Day 15 Rapahoe -> Mapua (Abel Tasman)

Today was another transfer day. We drove from Rapahoe to Mapua to our accommodation for three days, the Apple Pickers Cottages https://www.applepickers.nz/. Now we are near the Abel Tasman National Park, which we will explore tomorrow by kayak. The drive today was long, we were in the car for about 6 hours for approximately 350 km. That's New Zealand. That's why there is not much to report.

We made a very nice stopover at Cape Foulwind, where we walked about 5.5 km on a trail to a seal colony. The trail always followed the coast and was well maintained, so we were able to walk it in flip-flops. It's an interesting story because they blew up the granite of the coast to fortify the port of Nelson. Previously, the cliffs were densely forested, but afterwards there was nothing left. Now it has been reforested mainly with New Zealand flax (see photos). When we reached the seals, we got to observe various newborns. By the way, the baby seals are called "pups". The photo at the top is actually a hidden picture, see how many seals you can find; hint: there are many. We continued our journey in the car through narrow valleys and roads. In New Zealand, they are really clever: because there is so little traffic on the South Island, the bridges over rivers are very, very often only one-lane. I have never seen that frequency anywhere else. One direction always has priority and so you have to adapt, even if the bridge is over 100 m long. We have never driven through tunnels, despite the Alps. We had a lunch snack at the "Berlin" café. Funny, it had Berlin bears inside.

Finally, we arrived in Mapua and at our accommodation. Just before that, we already had the feeling that civilization had found us again on the roads. There were these things with colorful lights, I believe they are called traffic lights. We haven't seen them in ages. The quarters are beautifully located on a kind of lagoon, Waimea Inlet. It is subject to tides and when we arrived there was still some water, but later there was none. Let's see how it is tomorrow.

The last few days we were in the uninhabited part of the South Island, and it is not a culinary highlight. But tonight we went to Nelson, which has about 45,000 inhabitants, and had a delicious Asian dinner - WITH dessert. Fantastic.

Good night.