Reswitht I am writting this post as Raechell had written a very witty and lovelly post, unfortunitly I deleted the post by accitdent therefore I am now I am writting it. We left Wellington early Sunday morning dropped off by Raechells Dad.. thanks Roy....Roy drives his car like a Spitfire fighter pilot so was glad to get to ferry terminal in one piece. Wellington put on a lovelly day for the crossing , I think maybe the best crossing i have ever been on in the Cook Strait which was good as Raechell gets sea sick and Bella has not been put to the test on Ocean going ships yet, We were so tired we went straight to the movie theater and watched Into the Woods....slept through the first part. The trip across Cook Strait was very uneventful as their was very little swell we arrived in Picton unaware and had to be booted off the boat as we wanted to see the end of the second movie. We went straight to the ISite and booked our ferry trip to the start of the Queen Charlotte Track. The Operator that ferried us to the start of the track had a extra stop at a bird scantuary on a island just of Ship Cove called Motuara Island Scenic and Historic Reserve this was awesome as we walked to the top of the island and got to see a South island Robin which reminded me of many of the hardcore New Zealand Trampers we meet, Tall, extremely skinny legs, very fit....all that was missing was a beard... Their were a lot of Penguin nesting boxings and when you lift the lid on some of them we found some occupied, they are so little and pretty keen climbers as the island has steep sides and some of them nest right at the top of the island. We had 40 minutes to explore and then we were off to the start of the QCT at Ship Cove. Ship Cove is where Captain James Cook first planted the Union Jack and Claimed New Zealand for England much to the surprise of the Maori who had been living there for a while....Once the Ferry left with the day trippers we were on our own and had Ship Cove and the Track to ourselves which was just how we like it, we spent some time exploring, walking up to the waterfall which was not huge but very peaceful and we took photos at the monument etc. We headed off on the track and to our great surprise the track was covered in Animal traps one every 3-4 metres, each was numbered and Raechell saw numbers around the 2000 mark, I have never seen so many traps, a local told us that they are testing a idea instead of a preditor proof fences which cost a lot of money and cannot be relocated they are testing.. for want of a better word a fence of traps, this fence of traps can be moved as required and does not cost as much as the preditorfence...BUT it was a eye sore and not something we wanted to see on a Great Walk. Our first camp was at Resolution bay, Raechell made some friends with the local Chickens they just seemed to follow her Bee befriended a pet goat. We did plan to stay at School House bay but in the end flushing toilets won out with the ladies, with the added advantage of a hot shower and as we were the only ones at the camp we had it all to ourselves. The Resolution Bay was a Marine Reserve so plenty of Blue Cod around the wharf which are lovelly eating and i thought of pushing Bella into get one. ...but I think Bella could take me in a fight..so i didn't .....Once we set up camp we had to defend it from the local Weka's who seemed to love raiding our gear....I dont know when they sleep as they were at it all night they grabbed the billy and tried to drag it away but gave up when they realised that old teabags are not a great meal. Next day was 22Km with fine weather and very little people on the track, I have never seen so many private property signs Raechell thought if they put lights on them it could be Queen Charlotte Vegas...Most of the track is Private Propety with the OCT a skinny strip through the private Property with very little easy access to the water which is a shame. One of the few places we could acces the water we stopped and were rewarded with Dolphins coming close to shore which was awesome, they were the very small onces with the rounded fin. They hang around for about 45 minutes, and it was relaxing lying in the sun watching them do their thing. The Weather packed in for the last two days and with the added extra fun with many of the camp sites full of Schools kids.....Raechell and Bee could not face the crowded camp site so took off and booked us into a resort for the night. This was awesome as a crowed campsite with swarms of sand flies that were even attacking me drove us indoors to the bar. the final night was at Cowshed camp site which again was very crowded......which to many people would be ok but to a Te Araroa walkers who are use to camp sites all to ourselves or just a couple of people tested us....we like hiking on our own and enjoy the remoteness of bush campsites.....we did have a good sleep though....last day was again wet but humid 25km and we had to be at the wharf by 3:30pm, we smashed it out by 1:30pm so had time to kick back and watch the Outwound Bound team perform a Haka and Welcoming new visitors to the school which was good timing.
So ends our QCT walk!!!
So ends our QCT walk!!!
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