Abel Tasman National Park is New Zealand’s smallest national park, covering only 87 square miles, but it’s not lacking in spectacular beauty and diversity. This park includes the Coast Track, which is a hiking trail up the coast.
The park’s climate is mild and lovely, and if you’re hiking, you won’t mind staying at any of the camp sites and huts available for trekkers. Abel Tasman is popular in summer, so book huts in advance. Wainui Falls are the best waterfalls in the park, and it only takes a 45-minute walk to get to them.
You can also partake of the other warm-weather activities in Abel Tasman: sea kayaking and swimming. Sometimes swimmers are delighted to find they have friends in the water: friendly seals who also like to swim the same waters. There’s great fishing, and also a marine preserve, where marine life is protected along 8 miles of the coast and into the waters, so no fishing from shore or from boats in that area, called the Tonga Island Marine Reserve, which is located on the northern part of the coastline in the park.
To get to and from the park there are numerous water taxis leaving and arriving at Marahau, the southern gateway to the park.
