bye bye able tasmin!

said goodbye to our fellow travelers, and jumped on the bus back to
Nelson with barely a minute to spare. picture below shows the bay
where we landed the kayaks. the bay us so shallow that the water
completely empties out on low tides. the little black spots in the
middle are actually big tractors that are used to pull the water taxi
speed boats with giant kayak trailers attached. it was pouring on the
first day when wr loaded up the water taxi, and I am bummed we don't
have any pics of that! quite the sight. big speed boat with all our
gear, us, and 7 big kayaks stacked on the back.

anyhow, returned to Nelson for the night. heather and I busted out a
few loads of laundry, showered, then found a nice little pub for
dinner, and watched a few minutes of the olympics. so tired by the
time we got back. managed to do a few online hostel bookings before we
passed out. next adventure.... car rental, and learning to drive on
the left side of the road! oh my.

kayak sailing...

wind kicked up just a touch on our way back to home base, so our guide
dawn led us in one last little adventure. we ragged our boats up (held
them together side by side), and hoisted a big sail onto paddles, and
cruised across the bay as a little pod. didn't go too fast, but it
sure was fun. except I wax a sail paddle holder, and it was quote a
strain on the arms! they were jello after that. oh well only had to
paddle in the last 5 minutes. dawn wanted us to spend every moment of
the trip on the water... so we landed, loaded the kayaks, and had to
unpack and be on the bus in under 30 min. ha.

continuing south along the coast

made it through the "mad mile"... a fun and funky section of exposed
coastline with shoals that kick up some pretty big waves. sun still
shining bright, we made one last lunch stop on an island. sandwhiches,
wine and a last bit of sun before the clouds rolled in.

heather's turn

weeeeeeeee...!

of course I went down the slide!!

super fun... :)

waterfall and waterslide

cleopatra's pool

short hike brought us to cleopatara's pool. little waterfall of water
fed into a natural waterslide and pool of chilly fresh water below.

baby goat

if you look in the center of the picture you can kinda see the little
baby goat we encountered on our hike.

river hike

sunny girls

followed the estuary way back to the rocks blocking further progress
up the river... jumped out of the boats and hiked 5-10 min farther up
river to some fresh water pools.

heather paddling away...

kayaking day three, blue skies, glassy water

woke up to perfect morning conditions on our third day. nice casual
pace to begin the day... waiting for the tide to rise so we could
explore more estuaries.

ditched all the rain layers, lathered up in sunscreen, and we finally
were able to get some sun on the skin!

happy paddlers

we had a fantastic morning exploring the coastline, and to everyone's
amazement, the storm completely passed by by mid-day. we spent another
late afternoon basking on the beach soaking up the sun. with a few
hours of precious time, I FINALLY finished the lady Harry potter book!
done!

spent a nice lazy evening gorging on too much food again, and chatting
with our fellow travelers swapping stories.