First Blog

Well everyone, not sure completely how this is gonna turn out but since I hope you all got my last e-mail, the only thing we've done since then is that we just got back today from a 2-day sea kayaking trip trough the Tasman Bay and through the Abel Tasman National Park which is on the very north part of the south island. We had two 2-person kayaks, Annie and I in one and Tim and Chris in the other. The first day was pretty lousy with plenty of rain, not hard though and then we had to paddle through what they call the "Mad Mile", which was not the most fun where we had to paddle nonstop or go backwards for a mile and the waves were washing over us, getting us all drenched, with only our adrenaline to keep us going. After that, we paddled to a beach to eat a little grub and rest a bit. We then finished off the day by arriving in Bark Bay where we stayed in a "hut" for the night. The hut was actually a bunck house that had rooms of rows of 7 beds connected on the top and bottom. We stayed up the latest, playing cards with another American, until about 9:30, because everyone else went to bed at about 8 - 8:30. Also, the hut had no hot water or electricity, so the showers were fun. The next day, we paddled another km north where we dropped off the kayaks for the water taxi and then tramped back another hour, back to the same huts. Then, today, we woke up late and tramped to another bay to get picked up by a water taxi, about 4 hours away. The scenery was awesome and took a bunch of pictures and will try to post some and hope to have most of my pics up later when I get more internet time.