I was woken up during the night by a loud rumbling noise. At first I thought that it was an earthquake but I quickly realised that we’d managed to find another campsite located next to a railway line! Fortunately, that turned out to be the only train of the night and I soon went back to sleep.
Blenheim claims to be the sunniest town in New Zealand but it was still raining when I got up. We headed south down SH1 towards Kaikoura. At Lake Grassmere we turned up a side road towards a salt works. Their huge piles of salt were impressive but the place looked a bit dingy so we didn’t bother to stop and look at their exhibition. South of Lake Grassmere the road reaches the east coast of the South Island. We parked the campervan to take our first look at the Pacific Ocean.
The road and railway runs along the coastline
Further down the road we had lunch in a rest area by a stony beach. Walking around the beach we found that a number of seals were resting on the large rocks by the water. They didn’t seem to mind us although we thought that it probably wasn’t a good idea to get too close.
Lazy seals
Close enough for the both of us
As we were looking at the seals a passenger train came up the railway. It’s a tourist route from Christchurch to Picton
Just north of Kaikoura we came across an “official” seal watching site. It was located on top of a cliff and the seals sat on the rocks at the bottom. This was nowhere near as good as the first place we stopped at. We told the people there about our better location then headed to Kaikoura.
We had a whale watching tour booked but on our arrival we found that all of the trips that day had been cancelled as the Pacific was too rough. Our original plan was to travel to and stay the night in Hamner Springs after the boat trip. We decided to stay in Kaikoura and hope for better weather in the morning.
Having decided to stay in Kaikoura we realised it would be a good idea to sort out our accommodation for the night before the nice places filled up. We settled upon the 69 Beach Road Holiday Park. At $75 my en-suite cabin was the most expensive night of the tour but it was a good quality room that was quiet throughout the night.
We wandered through the town centre which has a reasonable collection of shops. We stopped in a DIY shop to buy some glue to repair a door in the campervan (it came apart in our hands, honest!). Whilst my friends used an Internet café to check their email I went further up the road to a second hand bookshop. I’d taken a couple of books with me but I’d already finished reading them as I was still waking up early in the mornings.
Just south of Kaikoura is a winery. We enjoyed a cup of coffee and a cake in their restaurant although as it was raining we didn’t go on their vineyard tour.
Before dinner we drove down to the beach. Although the water was cold I grabbed the chance to struggle across the stones and wade in the Pacific. I found a pebble that looks like an Oreo cookie. I’m no geologist - I guess the white streak is quartz but I haven’t got a clue what the grey is! Another good find was a pure white pebble.
Stones from Kaikoura beach