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| Abel Tasman - French Pass to Farewell Spit |
Cruising Guides |
 The Abel Tasman area’s main claim to fame is it’s beautiful national
park - comprising some 40 miles of sheltered and varied coastline – golden sand
beaches are interspersed with outcrops of enormous boulders covered with fur seals. Some
of it’s better known beaches stretch for miles, while others are hidden away and so
tiny the sunbathers have to lie on top of each other. Native bush clad hillsides and quiet estuaries are home to herons, penguins and all manner of birds while a stream of trampers grunt their way along a world famous network of walking tracks, camping grounds and lodges. It is a great place to drop off any crew members in need of exercise, a regime easily enforced by collecting them further along the coast. The ideal vessel for an Abel Tasman Park sailing holiday is one with a
sufficiently shallow draft to sneak in to one of the many tidal lagoons that lie behind
the beaches. Motor or pole your way in at high tide, anchor on the sand and spend as long
as you like happily re-acquainting yourself with the earth and tracking sand through the
boat. In the middle of Abel Tasman Park, Torrent Bay provides the only really
good big boat anchorage. It is a superb spot, tucked behind the western side of a
protecting headland that ensures an agreeably long sunset and shelter from any wind
direction. A sweep of golden beach is about the right length to work up a breakfast
appetite. There is a Department of Conservation camp ground at the Eastern end of the
beach with showers, washing facilities and hordes of admiring European trampers ready to
believe any salty lies you are inclined to tell them. (Slip the DOC ranger a few dollars
for the use of the shower) It is a four hour sail from the Abel Tasman side to d"Urville
Island in the east, but with Farewell Spit protecting it from anything nasty out of the
Tasman Sea, the mountains as a backdrop and a summer’s sea breeze, the time slips
away unnoticed. |
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Tasman Bay is big.