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Trekking Abel Tasman

By October 31, 2013March 9th, 2015Travel

Trekking Abel Tasman

In Nelson (NZ’s famous sunny spot) I find myself in the geographic centre of New Zealand. There’s a spike like statue to prove it too. The city sprawls out quite far into other neighbouring towns overlooking the north coast. Like most towns in NZ its not too long before you have explored the city from one end to the next. Nelsons’ Saturday markets allow me to sample enough freebie foods to fill me for breakfast. Homemade chutneys, manuka honey and peanut butter, seasoned salts, granola, nuts, sweets, fresh gluten free breads, feijojas and kiwis a plenty. Its been a long time since I treated my taste buds.

From Nelson, it’s almost a given that I will do one of NZ’s ‘Great Walks’; the 3-5 day Abel Tasman Coastal trek.

Abel T NPThe trek consists of a really well signposted route along boardwalks, bridges and sandy beaches that offers some stunning views of the crystal turquoise waters.

Lots of people chose to pay big bucks to kayak along the route. As I’m a cheap skate, I take the hiking option staying overnight in the much talked about DOC huts (department of conservation). If NZ does one thing really well it’s that; conservation. These camping huts (of which there are thousands) are sprawled all over the country in remote secluded areas to allow trekkers to camp overnight and get shelter. Most are basic shacks with a fire place but most of the ones in Abel Tasman are luxurious little homes with mattresses and plenty of cooking space. Very social, communal and definitely not the roughing-it’ experience which I had expected.

The nights though, are freezing cold, and the sleeping bag I stole from my hostel simply can’t keep me alive. So each and every night, myself and two others I hike with crash by the large open fire place in the kitchen area. Success!!

During the day the trail is quite easy going. The place gets jammed packed in Summer but at this time of the year it’s simply a secluded paradise. Nothing like I expected NZ to look like. This looks like a postcard from Hawaii or Thailand…

After a busy going 4 day trek of eating porridge and burnt homemade bread ( we cooked previously that looked like a football ) it was great finish back in Takakas little hippy town for some beer and fish n’ chips (which I gorged down in seconds, without even asking for tomato ketchup).