Where we trade the car for a boat

 OK, we did have to go up and over Takaka Hill (again) to get there.  But still.  

Abel Tasman National Park is New Zealand’s smallest but most popular park.  You can hike the trail or approach it from the sea.  There are 5 outfitters who bring, in total, some 250,000 people pre-Covid, and even more since then.   Guess visiting this country was not just our idea.  But visiting in the early fall makes it less crowded.  We opted the by the sea approach and joined a 2 hulled catamaran that used to be a racing vessel, now repurposed to bring people up and down the coast for day trips.  The sun was shining and we had a good time (all things considered).  

This park is a great example of what we have been seeing in other parts of the country.  The area, prior to being designated as a park, was privately owned, the land razed for farming and grazing.  The settlers (ok let’s just call them the colonists), in their wisdom, imported rabbits, weasels and stoats, along with their sheep, goats and cattle.  There were also the opportunists such as rats and mice.  None of these were present before colonization.   As we know, you introduce things, and it has unintended consequences.  The loss of trees (read: habitat) and the smaller mammals had a devastating impact on bird life.  

New Zealand has been spending an enormous amount of time and energy to eradicate these animals and restore the habitat.  On Kapiti Island, they had some startling photos of how the island looked around 1900-1920, which I show you here.  Eradicating the pests on Kapiti started with a huge drop of poison (not dangerous to the birds evidently) then hunters and trappers then hunters with dogs, to eliminate the weasels, goats and more.  We are talking millions.  They have ongoing traps set out in many places and have not caught any more in 20 years.  When we were on the Cape Kidnapper coast looking at the gannets they had started to install in incredible fence that is submerged a meter into the ground to keep out the rats and mice.  It costs NZ $1000 per meter to install.  So yes, they are taking it seriously.  

Here is the before and after pics from Kapiti. Regeneration naturally, no formal planting.  

Here on Abel Tasman, it’s trickier since the park abuts the mainland in a larger way.   They use helicopters looking for pigs and invasive grasses from China and other approaches.  The forestry efforts are being extinguished and all of this has resulted in amazing regeneration of the land, all in the last 80 years.  They have reintroduced threatened bird species successfully.    There were settlers on the land who declined to sell out, and have been grandfathered in, who still have homes on the coast.,  To do any renovations, or to bring supplies, it all comes via boat or helicopter  (ka-ching).  

Our catamaran can be sailed by 1 person, and his name is Marco,he was amazing to watch, the ropes are all fed into the cabin and managed with a series of winches and clamps, I am sure any sailors can correct my terminology.  Crew of one.  It was a lovely sail along the coast, looking at seals, listening to birds and admiring the coast.  Check out th iconic split apple rock.   Ask Jim for the details, it was split with some ice or something a heck of a long time ago.