Sawyer and I reached the South Island, greeted by massive mountains rising out of the emerald sea to form the beautiful Marlborough Sounds. If I haven't mentioned before, Sawyer and I have been using a combination of hitchhiking and buses to get around, so from Picton, the town where the ferry arrives, to Nelson, the sunny capital of the northern South Island, we rode with an old man who had a visitors book in his car for all the hitchers he picked up. He said that he'd often just go for a drive intentionally so that he could pick people up. To make our first impression of the South Island even better than it already was, we checked in to fabulous hostel in [windless - thank goodness for the change] Nelson appropriately named "Paradiso". A pool, sauna, hot tub, ping-pong, volleyball, and pool amongst palm trees were some of the amenities as well as free soup and bread each night and free breakfast in the morning. A dream long term hostel, but sadly Sawyer and I weren't looking for jobs in Nelson. Except for the guest population seemingly being over 90% German, which has honestly become quite irritating, it was nice to have another three days of paradise.
In every city, centrally located, is a tourist information center full of more than you need to know about the region, activities, and beyond. This makes it even easier for every tourist to make plans on the fly, as if New Zealand didn't make it easy enough already. We immediately booked a day of "freedom" kayaking in Abel Tasman National Park, a place high on my "to see" list since arriving in the country.
And of course, if you pay enough money, New Zealand never disappoints in the nature department. We kayaked through beautiful, rather calm green/blue waters beside coves with private beaches and picturesque rock formations... everything you see in the pictures. We saw seals, birds, and a sting ray at the private secluded beach at which we stopped for lunch and a swim.
Sunburnt faces and dehydrated, sore bodies knocked us out the following day... resting for the next day, a bus ride to our WWOOF host in Westport at the Art Hotel.
Now why do I always seem to be catching up on posts, talking about things that happened two weeks ago, when I'm living the most relaxing life ever in a country that, summed up, is basically a young adult's playground? Maybe it is complacency, or maybe it isn't so relaxing as it sounds. As flowy and spontaneous it looks from the outside, there's always a bit going on in the back of a backpacker's head...or at least, in mine :) Check out the random section for these thoughts!
