Nebelhom's Miscellaneous: Arrival in Abel Tasman and the Golden Bay (16.3.2014)

With the closing of this day, we have now been here for 2 weeks. It has been a glorious ride so far and we're hoping for several more good days to come. I write this as I realise that time goes forth unstoppably. Three more days until our ferry to the North Island and with the setting over to the other island our final destination, Auckland, comes ever closer. However, we are trying to enjoy every day to the fullest even one like today.

Under normal circumstances, we would call it a write off and stay home, but being on the other side of the world, we saw it with different eyes. As I wrote in the last entry, in a bid to drive through the storm that was coming down from the North on its way to the most southern parts of the South Island, we are trying to catch some last sunny days, before we catch the ferry to Wellington from Picton.

We set off from Fox Glacier at 7:30 am, gladly leaving that horrible room behind, but cherishing the experience of having walked on a real glacier. Setting our GPS to our new destination gave us the first surprise of the day. The motel we booked (due to lack of other availabilities near Abel Tasman) was not only near the National Park, but lay actually on the beach in Golden Bay, one of the top Kiwi holiday locations. We heard that usually these places were unaffordable...

The day was colder than yesterday but still dry except for the usual morning dew sitting on the grass. We were aware that we will most likely be encountering some rough weather, but we were not prepared for what lay in store for us.

As the journey progressed up the west coast past the constant greenery, we were first met with very strong winds from the side that made it difficult to drive straight down the road. When we crossed a bridge going over a river with some dry parts of the river bed, we had even the displeasure of briefly entering an ad hoc wall of dust.

Later the wind lessened and was exchanged for rain. Just your standard kind, nothing major. We even dared to openly wonder if we already passed the storm. The rain grew stronger steadily with every kilometer that we went further north. Unusual for us, though, it was not cold as it usually is the case in Europe when it is raining.

The rain actually helped to cool you down a bit. We found this out during our lunch break at the longest swingbridge in New Zealand. It went over the Buller Gorge near Westpoint. As a side point, you all probably know that I have a rather strong, illogical fear of heights, but because it is illogical I always want to test if I can overcome it. Well, walking on a slippery wet swingbridge over a river about 10 meters below was one of the sillier ideas I had in that respect... but, to my own surprise, I made it over :)

We walked on a very short walk over as a lunch break tour as we have been on the road for 4 hours by then and needed to move our legs a bit. The combination of warm rain, insanely high humidity, greenery all round and those pesky sandflies everywhere was... interesting. A 15 minute walk and you feel like you need not one but two showers to feel clean again.

After we were done, the "real" fun started. To get to Pohara, which is on the north side of Abel Tasman National Park, we needed to cross several mountain passes with their serpentine roads snaking themselves up and down the side of the mountains with one side a steep way down, while the other either a sheer rock face or overhanging greenery. Add torrential rainfall and a storm and you have just entered nature's custom made surprise rollercoaster. Between strongly impaired vision, the potential for falling rocks and branches and the very hard to navigate roads, it was extremely tiring for both the driver and the person in the passenger seat to constantly look out for potential dangers.

At one point, a huge branch broke and swung literally a meter before our car across the street. I don't need to mention all the rocks we had to circumnavigate. At certain moments, it felt like the storm had defoliated entire trees, there was so much greenery on the road. The closer we got, the harder it became to get any further. I remember a point where our GPS said that there were 32 minutes remaining until arrival for what felt like 15 minutes as we were so slow to move down the pass. At that point we really entered the storm...

The pinnacle of this weather ordeal came when 5 km away from our destination, the road was entirely blocked by a fallen tree. I only heard Isi swearing (who was driving), but it took me about 10 seconds to realise what was going on.

Between Isi's fantastic skills as a driver and mine as a manual laborer getting the worst out of the way, we somehow managed to navigate past this one, as well, (please don't ask how, it is a mystery to us, too), and arrived straight at the beach where our motel is situated.

It is a gorgeous little cabin no 3 minutes walk away from the Tasman Sea. We brought our baggage inside and couldn't help but go down to the beach to observe the sheer natural forces acting on the waves of the sea. So cool! And from one moment to the next, the storm and the rain was gone. We really traversed the storm! To top it all off, the weather promises the next three days to be sunny. It looks like our weather gamble worked out, after all.

After dinner, we went down to the beach one last time to let today's events sink a little and enjoy the scenery without wind and rain in our faces. It was so tranquil and if you did not look behind you, where plants lay uprooted, you could almost think the storm never happened.

Now we are getting ready to sleep and take it easy in the Abel Tasman National Park. It is said to be the sunniest day tomorrow, so a day at the beach is planned (oh the horror, I hope there will be some walking, too). The following day, we may hire a kayak and explore the Golden Bay a bit further. Let's see what the next couple of days bring :)