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Published: August 9th 2007
I want to live here
It beats pretty most any beach I've been to so far.There are two ways to go from the North Island to the South Island, the first is by plane and only takes 20 minutes, the second is by Interislander ferry and takes about 3 hours. I'd been told that the Cook Strait can be a notoriously bad crossing, I never get seasick but i do have a bit of a thing about big ferries. Even on the Dover to calais crossing i'll sit on deck or at least next to the stairs just in case something happens to the ferry. (The Poseidon Adventure had a deep and lasting effect on me as a child) So i wasn't too impressed when the Cockney i'd been travelling with told me that the two films being shown were Titanic and the Poseidon Adventure! (Turns out it was shrek 3) As ferries go, it had all the basic comforts, I went straight away to my "safe" place up on the sun deck and made a quick count of the lifeboats. 4 in total with 2 little launch things, now by my reckoning there would have been about 1000 people on board making that 250 per boat and they certainly didnt look big enough to hold
that many people. I reasoned with myself that the women and children first rule would be enough to get me one of the first seats on in an emergency. I stuck it out on the near freezing "sundeck" for about about an hour and a half before giving up and finding a comfy chair where i could listen to my ipod and imagine I was on a plane. The crossing was serenely calm and and as soon as I spotted the South Island I was back out on the deck taking in the stunning bays of green water.
The next part of my journey was on the Transcoastal train to Kaikoura. A very pleasant journey with yet more stuning views of NewZealand countryside, marred only slightly by the incredibly loud English family, I know that as a teacher I am supposed to have endless patience with children but once they'd started on the "Äre we there yet?" I had to struggle to keep the inner teacher firmly within. Kaikoura is a very quiet seaside town and I stayed in a gem of a place called The Dusky Lodge. A lovely warm room with thick duvets, boiling hot showers, spa
and the Internet was more could a girl ask for?....apart from a hairdryer.
My main mission in kaikoura was to go whale watching and i got up at stupid O'clock to catch the catamaran that would take me to the whales. Kaikoura has a massive trench about 3000 feet deep not too far offshore and it's where two converging currents meet, a warm one and a cold one and basically it's massively rich in nutrients that get pushed to the surface by the currents. This means the area is one huge banquet for loads of exciting wildlife like Whales, dolphins and albatrosses. Kaikoura is well known for it's Sperm whales, so called because when they were first cutting open the head of a male they found about 2 tonnes of a sticky glutanous substance which they thought was sperm. (funny place to keep it) their theory then came slightly undone when they found that the females had the same stuff but the name stuck. The sea was as still as glass, but the skies were still cloudy, we didnt have to wait too long before we spotted the first Sperm whale spouting in the distance, we got there just as
Kaikoura Beach
Awesome place. it dived below the surface, I did try to take a picture but I wasn't so good on working out where the sky ended and the sea began so in the end i just aimed and hoped for the best, pretty much the same thing happened with the second one we spotted but by then i was just enjoying the sight of seeing the head and then the flukes as it dived beneath the surface. The third Sperm whale we spotted i just went for the video option as it relied less on me pressing the button at the right time. I may include a photo of one of the aforementioned whales on here but i wont be entering any photo exhibitions anytime soon! I was also fascinated by the size of the Great Northern Petrels and there were so many seals just lazing about, it was a fantastic trip and will be a hard one to beat.
I finished the day with the best fish and chips I've ever tasted from the Continental Seafoods on Beach Road, seriously the best ever tasting fishbites and chips, far superior even to Harry Ramsdens in Cardiff Bay!
