We sailed in and out of numerous coves going as far north as Totaranui with the skipper stopping several times to drop off walkers who were doing particular sections of the coastal path and collecting others who had completed their walk or had stayed overnight at one of the Department of Conservation camp sites in the park. This must be one of the most beautiful coastlines anywhere!
The start of our walk was Torrent Bay but as it was close to low tide, our boat was too large to get in there and we were transferred to a smaller vessel and even then we had to wade the last few yards. We had ordered a packed lunch and this included some terrific and very large raspberry & white chocolate muffins!
The 2 hour walk to Medland Bay (close to Bark Bay which is sometimes the only one shown on maps) is not that far as the crow flies but we needed to walk in and out of numerous coves, over several rivers and with lots of climbs and descents. A really enjoyable walk through sub tropical vegetation and as you can see the lovely lady wife was in her element amongst the tree ferns. Interestingly the bark on some of the trees is black and at one time the bark from those trees at Bark Bay was harvested for use in the tanning industry at Nelson. Are you still paying attention?
We arrived at Medland Bay with about 45 minutes to spare before our boat was due to collect us and by this time the wind was really blowing so we found shelter behind some clumps of grass in a mini sand dune. On our way back to Kaiteriteri we encountered a solitary blue penguin and a huge flock of sooty sheerwaters (closely related to the manx sheerwaters we have seen on Skomer Island in Pembrokeshire)
An excellent day and it was decreed that it should be celebrated with a bottle of the very excellent Peregrine Pinot Noir to accompany our steak.
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