Where in the World is Saura

Here it is. Almost three months after we walked the Abel Tasman I’ve finally put this together. The walk was absolutely gorgeous, and its touted as the easiest of New Zealands Great Walks (although you couldn’t tell that to my feet after four days of carrying a heavy uncomfortable pack). The track takes you over the hilly coastline down to sandy beaches and bays, then up and down over and over again.

Our trip began with a water taxi, although there are several different ways to go about the tramp. The water taxi ride alone is a nice outing, taking in the crystal clear aqua blue waters and the golden beaches. The drivers are really cool and you get alittle info about the area. They took us by Tongo Island to see the seals sunning on the rocks. We even saw a few pups. Its a great perspective of the area that you don’t see while your hiking along. We were dropped off near the top at Totaranui and spent the first day hiking up to Mutton Cove then back to Totaranui to camp. We came a bit short of covering the entire trail north of our camp, but I really had enough after a few hours the first day. The terrain was hillier and my pack was heavier than I was prepared for. So we turned around and headed back for the day and hit the hay well before the sun.

If anyone reading this is a Kurt Vonnegut fan, you may be familiar with the term carass. I believe he first visits this concept in “Cat’s Cradle” then mentions it again in “Timequake”. Carass refers to people that keep popping up in your life for no apparent reason. We kept running into a group of three backpackers, two guys and one girl probably about our age, but never actually spoke with them. The first time we saw them was while taking a wee break after the first tidal crossing before we hit Ohetahuti. I took notice since one of the guys was packing his guitar along on his back and I was impressed with the effort. Once we made it to the Onetahuti camp, the three were there at a picnic table, eating, playing the guitar, and very passionately discussing something among themselves in a language neither Al nor I could place. We stayed for the night, but they headed on after a few hours. Unfortunately they were replaced by high school kids that kept us up much of the night.

We left early the next morning in order to make our last two tidal crossings without having to take the longer high tide tracks. This leg had to be the most beautiful part of the trail. We pasted by an ice cold pool, titled Halfway Pool (halfway to what, I have no idea). It was a difficult day, considering we pondered the possiblity of ending the trip with a water taxi ride back just 10 hours earlier. I was doing all I could to keep up with Alan, and did all I could to keep my mind off of the pain shooting up my legs from my feet.

We were rewarded at the end of the day with a remote, cozy, and scenic campsite way down from the trail at a cove more easily accessible by kayak. It was small and intimate, with only three or four tent pads. We had not registered for this particular site, so we were very lucky no one else was already set up there. I honestly wouldn’t have left if there were, I was in enough pain already. We put up our tent on a raised pad that looked out onto the beach and was completely protected by the cover of tree ferns. We layed down to sleep once the sun went down, and awoke an hour or so later to the sound of people coming down from the top of the trail. This trail was so steep that we took great care in daylight, so we were just amazed that people were coming down with gear in the dark. Once they made it down, we discovered it was none other than the group of three we ran into twice the day before. We had no idea how they got there or how we got ahead of them, and since we didn’t speak a common language we’ll never know. We were up and gone before they even stirred the next morning.

We were very excited about our short hike out, and the thought of getting back to the van felt like a long anticipated homecoming. We took a victory photo of ourselves that was alittle premature as I think we still had about an hours worth of hiking after that.

We definitely felt a wonderful sense of accomplishment at the end and all the pains were well worth it. We walked out stronger, fitter, and armed with memories of beautiful beaches, sparkling blue waters, and the drive to do this more often. I guess the best and the worst thing about living here in New Zealand is that we have absolutley no excuse not to tackle these great hikes more often.

Oh, and we did end up passing by that group of backpackers for a final time on our way back through Motueka.

This entry was posted on Saturday, June 10th, 2006 at 2:04 am and is filed under Travel. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.