The Ostrom Family Adventures

We arrived in Picton last night and stayed in a cheap little motel that was nicer than we expected. We have planned to both camp and stay inexpensively throughout this journey, and we love camping, but a warm bed was pretty nice as well. We set out this morning and drove 4 hours to Abel Tasman, stopping for pizza in Nelson and to my surprise drove right past a big bike park (I didn’t know my guys could do that!)

The goal was to see a bit of the Abel Tasman park and do a ride and hike from our campsite. The number of wineries in this area is astounding and there are several options for biking and wine tasting tours that Mason and I may have to do another time.

We have found that the driving part is more fun when we stop often at various lookouts and to stretch our legs. Hawke’s lookout was one of our favorites as we started the winding mountain climb!

We just so happened to be listening to The Fellowship of the Ring as we drove up the winding road into Abel Tasman National Park. We also happened to be with Frodo and his hobbit friends in Bree at the inn of the Prancing Pony during this very drive as we ascended Mt. Takaka. This also happens to be the very place filmed in the movies as Stridor led the hobbits into the wilds out of Bree fleeing the black riders!!! What a happy happenstance!!

We stopped off the road at Ngarua cave and found not only a super cool (11°) cave tour that took only an hour or so, with some amazing Moa fossils, but our guide sang a gorgeous Maori lullaby in the cave acoustics that will stay with me forever.

We passed some adorable Hairy Coos and arrived at Canaan Downs campsite at 4:30 – a little later than we had planned but it was tucked into a beautiful valley snuggled up to a dark forest.

We packed a quick daypack with headlamps just in case and took off immediately to see Harwoods Hole – a 2.3km hike in to see the 12th deepest Tomo (sinkhole) in the world. At 173Meters deep, we couldn’t see the bottom, just the tops of tall trees that start at the bottom!

We were welcomed to the hole by this gorgeous bright green Kereru pigeon.

The Harwoods Hole was incredible and the forest was teeming with Weka (Māori Hen) that clearly have no predators here. They were fearless and looked similar – but not quite like a Kiwi bird with a tail and shorter beak, but had a somewhat similar grunt and loud chirp sound that they made frequently.

It was a remarkably cold night – this first night camping on the South Island. But we watched the full moon rise over the hill and it was clear and bright. The weka poked around our tent and car for hours into the night and stayed very close as we ate dinner and even pecked at my hand when offered.

It was perfectly quiet from about 11pm until 0630 when the birds and sun started to wake in our little valley and it sounded like a tropical island again!

We woke up and started our drive south to a beautiful little mountain town called Hanmer Springs as had recommended by one of our local favorite bike shop guys. It reminded us of a small Aspen, CO and we missed our Duggan cousins!

A quick stop at flat rock cafe for coffee and a Kumara stack (grilled sweet potato with a mushroom, slice of capsicum(sweet pepper), chunk of cheese and a tomato!). We found out driving away that the opening scene of Fellowship of the ring was filmed from this spot as well!! 🙂

Next quick stop at Maruia Falls! We’ve made an unspoken tradition of bursting out of the car at some of these waterfall stops and running down to the viewpoint and back before jumping back in the car.

It started raining as we crossed the mountains and found our way to Hanmer Springs forest. But, we are not daunted by rain and muddy trails! We just embrace the spray and mom makes it an awkward photo! 😉

After a few hours of cold and wet riding, we hung our things in the shower of our little motel room (yes, we chickened out on camping here in the cold and the rain) – and headed to the Hanmer Springs thermal pools which was an awesome way to warm up again.

Then we ate a lovely dinner at Fire & Ice and saw a little St. Louis love on their wall! :).

We’ve also been collecting outrageous LotR sayings and practicing incorporating them into our everyday conversations. Examples are, “What in the Shire?” “Son of a Baggins!” “Oh my Gandalf!” Please feel free to start using them yourselves.