The car was frosted over. There was no scraper to hand so Amy scrounged a scrap of wood from the firewood pile and used that instead. It worked. In fact, it's still in the car, just in case.
First we drove into Kaikoura proper and took a stroll on the beach. We claimed part of it as New Grimsby for which I think Claire might have the photos.
And then the real excitement. Whale watching. Sea sickness tablets taken (just), wrapped up in many layers, we set out on the good ship Aoraki. We obviously wanted to see a whale, but didn't expect too much.
We saw a whale. A massive damn Sperm Whale, just lying there on the surface, bobbing in the waves. Many pictures were taken.
And then another one appeared. There. In the distance.
And then another and I couldn't work out where to look so I just videoed it.
And then they all dived, but I missed it because I was on the wrong bit of the boat.
So we motored away and a few minutes later we saw yet another whale. We are now up to 4 BLOODY WHALES. His name, apparently, is Manu and you can tell by the shape of his tail. And this time I managed to catch it as it dived. Just.
Pootled along some more and yup, just bobbing about, is another whale. Which I also managed to catch diving. WOO!
And then, just to top it all off, we came across an enormous pod of dusky dolphins which were quite happy to show off for us, leaping about and splashing and swimming in the bow wave. Didn't get many reasonable photos, but hey, the moment is what matters.
So, yeah, 5 whales. Apparently seeing 3 on the surface together is pretty much unheard of so imagine our glee.
We then tried out Kaikoura's fish and chips. It's good, but not as good as Grimsby. If we move here, we'll have to do something about that. We have also developed a taste for L&P which is sort of like lemonade and generally delicious. Mmmm.
Day ended with a fairly long drive to Motueka. I think I rode the endorphin high from whale-watching most of the way. Best day yet.
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