Sea Kayaking

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What a beautiful day for sea kayaking! After three days of rain, today is bright and beautiful! Lucky for us!

Again, one of my favorite things about the trip was the company of other international travelers. We enjoyed the company of a Romanian couple, LA newlyweds, and two Swedish guys on gap year travels. Those two guys were especially funny. They wore hats with little propellers on them so we knew how windy it was, and they were trying to sell us on their favorite NZ activities of bungy jumping, rapelling, and sky diving. Ummm....No thanks! They are staying here for three months and are living in a car the whole time because they are short on funds (obviously because they are spending their funds on potentially deadly adventure activities). It was hilarious to hear them talk about their lifestyle here. I realized hanging out with them how much I enjoyed and now miss working with youth. Their perspective on life is so interesting.

We started out at 8:45 this morning, kayaked through Queen Charlotte Sound, stopped for lunch on a beach, and stopped for afternoon tea at a primitive campground, before finishing up around 3:30. Scenery was spectacular. Not much wildlife about - that is noticeably absent here in New Zealand when you are used to looking out the back window in Indiana seeing squirrels, chipmunks, and rabbits. But, we saw some cormorants fishing for their lunch, and many gulls. The calm waters and beautiful hillsides were what we were mostly there to see anyway, and we weren't disappointed.

Tomorrow we are off to Greymouth, continuing our journey south. More adventures to come! And hopefully, more sunny weather (fingers crossed on that one).

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