Day 153, 154 - Kaikoura, South Island - Saturday 17th, Sunday 18th March 2012

We woke up to glorious sunshine - yay! The drive into Kaikoura along the coastline was stunning - crystal blue sea met by the snow-capped peaks of the Seaward Kaikoura range. As we drove along we spotted dolphins and seals larking about in the sea and so stopped and watched them for a while. Kaikoura is the place in New Zealand to see marine life - whales, dolphins, seals and penguins all call Kaikoura home. Apparently its due to the ocean current and continental shelf in the ocean; the seabed slops away from the shore to about 100m and then drops off to over 1000m meaning that the warm and cold water mixes and this makes it a high nutrient feeding ground, hence all the sea mammals. We were really excited about coming to Kaikoura as both of us had wanted to do some whale watching since starting our travels and Kaikoura was where this was going to happen - the whale watching company promises a 98% chance of seeing them! So with that in mind we quickly headed into town to book our experience - we weren't disappointed as they had space on their 3.30pm tour. Excited we mingled around town until it was time to go to the whale watching centre but not before stopping by at Point Kean where there is a seal colony right next to the car park. There were seals lazing around everywhere! The signs warn you not to go less than 10m close to them and I soon learnt this lesson when a seal started barking at me when I got too close!! Look at the pictures!

3.30pm came and we were ready at the centre for our briefing; once this was done we were bussed to the ship terminal and were quickly on board the swanky boat. After an introduction and some interesting information on the whales the boat anchored up and started to listen to the underwater whale sounds - they do this with this weird looking loudspeaker that goes under the sea, very cool.

Whilst we were standing on the edge looking for whales we saw a couple of Royal Albrotross birds - they are massive! Then we heard splashes and before we knew it the boat was surrounded by very lively Dusky dolphins! They were sooooo cute - jumping around and splashing all over the place. They even followed the boat when we started moving again. We moved again to try and find our whale and then saw a huge turtle floating around and also some fur seals swimming; the dolphins seem to like trying to jump over the turtle which made for amusing viewing. Then the crescendo came when we spotted the gigantic sperm whale floating on the surface of the ocean blowing big waterfalls everywhere with his blowhole. He was massive, 18 metres and between 40 - 45 tonnes in weight - he eats a tonne of food a day! After five minutes of creating rainbows with the water coming from his blowhole and hitting the sun, he had arched his back and a dived into the depths of the ocean - his tail came all the way out of the ocean making for some really brilliant pictures. We went on to see another three whales - all just as impressive as the last. The experience was totally amazing and left Ad and I both a bit blown away - it's probably one of the best things we seen so far since travelling especially as sperm whales are the one thing that you can never see in a zoo or aquarium. The best £150 we've ever spent!

When we'd finished with the whale experience we realised how hungry we were and so drove to a little spot near the seal colony that is basically a caravan serving BBQ'd seafood. We ate mussels and a paua pattie (like a kind of mussel thing that comes in a very pretty shell) - all for just £8. We scoffed it down and washed it away with two glasses of NZ's best Sauvignon blanc wine from the local area.

With our dinner done we drove out to a quiet little spot to camp up and, under a quite amazing star lit sky, chilled with some more wine and a soundtrack of Noah Jones - very romantic! This just might be one of the best of our travelling days to date……………..

After a bit of a lie in we got up and enjoyed a bit of breakfast whilst basking in the sun - it's so lovely when the weather is warm! We then headed over to the public toilets on the beach; the reason…….it had a cold (actually freezing!!) shower in there and as we hadn't had a shower for two days we thought it was about time we washed! The joys of living in a campervan!

After washing and then sitting on the grass overlooking the ocean and seals, we drove into town and had a quick coffee before starting our drive up to the top of the South Island. On the way out we stopped in at the iconic Nin Bins - this is a roadside campervan selling freshly caught and prepared crayfish. We picked one out and had him washed and prepared for our dinner.

We drove along the coastline and then in land until we reached Blenheim; we drove a little further out and settled for a nice little DOC camp site on the beach. Dinner was pesto pasta with crayfish and salad - yummy!

Oh, Happy Mothers Day to our mums - we miss you!