Abel Tasman

Abel Tasman - the Dutch guy who got to New Zealand 90 years before our beloved friend James Cook arrived and claimed it as part of the British Crown in 1769. Just think, if Abel Tasman had not been scared off by a bunch of guys showing him their tongues the countries native language could now have been Dutch! ;-) ... It is not all bad, he went on to discover a small island off the South of Australia and this island (Tasmania) along with it's neighboring sea (Tasman Sea) was named after him.

Fast forward to present times... New Zealand was kind enough to recognize old Tasman and his efforts back in the 1600's and they named a National Park after him. If just so happens to be an absolutely lovely place too!

Although you will now realize this as our general theme - we did not just want to walk through the Abel Tasman National Park when we could probably make it more 'difficult' for ourselves. So with some discussions at the information office and with some details on tide times we made a cunning plan which included taking a long water taxi ride to the far end of the park, walk for 2 days and then arrange to pick-up a kayak somewhere along the way for 3 days of kayaking (and camping on the beaches at night). So, that is exactly what we did!

 

Quite weird - we spotted this raft out at sea and kept a close eye on it as it eventually washed up onshore.  Quite an ingenious piece of engineering but the castaways were nowhere to be seen... ;-)

After a beautiful walk we finally picked up the kayaks and continued our journey...