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Kaikoura to Wellington
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Day 244 Mon Dec 27th
With only 3 dodgy channels to choose from NZ tv. is at best, poor, so even if its available we don't tend to watch it. Therefore, todays local morning paper delivered the first news of an earthquake off the coast of Sumatra. It appears that maybe a couple of thousand people have been killed by a Tsunami triggered by the massive quake. Rene and I are pretty shocked as reports show that parts of Thailand we visited in July may have been affected.
At 12.15pm we were sat in the back of a yellow open top landrover, dressed in 6mm thick wetsuits and holding our snorkels, masks and fins. Off to hopefully swim with NZ fur seals.
Having transferred from SealSwims yellow landrover to their yellow boat,we were motored out to, and dropped in the middle of the seal colony out off the headland.
Feeding mainly at night on squid,octopus and barracuda, fur seals are pretty lazy during the day spending many hours sleeping and sunbathing, but they are naturally curious and if you bob about nearby they'll generally come and have a look. And they did. Slug like and awkward looking on land, seals transform into the most graceful of underwater swimmers. For an hour various seala either flashed by us like torpedo's, or played amongst us, performing acrobatic somersaults and barrel rolls before moving in close and eyeballing us with the biggest, saddest looking eyes. The young seals were naturally the most playful, while the big bull seals leave you slightly unnerved. It's breeding time and the males are large toothed and very territorial, swimming past to make sure your'e no threat, which struggling to look anything but ungainly in an incredibly buoyant wetsuit and wearing bright yellow fins, we clearly weren't.
The NZ fur seal is only found in NZ and its subantartic islands, and off the south coast of Australia. Once widespread, it was hunted almost to extinction and today its numbers are only slowly beginning to recover. The biggest threats to the seals now are being caught in fishing nets, and swallowing plastic bags.
Our time with the seals passed far too quickly, and in no time we were being hauled back into the boat.
Our last afternoon in Kaikoura really dragged, sat as we were outside our apartment, glass of wine in hand , soaking up the glorious but all too shy sunshine, and absorbing the wonderful view.
expenses:- accom 100 , seal trip 140 , parking 2 , groceries 16.45.
Day 245 Tues Dec 28th
After a great day yesterday, today was a real downer. A day of cloud, rain and driving. The car radio news is full of the dreadful Tsunami which seems to be much worse than first thought.
Driving north and ultimately heading to Abel Tasman National Park we passed through Blenheim, which is in the heart of the Marlborough wine region. Flat and fairly featureless we didn't hang around, but instead drove on, passing by the towns of Picton and Nelson before eventually reaching the gateway to Abel Tasman NP, Matueka.
Due to the rain , the visitors centre was packed with miserable looking tourists asking for weather forecasts.
The coastal Abel Tasman NP is a hikers and kayakers paradise, full of rolling hills, small bays, and hundreds of inlets. We were hoping to have a day kayaking but the prognosis on the weather wasn't good. Rain and strong winds for the next couple of days. Despite the best efforts of an overly helpful lady in the visitors centre, there was no accommodation to be had in Motueka, so having bought a 2 man tent in Oz , there was nothing else for it. We jumped back in the car and drove back to Nelson where we found a grotty motel to stay in.
expenses:- accom 85, fuel 31, bread 2.60.
Day 246 Wed Dec 29th
We've kind of lost direction and focus, Kaikoura was the last on our Nz must do list, so we've decided to drive back to Picton today and catch the ferry to Wellington tomorrow.
Arriving in Picton fairly early, we booked into another tired and grotty , small motel room. A cloudy morning but Picton was heaving with holidaymakers.
Hoki and chips , and a pint of speight's for lunch.
A walk to the waterfront took us past tourist desperadoes playing crazy golf and riding on the minature railway. We sat on a bench and watched the ferry leave, hoping its bow wave might capsize one of the kayakers who were struggling to make headway against the strong wind. But it didn't. Rain set in mid afternoon.
The death toll of the Tsunami seems to be doubling daily, and the whole of the Bay of Bengal has been affected. The tv. news pictures of Banda Aceh, Sri Lanka and Thailand are horific.
expenses:- accom 70, lunch 40, postcard 0.70, internet 7.
Day 247 Thur Dec 30th
150mm of rain fell overnight and it was still raining as we drove onto the ferry. Fiordland had an astonishing 360mm of rain yesterday.
Queen Charlotte sound is reputedly a beautiful place, but low cloud and mist meant we were in no position to judge.
Undoubted highlight of the crossing was the appearance of the " world famous" childrens magician "Lavango". He was low quality and all the funnier for it. Personnally I find it a little hard to believe that any world class entertainer would end up working the Picton to Wellington ferry, but that may be doing him a dis-service.
Not just any old rain, but torrential rain greeted us in Wellington and continued all afternoon.
An internet special offer means we're in a quality apartment right in the centre of Wellington, but the car had to be parked about 500m away and we got well and truly drenched.
Satelite tv. in the room means up to the minute reports on the Tsunami. Some of the cam corder clips are unbelievable, and harrowing to watch.
expenses:- accom 75, internet 4, groceries 52.95
Day 248 Fri Dec 31st.
Our morning was spent exploring part of ' Te Papa ', the museum of NZ.
Dominating the waterfront the striking construction took five years to build and cost 317 million NZ dollars. 2 million visitors came through its doors in 1998, its inaugral year. Its a world class, state of the art museum.
The other must do attraction in Wellington is to ride the red cable car. So we did. It struggled its way up the steep hill from Lambton Quay to Kelburn, where we alighted and strolled through the pleasant botanic gardens, before white knuckling back down at speeds approaching 5mph.
New Years Eve celebrations were muted, we ventured out for a few drinks and a meal, before stopping by Civic Square where a band called " That 80's Band " were underperforming. With a yell of ' We love you Wellington ' they launched into a rendition of " We built this city on rock n roll " and we left.
We both said " I do " five years ago today.
expenses:- accom 75, internet 6, sunglasses 20, cablecar 7.2, wine 19.95, lunch 31,phone 10, dinner 45.15, groceries 39.60
Day 249 Sat Jan 01
Happy New Year.
After a late start we revisited Te Papa and spent a leisurely afternoon touching, pulling and pushing in this inspired and fully interactive museum. Heavy, wind blown rain set in around lunchtime, so Te Papa was swarming with hyperactive children and their struggling to keep control parents. We only twisted the ears of the really obnoxious ones as lagging way behind Mums and Dads threats of " there'll be no sweets if you keep that up " or " we're not at home to Mr. Squealy " were having little or no effect.
Having seemingly walked one hundred miles and discovered all that NZ had to offer historically, culturally, naturally and artistically, we had to face what it had to offer meteorogically; persistant heavy rain, and another serious soaking.
150,000 people are now believed to have lost their lives on Boxing Day in a truly incomprehensible human tragedy.
expenses:- accom 75, lunch 15
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