Our car got us to Kaikoura - hurrah!! A good drive, plenty of windy roads and good views! Staying in a hostel called "The lazy shag," named after the local birds (the animal kind). Arrived on Monday night tired and hungry. Tried to go out for tea but EVERYTHING closes at around 8ish, ended up finding a little supermarket so Jim had a pie and Clare had soup! Next day we had our "Dolphin Encounter." Was an amazing day. Got taken out in our gorgeous wet suits, found dolphins in only 5mins. There were around 100 dolphins, the view itself was incredible. Then we got thrown off the back of the boat and got to swim with them. Was a little intimidating at first having 100 WILD dolphins coming straight for you, but we soon relaxed and got to play with some of them. After the diving the boat took us back to the pod and we got some great photos. The dolphins came right upto the boat in a titantic esq way, saw some great somersaults from the dolphins too. A cracking day. Next day was equally exciting day as we went Whale watching. Took a while to find the whales but was worth the wait as we got to see two sperm whales. The boat then took us closer to shore where we saw fur seals, some more dolphins and lots of big birds including the Royal Albatross which has a wing span of 3.6m, the largest in the bird community for any bird watchers out there! Today we headed over to Hanmer Springs and relaxed in the Thermal pools. The pools had all different minerals in, one pool in particular was sulphur, which STANK (of rotten eggs and trumps). Tomorrow we move onto Nelson to meet Bill and Leah for the weekend, so thats all for now fans. Look after yourself.... and each other.