Welcome to Paradise!

“Stop worrying about the potholes in the road and enjoy the journey.” – Babs Hoffman

And seven weeks later, here we are! I can’t believe it’s been that long since I posted an update, but as I quickly learned: when you’re on the Stray bus, there’s hardly time to sleep, never mind spend any time online!

When I last posted, I was in Auckland about to hop on the Stray bus and head south. That ended up turning into nearly a month-long, whirlwind adventure of both the North and South islands with an absolute fantastic group of people! I have a TON to share about the trip which will probably span the next couple of updates on here, but for the moment I thought I’d catch you up on where I’m currently at and what I’m doing, before jumping in to my Stray recap.

As I was finishing up my journey with Stray, I ran into a problem that I had thankfully been able to avoid for a month while on the bus: Where next? What next? I had originally planned on settling down in Queenstown for a bit, but quickly discovered that it’s an incredibly expensive place to live and paid work was pretty hard to come by. I kept thinking back to one of my absolute favourite stops I had passed through on the Stray bus – the beautiful town of Marahau on the edge of the Abel Tasman National Park. Ever since passing through it, I had regretted not hopping off and spending longer there. I fired off a couple of quick e-mails, and after a few anxiety-filled days of trying to establish a plan, I heard back from two of them! Not only did I have a work for accommodation position waiting for me at the wonderful hostel I had stayed at called The Barn, but I paid work as well at a restaurant just down the road! I was over the moon excited – I had been so stressed out trying to work out a plan that I actually teared up when I got the e-mails back!

I ended my trip with Stray in Kaikoura, a town on the east coast of the South Island, on March 22nd, and hopped on NakedBus (one of the main bus companies that the locals here in New Zealand use to get around both islands) to head to a small town called Motueka, as that’s as far as the local buses would take me. I got to Motueka around 5pm with absolutely no plan on how to get the 30 minutes further down the road that I needed to be. I popped into the iSite information building to ask if there was a shuttle bus, but it turned out there wouldn’t be another one til the following morning. Just my luck though, one of the employees who worked at the iSite happened to live right down the road from the hostel I was headed to, and offered to give me a ride when she was done work!

As we were driving over the Marahau hill into the valley, we had an absolutely stunning view of the bay and the sunset, and I just got the absolute biggest smile on my face. I was so happy and content to be back, and so thankful it all worked out the way I wanted it to! I got to The Barn, and the first thing that I saw before checking in was a sign that said “Welcome to Paradise,” and that could not have been more true. This area is just absolutely stunning, and even after over three weeks here I still can’t believe I get to live here for a bit! I then checked in to what turned out to be my own private room for the first night (my roommates weren’t arriving til the next day)! Let me tell you, after nearly two months of sharing dorm rooms with multiple people, it was such a treat to have my own space for a night!

My ‘backyard’ here in Marahau – the start of the Abel Tasman Coastal Track. Paradise.

 

I started work at The Barn the next morning, and quickly settled in to the laid-back, relaxed lifestyle. The township The Barn is in, Marahau, is absolutely tiny (it doesn’t even have a corner store) so there’s not much to do here besides relax, hang out with the fellow travelers, and go for walks and explore the beautiful area. It has been a really nice change of pace for the past few weeks compared to the constant “go go go” of traveling with Stray, and it’s been absolutely lovely to unpack my bags for a bit and get into a bit of a routine.

My days right now consist of doing my wwoofing work in the mornings from 10am – 1pm, which usually involves making beds and helping with the general cleaning of the bathrooms and the kitchens. I then have a bit of downtime in the afternoon, and on days I work at the burger place down the road I go in for the late afternoon and evening there. On days that I don’t work, I hang out with the fellow wwoofers, head to the beach, or try some of the activities around the area. Just last week, two of the girls here and I went out and tried paddle boarding which was a blast (minus the wind storm that came up and left us stranded on a beach down the coast which we had to get rescued from. Oops. All part of the adventure I guess)!

The girls and I paddle boarding past Split-Apple Rock!

Yesterday I have a lovely day off of both jobs, and one of my fellow wwoofers and I went for a walk in to the national park to a beach called Tinline Bay and spent a beautiful day in the sun! We got photos with the ‘famous’ tree there, and I saw a flock of Canadian Geese swim past – looks like they new the best spot to come south for the Canadian winter too!

Overall, I am so incredibly grateful that my trip has brought me here to Marahau for some much needed rest and relaxation to break up the ‘traveling’ portion of my New Zealand adventure. I couldn’t think of a place I’d rather be at the moment while I recharge and get ready to continue traveling. I’ve been here nearly a month now, and have another two weeks to go before I move on and the adventure continues!