It’s been a while!
Since we last posted, we have done lots of stuff. The weekend was spent watching cricket. Or, to be more accurate, Jonny watched cricket and I read a book. A whole book in fact. Both boys were playing, and we got to watch Stefan. He did really well on Saturday, and got 40 runs (apparently this is good, I have a lot to learn) and his team won.
Yesterday, we set off for Manapouri, for our overnight trip to Doubtful Sound. From Manapouri, we had a 50 minute boat trip across a lake and a 45 bus trip over the mountains, before boarding the Fiordland Navigator at Deep Cove. So nice and easy to get to!
Doubtful Sound
We had a fantastic trip. To start, we had a safety briefing from Captain Dave, and then we were shown to our cabins. We had booked a ‘quad-share’ bunk rather than a twin room, because it was half the price, in the hope that it wouldn’t be busy and we would have our own room anyway. Not so. We were sharing our very close quarters with an English couple. Very cosy!
After a couple of hours sailing, we arrived in First Arm – an inlet off the main sound. This was our stop for the afternoons activities. Jonny went kayaking. I went in the tender craft – a motorboat that took us out on a nature cruise. We even got to see some penguins!
Don't fall in!
Then it was on a bit further, out to the Tasman Sea. We saw some seals, and more penguins. The sea was pretty rough and this was not fun!
After that it was dinner time where we had an amazing meal…lots and lots of food! It was also good because we had a chance to chat to lots of different people. We ate dinner with an Australian couple. He was in the Merchant Navy and had spent time in Northern Ireland!
The evenings entertainment was a slideshow about the area and New Zealand in general. I thought this sounded a bit boring, but it turned out to be really funny and well worth going to.
It was an early start this morning to we finished last night off with a game of snakes and ladders and off to our cabin. It was funny, we thought people would be propping up the bar the whole night, but everyone settled in with cups of tea and the board games provided on the ship!
This morning, we were up at 6, for breakfast at 7. We started to make our way back to deep cove. Along the way, we sailed into Hall Arm – another inlet. Captain Dave cut all the engines and generators, so we were in complete silence. This gave us the chance to take in the surroundings as they should be! It was pretty impressive.
We made our way back to Manapouri, via the bus and boat trips, and we are now in Te Anau. We are killing some time until later when we are going on a glow worm cave trip, so that should be fun.
Jill
