The trip was starting to come to an end.The last really exciting place (after one pretty dull night in Christchurch) was Kaikoura.Kaikoura is yet another must see/go in New Zealand.It is absolutely stunning, and is the place you can go dolphin and seal swimming and whale watching.These are all pretty expensive, and not something I was that desperate to do, so we took the advice of our lovely friends who had been there before, and went fishing.It was bloody brilliant!It was such a stunning day, and we went out on the boat with our beers at about 3pm.We had these beasty big rods which had two hooks on the end.We were fishing 80m from the bottom, so there was some pretty tough reeling involved.We had a competition; that the one who caught the biggest fish had to do nothing for dinner, and the one with the least fish had to do the bbq.It turned out to be a good result as Caz lost and is probably the best cook!I caught 9 fish in total (they only counted if they actually reached the bucket - we had a couple get away, and lots of preggers fish - the sluts!) - we were catching red sea perch, and the catch of the day was definitely made my Chloe, who caught an 80cm barracuda!It was hilarious.Andy the skipper said we should throw it back because they are riddled with worms so we couldn't eat it, but by the time we had posed for so many photos with it, it was dead! Woops - so we fed it to the Albatross!We go to see three different Albatross.One was a royal Albatross and one was an Wandering Albatross, which apparently is the bird with the biggest wingspan in the world!We saw hundreds of seals, but sadly no dolphins.We had over 40 fish in total, and the skipper chopped them all up for us, and we took them home and had a feast.We had them for dinner the next night as well.He also gave us three crayfish.We made a massive salad and rice, and Caz cooked the fish in all different ways - it was lovely.We were joined by team Germany and the hostel manager for dinner.

After Kaikoura, it was time to head back up to the north island.I stayed in Wellington for a few nights so I could get my head ready for South America.I then went with the guys up to Taupo, but couldn't do my walk due to poor weather.I have now been in Auckland for a few days and my flight to Santiago is all booked for tomorrow at 6pm.I am absolutely terrified (especially after meeting a lovely young lady who got mugged in Peru by a man with two screwdrivers!Not filling me with joy!).The gorgeous Diego is meeting me from the airport, so all is good there, and I will be staying in Santiago for a few weeks to get the Spanish lessons underway.I think South America is going to be the most enormous adventure and I cannot wait!My plan so far is the head up the west through Bolivia, Peru and Ecuador, then fly to Buenos Aires where I will stay for a few months, then make my way to Brazil, where I fly back from Rio.To say this is my plan is pretty loose seeing I am always changing my mind, but it sounds good for now!My flight home is booked for 28th August, so I will see you all in 5 months!!