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Published: December 27th 2006
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Hello Everyone, we got on the Kiwi Experience bus today and werent too sure what we would be doing, but not to long into our journey we knew that we would have fun. Our bus driver was called Bods and had been driving Kiwi Experience tours for quite a few years, He was really funny and kept pointing out stuff as we drove through from Christchurch to a place called Kaikoura. While driving through Bods told everyone about Kaikoura, where we could stay, what activities we could do and general stuff about the town. Jo and I decided that it would be cool to go Dolphin Swimming so booked ourselves on that activity.
When we arrived in Kaikoura we checked into our double room which was more like a shed with a double bed in it and a portable radiator. The weather when we got there was terrible and unfortunatly our Dolphin swim was cancelled because of the bad weather, but we got booked up for the next morning at
Five Thirty. As we looked and heard the weather beating down on our shed that night we werent sure that we wanted to do it as the thought of getting
Snow Capped Mountains
Very Rare For This Time Of Year in the cold sea that early hadnt occured to us when we booked it that afternoon. We Both half wanted it to be called off but were so glad that it wasnt after our amazing experience!!
We got to the Dolphin Swim centre at 5:30am and got all our gear given to us wetsuit, flippers, snorkel, gogles and hat. We then watched a video about what we would be doing. The people who run the swim say that they cannot guarantee that you will swim or even see the dolphins as they are totally wild and that when we were in the water we were there to entertain the dolphins not the other way round. So this meant making stupid noise's through our snorkels to attract them and then if they were close trying to spin round in a circle and also diving down.
When we got on the boat and out into the sea we went for about 10-15 mins before we were told to get ready as they had spotted some dolphins, when the boat stopped and we finally had to get in the freezing water we were both excited as the dolphins were right in
Southern Alps at 5:30
I took this photo just before arriving at the Dolphin Centre front of us. It is really weird seeing a dolphin so close to you and also being in thier environment but it was such a sureal experience. After making some stupid noises through my snorkel a dolphin came right up to my face and started swimming round and round me, I tried to keep up but had no chance and the dolphin swam off to see what other people were doing. I continued to make the stupid noises and was getting pretty good as lots more dolphins came to see what was making all the noise. Me and Jo were swimming next to each other as they were all around us, it was a really cool moment.
Then we were told to get back in boat to chase the dolphins to where they were swimming, when we got out we then realised how cold it was and I could barely feel my feet and thought they had fallan off!! But when we could go back in again we couldnt wait. There were many more dolphins the second time we got in and it was much the same spinning round and making the stupid noise's. When you see a dolphin
Dolphins
Flipper and Flipper Jnr swimming next to you and you see thier face and eyes you wonder why anyone would ever hunt them as they are truely remarable creatures. When we were told to go back to the boat I was the last person back on board and as I swam back to the boat I must of had ten dolphins around me it was so crazy! Jo and I loved every second of it and would definatly do it again as it was such a good experience.
When we got back on the boat we followed the dolphins for about half an hour and they were swimming next to the boat and doing lots of tricks like backflipping and smacking their tails on the water as you can see from the videos and pics. When we finally got back to Dolphin swim centre everyone had the biggest smiles on thier faces and you could tell that everyone really enjoyed it. After we had got changed and had some breakfast the Kiwi Experience Bus arrived to pick us up and take us to our next destination Picton and Nelson.
See you there!!
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