Beaches and Backpacks: December 2013

Wednesday 18 December 2013

A day at the beach

With our beach wear on and the sun out (in DECEMBER!), we were ready for a day touring the white beaches of the Coromandel.

First stop - the bizarre Hot Water Beach, where with a spade you could dig a pool of hot (in some places scalding!) water and bathe in the warm water.

Hobbiton

The realm of hobbits was hidden from sight, down in its own mini valley of the rolling hills of Matamata.

The view up to Bag End and the kidnapped oak tree (13th Dec 2013)

Smelly Wonderland

Leaving the volcanoes behind us we moved on to see more of the geological phenomena of this region.

Our visit to the Wai-o-tapu Thermal Wonderland certainly was a 18 sq km wonderland...

Starting our visit with Lady Knox Geyser who at 10.15am relieved herself at a height of around 20m lasting a good 20 minutes and was still going as we moved on.

Lady Knox Gesyer at full pelt (12th Dec 2013)

Photo of the week (w/c 9th Dec)

Kinloch sunset over Lake Taupo (12th Nov 2013)

Mount Doom

Waking up at 5.45am, we were up and ready to take on one of the Great NZ day walks - The Tongariro Crossing.

Unforget-a-bull

Lighting up our 4 hour journey from Wellington to Tongariro we stumbled upon the village of 'Bull' and their clever tourist stopping trick - living out its name right across the place...

Windy Wellington

Sad to leave the South Island we had become so fond of, we got on the early ferry from Picton to Wellington and enjoyed the ride from the top deck through Queen Charlotte Sound.

As we reached the Cook Strait and headed into open water the wind picked up and got stronger. Prevailing winds accelerate through the strait giving Wellington 173 days a year of wind over 60kph and it felt we'd arrived on one of those days!

Wellington's windy sign (9th Nov 2013)

Photo of the week (w/c 2nd December)

Our last view of South Island

It was saying goodbye to us with this stunning rainbow across Queen Charlotte Sound.

Notes of a wine trail

We couldn't visit Malborough without tasting their infamous "Sauv Blanc" and the idea of drinking my favourite wine all day in the sunshine was too good to miss!

Hiring a couple of bikes was certainly the best way to travel down the vine-lined roads, and the cars in the region seemed to be well practiced at avoiding the weaving wine trail cyclists towards the end of the tasting day!

Cycling around Cloudy Bay Vineyard (6th November 2013)

Abel Tasman Part 2: springs, swans and sandbanks

Our next day at Abel Tasman took us further north to the Pu Pu Springs, which have some of the clearest freshwater in the world. With a horizontal visibility of 63m you could see the beautiful blue colouring around the spring and the fish and plants as if it were a clean fish tank.

The Pu Pu Springs (4th Dec 2013)

Abel Tasman Part 1: sun, sea and (golden) sand

Having stopped to cook dinner on the Alpine Fault (which according to the tracking wall built by geologists hasn't moved so we knew we were safe!) and gathered a few more sandfly bites in the Nelson Lakes National Park at our DOC camp, we headed onwards and upwards to our next 'wow' spot - Abel Tasman National Park.