Anchorage Beach

We officially began the Abel Tasman Coastal Trek today. We hiked for four hours across bridges, over sandy beaches and along ridges that hugged the Tasman coast. The views were beautiful as we passed Adele and Fisherman Islands, Coquille and Appletree Bays.

After lunch-time we walked the steep side trail onto Appletree Beach and over PB&J watched the sea kayakers paddle against the rolling turquoise tide.

The Abel Tasman Coastal Trek is the most widely used trail in the country. It averages over 30,000 trampers a year. Luckily we're doing this trail the week before Christmas so we haven't run into the much -talked about crowds. I can understand why the crowds come. The Abel Tasman is an easy trail and mostly flat. The huts and camp sites are near the ocean and while walking to them you overlook sweeping views. The first hut at Anchorage Beach is set right off the sand.

But it is the accessibility of these huts; you can reach all of them via water taxi as well as the trail, that makes this hike seem like less than a true hike to me. Hiking to me as always meant reaching wilderness, the top of a mountain or some other remote place accessible only by foot. I guess I've been conditioned by the U.S. National Parks. Another hour and a half beyond Anchorage Beach and the trail at Abel Tasman leads you past residential vacation homes.

Despite the lack of remoteness, the trail is beautiful. It is well maintained and above all, not to be knocked, flat.