Tale of two boats

After spending time in Blenheim, in the heart of South Island’s Marlborough wine region, we drove south down the coast to Kaikoura …

… enjoying views of Marlborough Sound on the way.

Close to Kaikoura, we started seeing places such as this, which sell the delicious crayfish (rock lobster) that the region is known for (don’t worry, this time I’ll spare you the drooling photo!).

In the town of Kaikoura, a problematic reservation had us scrambling to find another lodging. With great good luck, we turned up an unlisted house with this gorgeous view (and the rest of the house wasn’t shabby either) …

In all our wisdom, we decided to go on an Albatross Encounter tour in this 10 meter boat. The reservations girl told us, “it’s just a moderate sea but take something if you’re prone to seasickness.” While 2.3 meter swells and 1.8 meter seas may be considered moderate in a large boat, in this small one, umm, not so much! Even though I wore wrist bands and took ginger pills to combat motion sickness, it was not a happy ride.

But we did get to see lots of Wandering Albatrosses (look at that wingspan!) along with petrels, mollymawks (small albatrosses), shags and gulls. We also passed dolphins leaping out of the water all around us, but didn’t photograph any as I was too busy looking at the horizon to keep from being sick!!

But once our stomachs settled down we rewarded ourselves with some of the best seafood we’ve had at this little shack on the side of the road (the reviews from TripAdvisor were spot on!)

Much too soon, it was time to leave the magical coast to head to the town of Picton, where I found this unique daycare center at a local bar. Unfortunately I couldn’t leave Ken there as it was time to board this much bigger boat, …

… the Interislander ferry, to cross the Cook Strait to Wellington, New Zealand’s capital. I am happy to report that this crossing has restored my faith in boats again as we enjoyed smooth sailing, in spite of ‘moderate’ seas, during the three-hour journey. Of course, being in a much larger boat helps a lot!

And we continue our travels on North Island …