Elaine Bay

Us in the very middle

We’re on the water

Lots of mussel farms here (that’s what’s below the buoys)

Are these buoys or fenders?

Another one of those lovely little places to have a break

The water felt nice so I had a swim, it’s a little cold at first but very soon it feels surprisingly pleasant, I stayed in there for like 10 minutes, no problem

Long Reef Point

We’re in Canoe Bay and decide to kayak to the beach over there, there seems to be some building over there

And there is! Someone’s bach I guess

It’s not even locked, so we have a peek inside

Great place for it! I’m still unsure how they got all the materials here. There seems to be a private road ending at the house but the map doesn’t (only a walking trail). Surely they didn’t bring it all by boat?

What a lovely bay. Cool to see those clouds directly over Mt Shewell

When Rachel told me there are naked ladies here I was definitely interested but it turns out they are flowers

A map of today’s kayak trip (in green, the other part is me doing a quick return in the morning to the shop in Okiwi bay)

Kayaking! (the inflatable kayak fits in the roof box)

Dialed in a little too much polarizer, hard to see on a small camera, but look how clear that water is here!

And the sky

Time for a break, you just paddle onto a little beach and enjoy

Now we’re in Tuna Bay and have another break

We just pulled the kayak up someone’s ramp and sit there for a while

Te Mako Bay, yet another break, it’s gorgeous here

And very peaceful, we both have nap here

Back on the same spot we had our first break today, only the tide has gone out so it looks completely different now

At Tarakaipā Island

Lots of shells here

Like this one

Map of today’s kayak trip (the green part)

The kayak, ready for action, the river flows from the right in the photo to the left, I will be going right, starting my track upstream

On my way, damn, this is lovely!! It’s been too long since I kayaked

One of the new bridges that were placed after previous ones were replaced because of earthquake damage

There’s a little side track here, you can go under that bridge, let’s do it!

This is where it ends up, nice for a break as you’re not dragged downstream which does happen on the Avon itself

In fact it’s very easy to drag the kayak on the shore here and stretch your legs before continuing

And continue I do

Near Pomeroy’s Old Brewery Inn is another easy way to get on shore again, clearly it’s also a very easy and fun way for some of Christchurch’s finest to dump supermarket trolleys in the river

Of course I get the trolley out of the river and leave it here, hopefully someone else will do the rest of the work and take it back to the supermarket

The river goes a lot further upstream but quickly gets too low for a kayak so I take another photo of the upstream river and then make my very easy downstream way back to my car, another well used day!

A map of the kayaking, the trip was 12.7 km and took 4.5 hours

That’s Quail Island, about 2 km from Rapaki Bay

On Quail Island, not many people today

Some info in this building about Quail Island

The island is pretty small so we decide to do have a walk

A DOC hut! I’ll be staying there some time, awesome place to have one

View North towards Lyttelton

View South towards Charteris Bay

And there’s the water taxi to take us to Bark Bay

Frenchman Bay

Kayak enjoying a rest

Walking from Torrent Bay Estuary to Cleopatra’s Pool

Cleopatra’s Pool

And again

Torrent Bay Estuary

Jasper wishing for an umbrella

The Anchorage

Looks familiar somehow…

Here we are in the Awaroa Inlet

Shag Harbour

One of the beaches in Tonga Bay, the photos below are all from Tonga Bay as well

GPS track of today’s trip

Towers Bay

With its famous Split Apple Rock

Continuing north

Torrent Bay

Sandfly Bay

Falls River

And again

At the southern end of Frenchman Bay

This as well

Around the corner should be the Totara Rocks

Ah, yes, there they are

Torrent Bay again

Beautiful little beach just north of Ballon Rock

Ain’t she a beaut?

It’s so pretty here

The whiteness is almost blinding to the eye

Continuing our way south

Torrent Bay Estuary

Still in the Torrent Bay Estuary

We paddled as far as we could towards Cleopatra’s Pool, which is pretty much here at this foot bridge

A less than 10 minute walk takes us to Cleopatra’s Pool

Not very busy here today

At the western end of the beach at the Anchorage

That man has been following me all day

Abel Tasman, so beautiful it had to be named after a Dutchman

Our next stop is Adele Island

Nice eh?

I need a yacht!

But for now the kayak will do

A map of today’s trip, starting in Kaiteriteri, then a water taxi to Bark Bay and kayaking back to Kaiteriteri

A map of today’s kayaking

A little desolate place

The only place to go ashore was this nice little beach, in the distance the two Chetwode Islands

Nothing much to see though there should be plenty of life

We were just glad to be able to stretch our legs

We decided it was a good idea (it wasn’t!) to kayak to the little island on the left in the distance (Te Kakaho Island) next

The weather was still looking great, a bit of a head wind but that should be a tail wind on the way back

See those few tiny black dots just to the right of the rightmost island in the distance? I thought they were the gennakers of some yachts

Te Kakaho Island with another welcome beach to be able to stretch our legs, it took us 1:20 hours and it was 6.7 km from Titi Island

This is on the westernmost point of Te Kakaho Island

As is this

By now we should have looong realised the wind had changed…

…into a strong cold southerly and we still had to go all the way back to the mainland which is another 16 km! It took us 2:20 hours to kayak back to Titi Island where we arrived around 19:10. After a 5 min rest we continued towards Titirangi Bay (still 7.8 km away). By now the wind had become so strong that 45 minutes later we had still only done 3 km of that and it was 20:00 and almost dark (sunset was at 19:45)! We realised we would not make it back to the campsite and so we turned to the left, to try to make it to Alligator head where we landed on some rocks at 20:15.

A map of today’s trip. The colour is a measure of speed: the more orange the faster, the more blue the slower. We started at the bottom (Titirangi Bay), then to Titi Island, next to Te Kakaho island, around it, back to Titi Island and back towards Titirangi Bay but ending up at Alligator Head (on a few rocks). In the dark. In the cold. In a strong southerly. Contemplating what do to next. Long story short: I set of my Personal Locator Beacon (PLB) and after receiving my signal Search and Rescue (SAR) sent a rescue helicopter from Nelson but the chopper had to return halfway because of the bad weather. Another helicopter from Wellington couldn’t even take off. SAR next located the nearest farm on a map, called the people living there who luckily were still awake (it was late in the evening by then) and asked them to find us and bring us to safety. Which they did! They were about to give up after a long search but then finally found us and brought us back to the campsite! Thanks guys and what a great investment the PLB is!

Looking back from the jetty

Portage Bay

Cicada basking in the sun at Portage Bay

Melville Cove and Port Gore as seen from Titirangi Rd

Titirangi Bay

Melville Cove, Tunnel Bay, Pool Head, Mt Furneaux

Glyn

Glyn plus kayak

Someone else with the kayak

Just the kayak, Guards Bay

Hikoekoea Bay