Whale watching in Kaikoura

The rain has stopped,  but its a cold grey day over Kaikoura.  Breakfast is served in our room, then we pack fleeces waterproofs, hats and gloves for today's whale watching trip.  We walk down to the railway station that now serves as the base for whale watching.  The station has been renamed to "The Whaleway Station", which never stops being funny.

We check in and have 50 minutes to wait so we get a coffee and sit outside.  In the time we sat there,  the mist cleared and the sun came through.  Suddenly our warm coats seemed superfluous and now we needed hats and sunblock!

After a safety briefing we left the whale way station on a coach that took us over to the specially designed whale watching boats.  These are high speed catermerans equipped with jet boat motors.  These things really move,  but have the unfortunate effect of producing a massive rolling effect which really brings on sea sickness.  We managed to avoid the worse effects by concentrating on the horizon but many were not so lucky and at times it was a bit of a vomit comet for some unlucky fellow passengers.  You have to feel sorry for the "Safety Officer" who's entire job seems to be collecting sick bags.

The tale End

We shot around looking for whales and were really lucky to actually sight 4 sperm whales.  We saw all of them flick there tale as they dived which is just so cool.  Then it was a gut churning ride back to base.

A whale tale

After heading back to base for a change in clothing, we had a trip to a local lavender farm - it was full of colour and buzzing bees. Unlike the one we visited in Kent over the summer, this one let you wander around unattended (for an honesty box contribution), so I could take as many pictures as I liked. The colour and mountain back drop was stunning.

On the way back from the lavender farm, we decided to pop into a supermarket  to get some water and see if there was anything there that vegetarians could buy.  We also hoped it would solve a query we had. "Manchester" - what is it?  Now we know this as a city, football clubs  and home to drugged up rave bands of the 90s. But over here we keep seeing adverts for large shops which say they have 'Manchester' at reduced prices / on sale, but without giving any more clues as to what it is. We have had some fun guessing, and on walking through the supermarket we saw an aisle which sold hosiery, 'health and well being', and more importantly, Manchester. So now we know what it is.......

Supermarkets here also do not cater well for non flesh eaters. It's nearly as bad as the week in France some years back when Maria lived off bread and cheese - only we're here for longer than a week, and too much bread does not agree with my lovely wife.  I keep telling her to try a hotdog,  as they dont normally have anything that is recognisable as meat in them.

We went back up to the seal colony area to do a short coastal walk which we'd seen signposted. Some great views to be had,lots and lots of blue lupins. Along the way we saw some cows. At last we could get fairly close to see what size they actually were. Maria was right, they are smaller - they're about elbow height . No wonder they can clamber up the mountain sides without falling off.

Then it was back to the B&B for a laze in the hot tub with great views of the beach and mountains.  Then a chance to grab some sunset shots - without the sunset. I stood by the side of the road and a couple of tourists stopped and asked what various birds were - like I would know.  I found the reply "Shags" seemed to satisfy them.  As the light faded a lone seal climbed up on the rocks next to me to keep me company.