Summer Hols Part 1

I've had to break up this write up into several 'chapters' as I write it otherwise you may well still be reading it by the time I see you next!

Following tradition, I'll start at the beginning with the Stag weekend for my colleague and good friend Steve and will get to the trip in the Abel Tasman and wedding in due course.

Steve and I flew from Auckland to Blenheim at the top of the Sorth Island on an 18 seater turboprop, the approach into Blenheim was stunning as it followed the Queen Charlotte Sound, sort of like flying down Loch Ness, before popping out over the plains surrounding Blenheim. The plains are covered in vineyards as far as the eye can see and the whole area is surrounded by large, dry looking hills reminiscent of the Napa Valley in California, which I suppose is why they make wine here too! One thing that struck me the most about the scenery was that in the 50km that separates Queen Charlotte Sound and Blenheim the landscape changes from lush green, wooded hills to dry dusty plains and sun scorched hills. I’ll spare you the details of the stag night in Blenheim, suffice to say I think we entertained numerous locals with our drunken antics and none of us got hurt in the process.

The following morning we rose at 6am (approximately two hours after going to bed…) to head to Picton to catch a fishing day long fishing charter. Whilst the sea air was just the ticket for a fuzzy head the motion of the ocean was too much for some tender digestive systems. Gravity was defied and the seagulls were grateful for the fast food dinners and breakfasts that one or two of the party had consumed. The charter took us out of the Marlborough Sounds and into the Cook Strait to fish and after limited success at the first spot the captain offered myself and one of the other guys who’d brought our wetsuits and dive gear to hop in for a spearfish. Brett had bought all his spearing gear and I had everything except the gun which I was able to borrow from the deckhand.

The frigid water of the Strait numbed my face instantly and very kindly blew away a few remaining cobwebs from the night before. The visibility was around 3-4m and neither Brett or I saw too much for the 1^st twenty minutes. After swimming a little way along the rocky coastline I dived down and found a Blue Moki which I promptly shot, it was about 7-8lbs. Two minutes later I saw an even bigger one and took that for dinner too. Brett found some Paua amongst the rock (Paua are a type of shell fish which have a black muscle like flesh that some people consider a delicacy, personally I found it quite tough and a bit over rated, the inside of the shell is nice though it's got all sorts of colours in it and is often used to make jewellry) so after measuring them carefully we took the legal ones and headed back to the boat.

We continued to fish all day with some success, I caught two Blue Cod, some of the guys caught small sharks which we threw back, one caught a large grouper and a few other species were caught and returned.

Steve fishing for Grouper off the back of the boat

By the end of the day two of the boys were still bent double over the side, the BBQ, toast and cups of tea we’d been furnished with by the deckhand enjoyed for a second time by the local wildlife. The charter dropped us off at Steve’s father in law to be’s ‘bach’ which you can only get to by boat, it was raining and we were tires but our haul of fish made for a feast at dinner before the drinking commenced again…

The boat we chartered moored at the jetty below the bach

We stayed at the bach from Saturday evening till midday on Monday. The weather was sunny for the most part with a few clouds floating about here and there. One evening we all went down to the jetty and stirred the water up to see the phosphorescence which are little plankton type things that are visible to the eye only at night and only when they are disturbed. Jumping in the water is a good way to disturb them so myself and one of the other fellas went for a dip and lit up the water with billions of tiny green glowing lights. I can’t describe it well enough to do it justice and I don’t have any pictures but despite it being a bit nippy I’d do it again in a heartbeat!

On the Sunday afternoon after a slow start to the day and having allowed enough time for a big breakfast to settle, three of us set out to gather scallops. I love eating scallops and luckily I can dive well enough to gather them too so I’d volunteered to bring my suit on this weekend for this purpose. The bach has its own ‘tinnie’, an aluminium boat with a small motor on the back of it. Steve set the boat up and Brett and I suited up, jumped in and we set off for the other side of the bay where Steve has scuba dived for scallops before. Having a touch too much alcohol in his bloodstream and no body else to scuba dive with Steve manned the tinnie while Brett and I looked all over for scallops. I was getting down to around 12-14m but wasn’t having any luck. We left that spot empty handed and tried our luck at another spot. I successfully gathered one scallop from the second spot, not enough to feed ten strapping lads though. Third time lucky and we moved to a spot just below the hill the bach was located on. This time in about 11-12m of water I found a good sized bed of scallops and spent the next hour or two gathering about 80 scallops (scallop limits in the Sounds permit 50 per diver and 50 for the boat assuming it’s crewed) That evening we feasted on scallops wrapped in bacon and scallops baked in garlic butter – delicious!

Breakfast time at the bach!

The water taxi picked us up from the jetty at Monday lunch time and we headed back to Picton to go our separate ways. Kieran (another work colleague) and I were able to get a lift to Nelson where we stayed in a youth hostel before heading to the Abel Tasman on the Tuesday.