School Camp -Abel Tasman

At the crack of dawn on Tuesday I, along with 72 year 11 girls & 9 other staff members, boarded the interislander & headed off on school camp. We had a smooth calm sailing & were rewarded with lovely views of the Marlborough Sounds.

We had a bus waiting for us at Picton & headed off towards the Abel Tasman National Park. First up was a stop at Pelorous where the girls enjoyed a river swim. While half the group was swimming, the other half went on a nice 40 min or so bush walk which included a very cool swing bridge. After some of the biggest icecreams I have ever seen it was back on the bus & onwards to Marahau.

At Marahau we were camping at Old MacDonalds Farm. On Wednesday morning we were again up at the crack of dawn to catch a 7:15am water taxi to Totaranui.

Again it was a beautiful calm morning with lovely views from the water taxi.

From Totaranui we walked to Whariwharangi Bay, stopping at Anapai Bay for a swim along the way

And stopping at Mutton Cove for lunch.Along the way we had stunning views to take our minds off our heavy packs & sore feet...

We arrived at Whariwharangi late afternoon & most of the girls headed straight to the beach to cool off with a swim. While they were away the camp was visited by a very inquisitive weka. Much to the amusement of the few girls who had decided not to swim, the weka started rummaging through some of the gear of the only male teacher with our group. Having selected a pair of 'tighty whiteys' it then started trying to drag them into the bush!

While most of the group were swimming I set up my camp. This trip was the first outing for my new tent, the Macpac Macrolight, purchased in the pre-Christmas sales. I was very impressed with it, hopefully this will be the start of many a happy trip together...

Whariwharangi has a gorgeous historic hut that I definitely want to revisit and stay at with Will one day.

While doing a final round to make sure the girls were quiet in their tents before turning in myself I came across the biggest possum I have ever seen! At first I thought it was a big black cat. It just came out of the bush, had a little wander around the tent, taking no notice of me at all before casually sauntering off again.

The next morning we hiked back to Totaranui, but this time via the Pigeon Saddle (as opposed to the coastal track which we arrived on). This track took us nice & high inland, offering more of the spectacular views which the Abel Tasman National Park is renown for.At Totaranui it was time for lunch, & yet another swim before taking the water taxi back to Marahau. On Friday morning the girls went kayaking for 3 hours. We sent them off with the male staff members & us ladies enjoyed a bit of downtime, starting with a fantastic breakfast at the Park Cafe!Tess, in the photo above, is a local girl so her parents came to visit her from Motueka. While they were catching up Barb & I did a bit of stone art...

The idea was that the other 2 groups who were walking in the southern part of the park would see it as they crossed the boardwalk back to the park HQ. Unfortunately we had forgotten that they were getting a water taxi from their final destination back to Marahau, so weren't in fact walking back! Oh well, it killed a bit of time...

Once all 4 groups had assembled at the Marahau water taxi base we hopped on a bus to Nelson, & flew from Nelson back to Wellington. It was a brilliant camp & I'm well up for going on it again next year...