New Zealand 10 (or ... Abel Tasman too)

10-April-2011

Let's see, where were we. Ah yes, Sunday morning in Marahau. We got up a little early so we could get over to the water taxi place where we were catching a ride on a 7m (ish) aluminum outboard with about 15 people and a bunch of kayaks up into Abel Tasman. We actually paid for a guide and the price included the kayak, water taxi rides, and lunch. The plan was to get dropped off in one spot, kayak for a few hours down to another spot and eat lunch, leave the kayak for the guide to take back, hike for a few more hours, and then get picked up by the water taxi and get taken the rest of the way back to Marahau. And the plan worked great. Our group was nice: just the guide, the two of us, and another couple. The rest of the people and kayaks on the boat were another tour.

We got to the outfitters and got a quick safety briefing, and all thaat stuff that has to get done. Then we donned our appropriate gear there on the lawn. Which I thought was a little funny, since we were, well, there on the lawn.

There on the lawn.

But the reason they wanted us to put everything on is that they had us all load into the boat which was on its trailer... right there on the lawn.

On board the boat ... on the lawn.
The other people sitting there are doing a different trip, but taking the same water taxi.
The woman standing in the background is our guide, Emily.

And the reason that they had us load up on the boat on the lawn is that they had the boat trailer hooked up to a tractor, and they just drove it down the street fully loaded to launch it.

Driving down the street.

Out onto the beach.

And into the water.

Once in the water, they turned around in the shallows, and then backed as deep as they could go, and launched the boat. I must say that it sure looks funny seeing a tractor pulling a boat out in the water.

Once in the water (without tractor), we quickly sped up the coast, and they deposited us on a beautiful beach.

Just one of many. Did I mention beautiful?

I didn't get a lot of pictures while kayaking because I didn't want to get the camera wet. But it was really beautiful. I gave the guide my camera to take a couple pictures even though she told us that she once dropped a very expensive digital SLR overboard. (Bummer!)

Not much to say, but we're in a kayak; though that is probably obvious.

I could have said beautiful scenery, but that's rather obvious, too.

And this would be why they put their names and websites on their life jackets.

Gives a good idea of the places we were kayaking, though.

The kayaking came to an end, and we got out of the water and onto the beach to eat lunch with a couple local birds... Paradise Ducks.

Girl duck.

Boy duck.

And then we said good-bye to Emily - who had a wonderful laugh and reminded me a lot of Vanessa from college - and got on the trail to go hiking again.

Bye Emily!

Hiking through the drab, miserable, same-old same-old.... ridiculous green.

Wow. Nice trail.

Actually, the same-old same-old comment is kinda true. It looked like this everywhere!


Lots of views from the trail out into some little bay or inlet...

Here's one such view.

And here's another.

There was a suspension bridge that one needed to cross during the hike to get over a bit of water that came way inland. Here's Lynne standing on the bridge (the view is looking back the way we came - north).

Again with the ferns!

Here's the view from the middle looking inland.



And here's the view of me in the middle(this view is looking south - the way we're headed).

It was narrow, and moved a little, but not too much.

And finally, here's the view looking out toward the ocean.

The ocean is just sort of around that bend there.

I'm not sure if I've mentioned that I liked the ferns, but here's a nice one...

This is looking straight down on one from the suspension bridge.

Actually it's the one to the left of Lynne (to her right) in that picture of her on the bridge.

Continuing with the hike... here's another typical scene.

(For some reason, I've decided that this will be Marc's favorite picture. Yes? No?)


Another beautiful little spot.

That's a pool of very clear water just underneath those... (dare I say it?) ferns.

And here's where our hike came to an end. This is Torrent Bay looking toward the south.

The water taxi picked us up from the beach at about that little bump in the coastline just above my hat.

A great day: incredible scenery, good food for lunch, and tractors towing boats out of the water. What else could anyone ask for?


And that about does it for our weekend in Abel Tasman. We definitely had a great time there.

Still another entry or two to come before the trip is over....

New Zealand 9 (or ... Abel Tasman)

9 April 2011

Saturday afternoon before the buoy went out, we drove around Tasman Bay to Marahau at the south end of Abel Tasman National Park. (There's no label on it, but Marahau is just north of Kaiteriteri on last post's map.)

We stayed at a little lodge just outside the park.

Our room was right there on the right.

We got there late afternoon, and went for a short walk into the park right after checking in. Just down the road and across the bridge and we were in the park.

Here's Lynne where the hiking trail crosses into the park.

Little stream crossings everywhere. Since it had been raining a lot when we left Santa Cruz, I kept thinking that everything being green sort of makes sense. But then I would remember that New Zealand was just coming out of their dry season... summer was just ending, and it was still ridiculously green there. That's a good color name. it's sort of like kelly green. Definitely darker than lime green, and definitely lighter than forest green. "Ridiculously Green"

Just somewhere along the trail...

We walked down to the beach where the vegetation just came pretty much right down to the sand. A rocky beach...

Here's where a little creek is entering the ocean.

Still on the beach. We walked around a the sand for a bit and ran into this... Just about as picturesque as you could ask for. Too bad I'm not a better picturer!

That's actually the same species tree as the Monterey Cypress we have here.
They grow a lot bigger down there.

