A Sperm Whale called Noodles

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A rather impressive storm blew in from Antarctica on our first night in Kaikoura, the wooden lodge was whistling and groaning in the gales and there was some stunning lightning flashes over the sea - all of this just added to the dramatic scene of the snow capped mountains towering over the town and its lovely bay and rocky cliffs.

Unfortunately, our planned whale watching on my birthday was cancelled but we enjoyed the day in the comfy lodge with a real log fire (expertly built by Tim and fuelled/stoked by me all day!) and instead of whale watching the lodge manager took a group of us eel watching at a nearby stream - yes, I said eel watching! He threw in a bucket of chicken scraps and soon loads of the slippery chaps swam up - we all stood there transfixed and fascinated by these things!

We cooked a gorgeous garlic mussel risotto for my birthday dinner and opened my gift - a bottle of the Sav Blanc from Wither Hills - Bliss!

The whale watching was cancelled again the next day so we attempted the 'Clifftop Walk' - we were wearing multiple layers of clothing inc. waterproofs, hats and gloves and had to turn back after an hour because of the freezing winds but we visited the local seal colony instead - you never get sick of the big fury things.

We stayed an extra night and thankfully went out on the whale watching boat on Tuesday morning - there was a strong sea-sickness warning for the sailing - we weren't worried but boy was I queasy when we got out there! However the whole experience was great - we saw 3 huge sperm whales (one known as 'Noodles' because unlike the others who spend nearly a quarter of an hour at the surface he only surfaces for 2 mins - as in "2 minute noodles"), 4 Wandering Albatross (the largest albatross in the world and even bigger than the Royals we saw in Otago) and some Huttons Shearwaters. All in all pretty fantastic!

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Photos

Same whale
(This isn't Noodles)