Motueka - Abel Tasman - Far Out

After a lovely forest walk in Hanmer Springs we headed to Abel Tasman. We had heard from multiple sources that this is one of the top spots to visit when in New Zealand, and we must say that we were not disappointed.
We decided to head for Motueka and the choice fell on Top Ten for camping as many times before. Although all places have been good, we must say that this is one of the sites that we loved most so far, really friendly staff and great park facilities and great surroundings.

Our first day in Abel Tasman we decided to go for a combined hiking and kayaking trip with Kahu Kayaks. We started with about three hours walking out to Watering Cove in the Abel Tasman National Park. From  there we kayaked back to Marahau, with some small stops on the way. We were pretty OK with the weather; On the hike out it drizzled a bit, but by the start of the kayaking it had stopped completely. Kayaking was good fun and on the morning after we discovered muscles that we thought that we didn't have :-).

Our next day, the second full day in Motueka started out a little tenser than our normal mornings. The reason for this, was that we had agreed on the previous night at the spa, to go and check out the Abel Tasman Skydive. Once getting there and after a lot of umming and erring, we decided to give it a go. Quite far out as the Kiwis would say (at least with the two of us as reference, we are surely not the biggest adrenaline junkies out there).

After having signed up there was a waiting time of two hours, that we spent buying food groceries and walking the Moutueka beach and asking ourselves what we had signed ourselves up for.
Far
Out.


When we came back to the air strip the preparations started pretty much immediately, which was good. The waiting time was the worst in general, too much time to wait wasn't doing our french nerves any favours.

Getting into the jumpsuit, Henrik got a bit taken by the reality of the whole thing, but he perked up again as we got outside and saw people landing (successfully). Our turn had come up, and we got in the plane and took off. The whole thing felt a bit surreal that we were going to leave a fully functioning plane, but it got a lot more real as the ladies who came up with us first got out at 13000 feet. After that we had a spacier cabin. We climbed another 3500 feet and had some sips of oxygen to strengthen us for the ride, and then it was time.

Sel got out first of the two of us and Henrik left last. "Felt like the right thing to do somehow having seen Selina getting out" Henrik said.

Somehow this event cannot be well described in words. Photos to come soon.

In summary, it is probably the most amazing activity that we have undertaken on our holidays so far (and will undertake).
Far Out.

Over and Out for this time :-).