As I had a couple
Rocks
I like rocks... of days to kill in Kaikoura I felt that a bit of a wander was in order. I glanced at a map and decided to walk around the entire Peninsula, now I'm not claiming that it was the size of the Lleyn Peninsula in any way but it was a fair decent walk. The tracks were really well marked and took me through some varied terrain, at one point I had magnificent alp-like mountains on one side and an emerald green sea with such amazing rocks that I have never seen the like of before. Several times I had to just sit and take it all in, it was a place of such beauty that I was quite saddened in some ways that I had no-one to share it with but then at the same time quite happy just to enjoy the peaceful solitude it offered. This truely was a place that my Grandad would have loved to be in. After some time of quiet reflection in this idyllic place I just had to brag about it to the one person I knew would be most envious and at the same time pleased for me being in this place. So
Seals and unfriendly gulls
The cause of my extra laundry. I rang Dad! As I continued to walk around the Bay I spotted several seal colonies far below the high cliffs I was walking on and at one point found a track to take me down to the rocks below. I did of course notice the sign that said that no further barriers were there for my protection and that i should remain at least 10 metres from the seals and breeding birds. As much as I like to get up close and personal with wildlife I abided by the rules and remained at a "safe" distance. A few of the larger gulls started flying fairly low overhead and seemed to be squabbling with one another and I watched with a quiet fascination of their behaviour, it was only later that I realised that they were probably fighting over who was going to attack me first. I backed off realising they weren't too happy and still they advanced bringing more winged friends with them. I like to think myself a friend of gulls having rescued 2 at great personal risk to myself but these were downright vicious and clearly hadn't read the sign that said I was allowed up to
No swimming
It was far too cold for swimming anyway. that point. Not wishing to distress the winged wildlife any further and also not wanting the several hundred New Zealand Fur seals to get in on the action I backed away, noting that I would have to do a bit of washing once I got back to the hostel. But still it was worth it to get such a perfect view of the seals.
Seceral hours passed and I was still wandering quite happily around the peninsula when i reached an awesome example of wavecut platforms (nice flat rock to you geographical heathens) I was quite warm by now and had stripped off my fleece and coat and was now wandering around in my rather vibrant turquoise helly hansens. (I think this was what the gulls had objected to earlier) I was meandering carefully through the dense swathes of seaweed and rock when all of a sudden I was surrounded by a massive swarm and we are talking of biblical proportons here of sandflies. Millions of them surrounded me, they flew into my hair, eyes, clothes, thankfully I'd got my mouth closed and I lurched forward quickly looking like an escapee from a local asylum waving my arms and legs
The Hills are alive....
Just makes you want to sing and swing a guitar about doesn't it? about in an effort to rid myself of them. I made a mental note to wear more muted colours next time I was meeting local wildlife, it also made sense as to why that part of the beach was completely deserted. Having exhausted myself with the sandflies I sat myself down on a rock and took a few deep breaths, i closed my eyes and just sat basking in the warmth of the sun, I became aware of another presence very close by, also breathing very deeply followed by a slight deep throated cough and a shuffle. How i didn't notice the 7 foot seal sat within 3 feet of me I can't imagine, I think the fact that he was laying partially hidden under a bush enabled him to go unnoticed. Moments later I realised that I was in fact surrounded by seals, most of whom were laying in amongst the vegetation, a very sensible move on their part as the rocks were where all the sandflies were! And so I spent a very happy hour just watching and smiling at the seals.
Kaikoura is without doubt, so far, the place that I would come to live on
Oystercatcher footprints
I'm actually an expert in tracking. the South Island. So much wildlife and imcomparable beauty. But then there's a whole lot more of the South Island to see yet and glaciers!!! Woooo!
After Kaikoura came Christchurch and because this is now quite a long blog, I'll just say Christchurch, nice place did lots of cultural things like museums (because they're free) and art galleries (also because theyre free)'and wandering through Botanical Gardens and Parks (you guessed it...free!)
Tomorrow I head for Australia and the bright lights of Sydney. To say I'm excited would be an understatement, Sydney funnelweb spiders, King Brown snakes, Sharks.....oh wildlife heaven!! Will be really nice to see Mike too!
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Jean
non-member comment
wonderful Wildlife
It's great to read about all your adventures. You'll have to write a book when you get back - put in all your fantastic photos!So glad to hear you're being sensible with the wildlife - especially bad-tempered seagulls. G'day! Catch up with you in Oz!