Sperm Whales and Acrobatic Dolphins Saturday, March 29, 2008

We've had a great day off in Kaikoura. Matt McKenzie put us in touch with Gaz & Sarah here in Kaikoura and we're camped in their garden and are showered and have been fed with lots of tea! They did offer us dinner last night but we'd already had fish and chips, a double ice-cream and a large pizza each ( and that all between 4.30pm and 6.30pm!). Gaz is a kayak guide here and Sarah works on the whale watch boat. She took us out on one of the cruises this afternoon which was fantastic. We saw 2 sperm whales, both of them dove down to go fishing and showed us their fantastic tails. We also saw a pod of about 200 dusky dolphins showing off to each other and to us, doing more back flips, somersaults and tail slaps. It was a great tour with informative commentary on a fast boat which handled the swell really well and traveled at 25 knots!! ( what are we doing in kayaks, again!?).

We have less than 200km to go to get back to Christchurch. It's day 64 today and it was a great day for paddling today but we decided we'd rather have a day to chill out, rest, soak in the local wildlife and chat to Sarah & Gaz. The forecasts have been unreliable lately ( no offence Karel who has done a great job sending us daily forecasts by sat phone ! There seems to be a complex weather system at the moment, with all sorts of winds predicted at different times but it never seems to do what they say!). But we hope to get back on the water tomorrow and continue the paddle south. We're not sure how long it will take us to complete the circle - we don't fly home until late April so there's no rush, we'll just see how we feel! Personally, I have mixed feelings and part of me wants to 'get it done' and get back to Christchurch, whereas part of me wants to savour it and make it last just a bit longer!!

Thanks to everyone for putting comments on the blog. We really enjoy reading them all when we get to a computer and it's great to know that people are following along with us.