We finally left the beach and walked back up on the trail. Just feet (actually, it was just meters) away from the rocky beach scene, you get back into the forest.

Wow, ferns. Ponga, actually. The silver tree fern. I like ferns.

Really, I like ferns. This will probably come as a surprise to Lynne, but it's true. I mean, how could you not like ferns.

See? That's what I'm talking about.

There's still more Abel Tasman to come.....

New Zealand 8 (or ... um ... New Zealand)

Taking a little step back here...

I thought I'd post a couple images of New Zealand, just so you know where all this action is taking place.

Here's New Zealand...

There are two islands: the north island and, um, oh yes, the south island.

You can see Wellington at the bottom of the north island in this picture. That's the capital.

The Cawthron Institute and Paul Barter are both in Nelson which is at the top of the south island on the edge of Tasman Bay.

Here you can see Wellington again, and the Tasman Bay and Nelson over to the left.

We put the buoy out in the Tasman Bay in the following location:

Also on that side of the bay is Abel Tasman National Park. Just north of the buoy in fact. You can see Adele Island in the above picture, and the one below. That's basically the south end of Abel Tasman. (Which will be handy knowledge for the next post...)

You can also see Kaiteriteri at the south end of the coastline in this picture. That's where some of the pictures from the first New Zealand post were taken.

New Zealand 7 (or ... Bike Ride!)

8-April-2011

Lynne and I got out on a bike ride during the weekend before the buoy deployment. (Yes, we're not entirely chronological here...). We both borrowed bikes from Cawthron employees. Thank goodness there's some serious cyclists around Cawthron, because they were great bikes.

Here's the Google Earth map of where we rode:

We started up in the top left where it says Nelson South, and then we rode in the counter-clockwise direction to finish back at the same spot. The high (elevation-wise) point of the ride was down in the bottom right. Where it's a bit brown in the image. It was odd, because we came out of a very forested area into a very desert-like area. They say that it is a lack of minerals that prevents the lush forest from growing there. After we got to the top, we dropped (very quickly, steeply, and rockily!!) into the Maitai river basin. Which was gorgeous. And then we pedaled back into town five hours later, and showered just in time to meet everyone to go to dinner. Phew! Just barely made it.

Here's part of the lush forest that we were in for much of our climb up. Love the ferns!

Here's the top where hardly anything grows on this mountain. The elevation really wasn't that high (around 3000 ft), so it's not like we were above the tree-line for that reason. You can see Lynne there just rounding the bend to come down that little bit of singletrack.

Here we are at the top of the climb. That sign we're leaning on actually says Copper Mine Saddle, but you had to work to read it when you were even right up close.

Here's part of the downhill after it really mellowed out.
I don't have any pictures of the really steep rocky stuff because,
well, I was concentrating pretty hard on going down really steep rocky stuff.

Here's Lynne rounding the bend down in the Maitai basin.
Back to soft swoopy fun singletrack again. Wheee!

More beautiful singletrack. Ahhhh.

Creek crossing. We actually had to cross just out of this picture to the left. Only slightly wet feet. Sidi bike shoes are really not the best thing to wear when trying to stand on wet slippery rocks in the middle of a creek.



And just to prove that it really was a bike ride....




... that it is official and can be recorded as such into the history books....




... and no one can question whether or not it was legitimate....




... yes....




... of course ....

... Lynne was bleeding at the end of it.

Muddy Sidis.
Great legs.
A little blood.

Oh yeah. :)

New Zealand 6 (or.... Deploy!)

11-April-2011 Monday

All right... I'll dispense with the work related stuff first...

We finally got the buoy out in the water on Monday the 11th. Beautiful calm day.

I mean, it was rough, there was a nor'wester blowin' in, and the sea was a harsh mistress that day. You may not be able to tell from the following pictures, the the waves were breaking over the house, and all crew were lashed to the rails. Aargghh.

Here's the buoy on the back deck while we're headed out.
You can't really tell how nasty the conditions were from this picture.

Here's the buoy getting lifted up and over the rail (I'm the guy in the blue hardhat).

Again, the conditions really aren't well represented here...

Final assembly: attaching the radio antenna.
The high winds ... uh ... and large waves ... um ... must have ... very briefly ... laid down at this moment.

Here's the deployed buoy in front of the first iteration that they had going. A great step forward!
Again, this doesn't accurately represent the horrendous conditions that day.
Really, I'm just glad we all survived.

New Zealand 5 (or... Quit Whining!)

4-April-2011

Paul B. drives a little Subaru (sue-bah'-roo). He had to fill up with fuel after we drove to Kaiteriteri. He put in about thirteen and a half gallons of gas (petrol) at the local filling station. It wasn't cheap.

At $2.189NZ per liter, that comes to $8.29NZ a gallon. And that makes it (depending on the current exchange rate) about $6.50 a gallon.

Ouch.

Not looking forward to filling up the rental car this evening....

(By the way, the price on the far left is for diesel. Pretty much everywhere but the US diesel is substantially cheaper than gasoline/petrol. At that price using the same exchange rate as above, that comes to $4.00 a gallon. About the same as the US. Not surprisingly, there are a lot of very cool diesel vehicles here.)