Our First Free Weekend

On our free weekend we went to Kaikoura (Kai- cour-rah).  About halfway there the bus broke down and we were stranded in a town called Cheviot.  We were there for about 3 hours while they sent mechanic with a part to fix the bus.  While we were there we got an ice cream, played on the school playground, sat talking with the students, and had dinner.  When the bus was fixed we all jumped in and off we went the rest of the way.

On our first day in Kaikoura we got up early about 6:00 am and got ready to catch our whale watching boat.  The land under the ocean drops off very deep close to the shore in Kaikoura so the whales can come in and feed closer than most places in the world.  We traveled on a big, power catamaran boat (two hulls). They use something called a hydrophone which is an underwater microphone to find the whales.  We got to put the headphones in our ears and listen for them.  The sperm whale is very loud and makes clicking noises.  Did you know that the sperm whale is the loudest mammal on earth?  They are also the largest toothed mammal on the earth. The first whale we saw was huge.  His name was Maki.  They see the same whales so often that they have named them and can recognize them by patterns on their backs and the shape of their tails.

Our first whale going, going and gone after watching him for about 5 minutes

The second whale that we saw was big enough to make the first one look small.  It was enormous and his name was Tutu.  It easily could have flipped the boat over if it wanted to, fortunately they are pretty smart and don’t want to.  Tutu has been known to protect younger, smaller male sperm whales from Orca.  We were able to see both of them dive under the water.  The average time a whale spends under water here is about 30 minutes but some whales have been known to be able to hold their breath for as long as 2 hours!

The Dusky dolphins were jumping everywhere

 

 

Then we found a large pod of Dusky dolphins.  It seemed like there were 500 of them and they were all over the place!  They did backflips, barrel rolls and many other things and they aren’t tamed at all.  They were having fun and showing off! 

 

 

 

They swam all around, in front of and under our boat

 

When we got back we went to the beach.  Now, when you say “beach” you think sand, big waves and what not.  This beach was nothing like that.  I mean sure, it had waves and people on it but the waves were smaller, about 2 feet at most and there were very few people on it even in the middle of summer here.  In place of sand there were rocks, rocks, rocks and more rocks.  There were also scallop shells that we found because the tide was low. They were everywhere (scallops are a bit like clams).  The water was freezing!

View of Kaikoura from the ocean. See why NZ is called the land of the long white cloud?

 

 

 

Me exploring on the beach

Some of the scallops we found on the beach

See all the little rocks on the beach?  When the waves go out it makes a hissing sound.

They have seagulls here too

See how many people are on the beach in the summer?