First full day on my tour :)
I managed to nap for a bit longer and got up around 0820h.
I met the manager of the campsite, who gave me a discounted rate as I was on my own and had come on foot, so I was pretty pleased with that. While there I looked at the tour options in the area, and discovered a day tour that went around all of the islands in the area, and included an option to swim with the dolphins. I opted for this, and rushed to the wharf, just over 1km from the campsite. I made it in time to order some breakfast of a bacon and eg muffin, before boarding the boat.
After we went to Russel to pick up the other passengers, there was a call from another dolphin swim boat about a pod of dolphins nearby, so we rushed over to that area, and kept an eye on them to make sure there were no calves.
This proved to be the case, but the dolphins were moving quite quickly. Everyone who had paid for the dolphin swim got kitted up, but as there was so many of us, it took a while - 3 people did manage to get out, but the dolphins were moving too fast, so the idea was abandoned, and we made our way to the next spots.
During the dolphin part, I managed to get a few good shots, and I am glad I invested in a polarised filter, so that the shots of them under the water came out reasonably well.
There is a lot of history urrounding the islands in this part of New Zealand, and it was interesting learning about it while being there in a boat. The water is so clear, and wonderful aquamarine coloured, I definitely feel like I'm in a lost bit of paradise!
Before lunch stop, there was a chance to go boom netting - that's where they hang out the net used for dolphin swimming, and pull you along at high speed with the boat. The initial jump in to the water seemed cold, but at 16'C it was pretty warm and didn't take long to get used to. It was pretty exhilirating being pulled along at high knots , clinging on to the net and keeping my head above the water - I will admit I did get a few mouthfulls of seawater!
Lunch stop was on an island which had superb view point of the whole bay, so I enjoyed some sandwwiches on top of the hill.
By now, the sun had come out, so I was able to dry off my trouser seat which was wet due to the swimming trunks being wet.
After lunch, we headed along the peninsula to a light-house, where we were lucky enough to see some seals basking in the sunshine - the tour guide advised that most of the seals in the area had left for elsewhere due to the time of year.
The sea was calm enough for us to be able to go through 'Hole in the Rock', so I have managed to take plenty of photos, just to inspire Sara and Colin with ideas where they should try doing climbing next - gotta do my bit for the New Zealand tourism industry ;)
After this, we went out to more open sea, for the purpose of trying to find some whales or more dolphins - both of which came to nought, so we headed back to Paihia.
I went to the main office for the tour operator to get the refund for the dolphin swim part of my tour, and took the chance to ask where a good pub was and where a good restaurant s, and came away with good information for both.
Armed with some ideas about what to do for the next few days, I went back to the tent, nd transferred the camera photos on to the phone ready for upload - I have established that there are 1.4GB worth of them to upload - that may take some time!!!
My power pack had got down to less than 5% by this point, and my phone to 35%, as well as having used up one battery on the camera (I took two as I knew that might happen), so I went to the lounge to try out the multi-power-type adapter thing to try and charge either. It was at this point that I realised that no matter what type of socket I plugged it in to, the footprint of the adapter, overlapped the switch part of the socket - rendering it completely useless... doh! I will have to buy better one when I get back to Auckland. In the meantime, the office for the campsite had one spare, so they have lent me that for tonight - hopefully I can at least get the wer point and phone fully charged, as there is still power left in the camera, and the camera battery that ran out had already been used quite a bit before the holiday without being recharged. I'll be fine!
With that in mind, I went south of Paihia to Alfresco's Restaurant & Bar. After checking the menu,I was going to opt for a burger and chips, even though it felt too much like standard fare, but I decided to ask what the fish of the day was, and was advised it was Snapper. I had only earlier in the day been talking to a fellow passenger about food and had advised that the last time I had Snapper it was too plain, so I decided to opt for that at this moment, using the excuse 'It must be fate!'.
It wasn't a wrong choice, the fish was delicious, and the salad and potatoes were prepared in a nice way too. I got talking to the waiter who advised that most of the staff there were from Scotland, and so he offered me a free lift back to the campsite - I was pretty impressed, so even though it's not customary to tip in New Zealand, I left a tip :)
While I was eating, I checked accomodation options in Auckland to determine how much longer I wanted to stay in Paihia, and decided that I would go to Auckland on Sunday and stay for 2 nights, and then head down further south on Tuesday. Not sure where yet - that will come!
Back at the campsite, I booked on to the day trip to Cape Reinga for Saturday, (I decided that Friday was too soon to prepare myself - it's a 12 hour day trip by bus) - I had been recommended to do the trip by another passenger on the boat. As it happened, Friday's tour was fully booked out anyway, so I definitely think I'm doing something right - though I am very aware that it may just be beginners luck ;)
I'm not booked to stay at the campsite for Friday night and Saturday night, so my plans for tomorrow are to wander down to Paihia and check out the options for going kayaking or sailing in a dinghy - it's been ages since I've sailed, so I'm very tempted to do that in such a nice area :)
I was about to try and upload the photos from my camera on to the images section of the blog, but it has come to my attention that the wifi at camp is broken, so you'll need to wait another day for them I'm afraid, as my mobile phone data is only 1GB,and I'm expecting that to last until I leave for Australia!