Kaikoura, NZ

After the Tongariro Crossing was over, we headed further down the northern island towards Wellington. Here we had to hand in the ol' faithful RAV4 and take a ferry to the first place on the southern island called Picton. Now, there's nothing really spectacular to tell about both Wellington and Picton as we mainly used Wellington to do some laundry, grocery shopping, planning, and some Internet preparations (yes, we also face the struggles of every day life ;-) Now the ferry ride lasted 3 and a half hours and was (as Interislander promo material already highlighted) on of the most beautiful ferry crossings in the world. When we docked and got off, we took the luggage and hopped into our shiny Mitsubishi Outlander and headed of to the nearest motel. Sois had some takeaway, a burger with a even a red beet (=bietje) on it while the owner reminded everyone to please eat their veggies as well.

The next day we drove about 2 hours to Kaikoura where we expected to do some serious whale watching. And guess what: we had 5 whale sightings (all on camera, yessirree) and also spotted a large pack of playful dusky dolphins. Here's how the caper went down: Immediately after arrival, Chel hooked us up with some tickets for the afternoon spotting. We were transferred by bus to a new, hightech, catamaran type of vessel. Now the sea was a little rough, and we both felt a little sick the whole tour (but only the real "mietjes" on board puked, not us ;-). Anyways, our "spotter" told us everytime when we saw a while when it was going to dive. You can see from the pictures how their tails came up (we also got some nice video footage). These whales are called "Sperm Whales" (now don't laugh just yet, wait until you hear how they got their names) and can age up to 70-80 years and grow up to 20 meters long (there are bigger ones, but they're elsewhere). Back to the sperm. The first whalers catched one of these whales and sliced upon its forehead and out came an enormous amount of oil (they've got a huge reservior, +/- 10000 liters, have no idea exatly for what, in their forehead) which was whitish exactly like... you het the drill. Now these guys thought it was sperm but which man or beast would need (A) so much, and (B) put it then in their foreheads. Nevertheless, the word got out across the region (and ultimately the globe) and that's how they got their wrong name. Cool.

As a little dessert (while Sois was seriously considering grabbing on to one of them pukebags), we also got to see a pack of Dusky dolphins which grow up to 1-2 meters, have a white belly and can be considered as "clowns of the sea". They jumped and went up along the boat and went just plain crazy. Another nice fact about them is that they are so "sjerrep" that they "mate" 10+ times a day with their several partners a day. Now I know what you guys are thinking, but probably only the gals could handle that one. Alright, hope this post left a smirk (=faint smile) on your face (we sure had a smile from ear to ear) and Chel could refrain herself this time from jumpin next to the dolphins and whales so alls well that ends well. And with that jabber, we close this post. Peace!