We dropped off the illicit Jenny II at the ferry terminal and met up with the rest of the Stray bus group who came across the ferry from Wellington. Mambo was our trusty bus driver and tour guide and was full of history lessons and local legedns and all sorts of random trivia. Our bus was a bright orange 24 seater that never wanted to get into second gear, which made climbing the many narrow, windy mountain passes especially, erm, exciting. I think we only ever fully stalled once, but there was always a lot of jerking and shaking and coming to a full stop before crawling off in first again. Apparently the bus will me retired after our trip.
The first stop of the day was at... the Marlborough wineries! A lot of the guys who stayed in Picton went on a wine tour the day before as well (sounded the same as what Tif and I did, but ours was free!) and a few of us opted to do a liquor tasting instead. Nice, but possibly not the best idea before a day on the bus!
We had a quick stop in the town of Nelson and picked up another girl and fresh mussels for the BBQ that night. As we were driving we played different "get to know you" games like international speed dating. People on the bus were from England, ireland, Germany and there was the "token Aussie dude", with tiffany and me representing "team America".
Our destination was Able Tasman National Park, which is in the far north of the South Island. We stayed at a place called Old Mcdonalds Farm, which had little cabins and a central kitchen and grill where we had a big group bbq and tasted some more mussels. The ones out here are enormous and beardy- good, bit also kind of oogy.
In the morning we got to explore the park. A group of us opted for a half day hike and anafternoon sailing trip. We did 12.5 km from Marahau, where we were staying, up to The Anvhorage. It was a beautiful walk, partly through forests and over waterfalls, some of the time along beautiful goldenbeaches. We were told that a few days before some of the beaches were white because they had inches of ice on them. They were frosty, but luckily not that cold! The water everywhere was so so clear and varying shades of blue. I don't know what New Zealands secret is to their amazing water! It's always so clear that I think it'll be warm and tropical and want to jump in. Luckily no one has let me yet!
It started drizzling early in the afternoon, and by the time we met the sail boat it was cold and really dreary. It was also very still- good if you are walking, not so much if you want to be sailing. We ended up motoring everywhere, which was still good fun. Darell was our skipper and Scotty was his crew. They were both real characters and we were entertained- albeit freezing- all afternoon. I got to steer the boat for a bit and didn't crash into anything! Good job me, I know. We saw some seals, shahs, a grey heron and a few intrepid kayakers.
The boat poked into a bunch of little bays and inlets, around islands and up a few streams. We ended the day seeing split apple rock, a big round rock that's cracked in two, hence looking like a split apple. We spent the rest of the evening huddled together under the heater at the fatm thawing.
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