After a brief stop for pies and coffee at the Bus Stop Cafe we turned our faces North again and headed towards Golden Bay and Farewell Spit. Last year Iain spent over 2 weeks in this beautiful piece of paradise woofing for a small holiday park in Farewell Spit. We hoped to visit with his friend Dean and check out the beaches and birdlife for a day or two before making our way to Christchurch.
Our luck with weather continued to hold as drove up island. We cruised through small, picturesque towns, watched the evening light illuminate the deep green valleys and burnt yellows of the pastures and finally the rich browns and blues of the enormous estuary that houses thousands of migratory birds in the Farewell Spit region. We found Iain's friend Dean managing the Farewell Garden holiday park where Iain had worked and he very generously gave us free accomodation, hot showers and fresh caught crayfish. We enjoyed a peacefull night full of stars, good conversation and my very first view of a hedgehog! It was an excellent
The next morning we headed out to see the best part of the region, Wharariki Beach and Farewell Spit, New Zealands longest sand spit. The track to the beach was a 20 minute walk through sheep and cow pastures. The farmers insert stiles for hikers so gates remain untouched but we were still wading through skittish sheep and indifferent cows. I imagine people who never interact with farm animals would find it quite fascinating...I just wish I'd worn close toed shoes, there was a LOT of manure on the track!
Our first glimpse of Wharariki beach was a blinding stretch of white sand with enormous sandstone and conglomerate rock arches carved by wind and water. The wind howled off the sand dunes behind us digging sand into every pore and scouring all the sea trash off the beach so it was pristine. There was no trace of plastic, seaweed or driftwood, just sand, rock and beach grasses.
We spent hours poking around in sea caves, climbing into tunnels that would be surge channels at high tide, watching wonderful curling waves crash onto the flattest beach I've ever seen and searching for the fur seals we knew were hiding somewhere. We eventually spotted a young British family watching something in the tidal pools further down the beach, when we went to investigate we found four seal pups playing hide and seek under a rock overhang a few feet away from two children and their parents. The seal mothers apparently leave their pups in groups hidden in rock caves and overhangs while they go fishing, we saw one adult returning to the creche about an hour after we spotted the first pups. The babies were hillarious! They were by turns curious, timid, playful and shy. They would get brave and venture out to play in the pools then they would spook and run off towards their hidey hole, tripping over their flippers like puppies trip over their huge feet. We came across two separate 'daycares', the second one had 20 or more pups in it and there appeared to be an adult left behind to watch them.
After a few hours of being sand blasted and laughing at the seal antics we decided to head back to the van and to the Spit itself to enjoy a coffee and a look through the observatory telescope to check out the bird life. The number of people allowed onto the spit is heavily controlled, there are areas that are fully off limits to people and other areas where people can go on specific tours only. There is a much smaller portion of the start of the spit where people can walk around freely, but we decided not to explore too much, we'd had enough sand for one day and knew we'd see phenomenal bird life on Stewart Island when we got there.
Our brief stay ended with one last stop at Farewell Gardens where we picked up a few T-shirts and postcards designed by Dean, enjoyed a hot shower to wash off the sand and did a few checks on the van. Then it was off to the South and Christchurch.
'Can you spot the Kiwi?' Dean Atkinson
This is a satelite photo of Farewell Spit, Golden Bay
No comments:
Post a Comment