Justine bounded upstairs to Claire's room on Thursday and announced that she wanted to go away for the weekend. So she Claire and I decided on a weekend adventure to the south. The boys joined in last minute and booked the later freight ferry. We jumped a ferry Friday night and stayed in Picton, where the ferry arrives in the south. We went out on the town, which is about 4 square feet, and waited around till the boys got in. After checking into the hostel we pretty much just crashed from exhaustion. That next morning we got up early and rented a car for 5.. but we are six (Me, Jay, Claire, Justine, Phil and Kevin) so Kevin and I waited while the others got a car.
We then drove south for about 2.5 hours and got to the most beautiful place on earth. In Kaikoura you can see the monstrous mountain ranges pushing up through the earth, right next to the ocean. It was truly outstanding.
Once in town we went to the i-site and booked some fun for the weekend. We planned to go kayaking with seals and fishing early the next morning. We got a hostel and moved everything in, then went back to the i-site where we got picked up for the kayaking. It was so neat to get to kayak with wildlife right around you. I saw only one penguin... and it was dead, but tons of fur seals were out! There was one seal that was swimming around us so we followed it and it found an octopus to eat. it was the neatest thing to experience. I have never seen anything in the wild like that besides on the discovery channel. I felt like I was on some kind of cool seal show.
After Kayaking we spent the rest of the day exploring town and discovered that there was going to be a rail jam that night. Jay, being an almost pro snowboarder, was way too excited and we made him sign up for it. That night we went to eat dinner and got the tastiest pizza I have had in awhile then went off to a bar to the rail jam. Jay rode for awhile on a borrowed board and ended up winning best trick for going down with one foot out of his bindings. We stayed in the bar awhile longer till we got kicked out for taking the really awesome Monteiths pint glasses... they frown upon stealing here... Oh well! We did manage to get an air horn and a salt shaker somehow tho.
That night was a long one, so the next morning came way too early! We went out to get some breakfast before our 8 am fishing boat headed off shore. We first went to collect the crayfish pots that were laid out the night before, these pots only ended up having 3 crayfish in them, one pregnant female, one small male and one big enough for us to take it. The big crayfish was worth about $100, which is pretty amazing. I did not know it but crayfish are actually pretty big, about the size of a lobster, but without the claws.
We then put the rods out and went fishing for about an hour. We caught over 15 fish, mostly perch, but one blue cod. They then filleted them for us right on the boat. It was about that time when 50% of the group lost it. It being their breakfast. I surprisingly did not get sick, but Claire was first to go, followed by Phil and Kevin. We headed back to shore after 2.5 hours of being on the water, and all anyone wanted was to sit on solid land for awhile.
Because everyone was feeling a little off, we put off hiking and decided to drive around to see what we could find. We stumbled upon a real great lookout and saw the whole town. After that it was about time to get going and we made the long trek back to Picton then on the ferry and home. That night Jay cooked up the crayfish and we had a feast. Then I passed out from exhaustion, a weekend well spent in NZ.
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