for it's carrots. So of course, at the edge of town, there's a giant carrot.

  We stopped in a little place called  Bulls for lunch. The town has used it's name to create as many puns as possible; the police station was labled as Const-a-bull. Food was delect-a-bull. There was a little antique shop selling collect-a-bulls. Normally, I like puns, but this was just too much for me. They were everywhere, and got very repetative. Almost unbear-a-bull. (I'm sorry....)

Back on the bus for another three hours and we finally got to....

Wellington

 Wellington the capital of New Zealand is still only the third largest city. It was decided to make it the capital during the Gold rush on the South Island, to make sure they could keep hold of  the money,  and stop the South Island breaking away to make it's own country (I don't think this was likely, but people get concerned at the thought of losing money).

 The job back in Auckland came in handy here, as I had a free night in  a set of 4 and a half star apartments in the centre of the city, with a free breakfast. Score! So it was a nice quiet big room all to myself, with a nice comfy bed. It's the little things. 

  

 Only having a few hours of the working day (we had to get to the ferry port at 7 am the next  morning), I took a quick wander and then headed to Te Papa, the national Museum of New Zealand.  Te Papa translates as our place, and is one of the best museums I've seen. I only had an hour and a half in there, but you could easily spend a whole day. I was mainly looking at the Maori history stuff, and about the founding  of the country (with the British and the Maori), and learnt a lot.

 

 Had some great fish and chips that evening with some of the guys from the stray bus, and got a nice early night. 

Journey to the South Island

Getting up early wasn't a problem (especially with a hotel wake up call) and a quick taxi ride later, I was at the ferry port. 

 Now the Cook Straight (The bit between the North and South Islands) is beautiful, especially the sounds before getting to Picton. It was beautiful weather, nice and calm, so I took a lot of photos, here's some of my favourites.

Wellington got smaller....

And smaller...

First view of the South Island

First real view of the South Island

In the sounds

                                                          

Picton, where we got off

There were also some blue penguins in the water, but those guys move fast! 

 From Picton we took a bus out towards Blenhiem where we did a wine tasting, and a fudge tasting (Yum on both counts. Then we started towards Nelson, stopping for lunch near a little bridge where they've filmed some of the Hobbit apparently. 

You just can't escape the Lord of the Rings over here...

So after a nice relaxed journey day, I got dropped off in Nelson, which I'll tell you all about in the next entry. It may be a while though, tomorrow, I'm off to a little eco retreat hostel in Golden Bay to work for accomodation for an unknown amount of time!