Thought that I would get up early today to go and see the rest of the museum and then go and have a look at the start of the carnival. That didn't happen as I really just wanted to have a lie in! It was a bit of a muggy night, so I don't think I slept too well. However, it did mean that the sun was shining today, so that was good. I was told that the weather forecast for the whole weekend was meant to be rain, so it could have been awful weather for the carnival! Luckily, it was proper carnival weather - yay!

Walked around the stalls and streets with Catherine, whilst Coni and Andrea were going to the botanical gardens via the cable car. It was nice just having a look at all the stalls and so on and I bought a lovely hot apple samosa. It wasn't really a samosa, but more like an apple turnover! Oh well, they'll call it what they want I guess and it was yum in my tum, so what does it matter?
There were certainly some interesting people in costumes wandering around - some ladies with fruit on their heads shaking maracas, some wee bairns in bee costumes, a little boy in a home-made robot outfit (basically a cardboard box with the words robot man written on the side, and I think he had a tin foil hat), and there were even professional morris dancers there!! Why they were there is anybodys guess! I guess carnival day means dress up as silly as you like day!
An interesting woman also passed us, who just happened to be wearing a rat head costume. It was only the head of some hideous rat costume mind, nothing else. She was wearing really casual clothes with flowers on and some little lace-up shoes, so we were really puzzled why she'd thought to stick the head of a rat costume on her head. I mean, I know you've got to be careful about burning in the sun and you should wear some sort of hat if you want to, but putting a rat head on???? That's just, well, wrong basically. Not to mention wierd!!
Of course there were other people in funky costumes walking about, but I'm sure I missed quite a lot of fabulous outfits and great music in the evening! Oh well, I just hope that I get lots of pictures from the other girls :D

Off I trundled to the ferry station to get the InterIslander to Picton. We cross the Cook Straits, and pass lots of lovely little islands and so on. I found a nice little nook on the ferry and after about half an hour, I promptly fell asleep for about an hour! I didn't think I'd sleep quite that long, but at least it made the journey go quicker! It was only about 3 hours in total, so I slept for a quarter of it - yay!
There was also an avid sea chart gentleman sitting next to me, as he had his chart out and his binoculars and so on, making notes and notches on his chart. Whilst everyone else was taking pictures of tree filled islands and boats whizzing by, he's studying the sea! It just made me chuckle a little. I was tempted to ask him to teach me a bit, but he just seemed to engrossed that I thought I'd leave him to it. He'd probably just confuse me in any case, and I was quite happy to be photographing trees and waves in any case!
I was also worried about the ferry crossing yesterday, seeing as the weather was so rainy and horrid, I was hoping it wouldn't be the same otherwise the crossing would be pretty dicey! Fortunatly, it wasn't so my travel sickness had to keep itself to itself. It'll have plenty more opportunities to bother me in the next couple of weeks in any case! Seeing as I'll be visiting another 6 cities or towns or so, before heading back to Melbourne on the 6th of March.
I do wish I'd allotted more time to New Zealand, aren't I a daft girl for not listening to other people? Though, I do still need to leave plenty of time to get around the East Coast of Australia by train as travelling will take up most of my time there too.

Arrived in Picton ok and got picked up in a nice red van by a nice guy from the hostel I'm staying at. I was the only person going there, and it appears I'm the only person going back tomorrow!
I'm not surprised as Sequoia Lodge is so laid back and so nice, that I really want to stay longer! It has free chocolate pudding and ice cream every evening, has free breakfast (just bread, cereals and spreads and so on, but still free), free wifi (slow, but still free), and even has a free hot tub! No keys as there are no locks on the dorm rooms either!
I was tempted to get in the hot tub, but by the time I got there and faffed about and ate chocolate pudding (yum) I was just too tired, so I just tucked myself into bed instead! I thought that I'd get an early night and so be able to go for some nice walks in the town centre before heading off to Nelson tomorrow. I have a map of some walks around the town, and there's one that goes to a high look-out point, so that's probably where I'll head.
Another good thing about Sequoia is that the bunk beds are properly made so that you can actually sit up underneath them!! Half of the hostels I've stayed in so far, that have had bunk beds, have just been really low so you end up clonking your head on the top, or losing half your hair! Base hostels are the worse. I think they must have their own bunk bed factory as they're all the same black beds, and have just made them ultra low on purpose!! Even though I'm little, I still can't sit up on the bottom bunk, so I can't imagine how uncomfortable they must be for taller people! They have got really good internet connection though, and most of them have wireless too, so I guess I just have to put up with it - or just stay on the top bunks!

Sequoia have a sister backpackers in Nelson too, but I've opted to stay in Shortbread Cottage for a couple of nights as I just liked the sound of it! Mmmmm, shortbread....