Our hosts had checked with the company that they had seen whales on their earlier trip, but they did issue a warning that gales were forecast and yet again advised on seasick medication.
On arriving at the office we find the sailing had been cancelled because of bad weather and safety concerns. Eric reckons they just can't face the idea of cleaning up the possible product of 40 people who
a) may not have taken the proposed remedy or
b) took it but it didn't work.
We are too polite to use the 'V' word in a blog that may have an audience of millions.
Discussing options with the staff we find we could either go on a sailing trip later that day, but with no guarantee at the time that it too wouldn't be cancelled. As it's our last day we can't opt for a sailing on a later date. If we opt for the later sailing and then they cancel it, they'll give us a coupon to get the money back from the travel agent.
The second option was to do a direct swap for a trip with Wings over Whales - no extra charge, but if we don't see any whales from the aeroplane we don't get any refund. On the boat, if you go and you don't see any they give you an 80% refund.
So instead of the potential stormy sea we have to consider a "white knuckle" ride in a six seater aircraft about the size of our MG! You may remember our nervousness of being about 60' off the ground in the chairlift in Canada.
Eric leaps at the idea as we now learn that his middle name is Biggles (he'd not mentioned that before!)
We are booked onto the 11am flight, but the airport is 10 mins away by car...and the car is at the B&B. Walk (quickly?) back up the hill and then on to the airport with our wheels. They explain all the ins-and-outs, do's-and-don'ts and then...we wait. Why? Because the whale we are specifically going to see is the Sperm Whale, and it surfaces for about 10mins after a dive of (ususally, if there is such a thing in nature) about 40 min. Although they can stay down for two and a half hours. So they time the flight depending on the last sighting they've had. We know the whales are out there as the boat whale watching people told us they'd seen them when they went to check on suitability of sea earlier that morning.
'Biggles' checks out the life jacket that we had to wear.
Three other people turn up who were also on cancelled boat trip. Like you see in the wartime movies we get the call to scramble, dash to the aircraft and it's...chocks away.
Eric, aka Biggles, waiting for the seat to be adjusted, but in the end Liam takes command.
They had explained that the whales travel down from the Pacific Ocean in the Tonga region, just south of the equator. They are a toothed whale, but with teeth only only the lower jaw. They like the deep water as that's where their food is - they eat squid, fish, stingray and sharks! Once their vision is limited in the deeper water they find their prey by echo-location from one nostril, they use the other to breathe, with the 'pings' getting more intense as they approach their meal. The sound is so intense that it stuns it's victims. Apparently if you are in a metal bottomed boat and the whale 'pings' it, it can be felt through the hull as it is equivalent to the sound intensity of a jumbo jet engine.
The day is sunny with some cloud but the ride is a little bit bumpy in places. The mountains and the sea look rather good from up here too.
About 6 miles out Liam spots a Sperm Whale on the surface. Apparently they are happy to stay there while the plane circles around. This is unlike other whales, which tend to dive in this situation. We see it 'blowing' and chundering along before Liam tells us it's about to dive.
The whole whale.
Manage to take a picture of the fluke as it goes under - but at 800ft and using an iPhone we may have to wait until we get home in order to blow it up enough to see it!
The pilot now takes us in toward Kaikoura town to see if we can spot any dolphins from the air, but as we get closer the turbulence starts bucking us around and he decides that it's a bit 'knarly'. We turn around.
From here you can see the Peninsula that we walked around yesterday - the aeroplane strut bisects it but I think you can get the measure.
We head back to Kaikoura 'International' Airport for a landing on the grass runway.
Remove the ear defenders we have been wearing and jump out to have our photo taken with the plane.
Decide our next move should be to head off to St Anne's Lagoon, a place a lady on the boat yesterday told us about. Another bendy twisty road and umpteen road works traffic lights later we arrive.
On the way one of us did manage to spot a Black-billed Gull.
It was a good place for a bit of a picnic, with emphasis on bit, as we only had a packet of crisps and a banana, but we did have 2 bottles of Bundaberg ginger beer which is becoming a bit of an addiction.
The tumpty bits (possibly could be defined as hillocks?) along the way were covered in yellow broom - a non-native plant that seems to be crowding out everything else. There was also this rather strange arrangement of well manicured hedges screening off bits of what looked like very well fertilised fields.
We also visited an Historic Bridge - but could find no evidence of its actual history to enlighten us.
Before heading to the cinema tonight we thought we'd have one last walk along the beach area, this time the other side of town. That was the idea anyway, until we notice that an earring (one of the new ones purchased in Canada) had gone missing and realise from the earlier photo that it must have happened on the plane whilst removing ear-defenders. Dash back to the airport, but they'd shut up shop for the day - Will have to try on our way past tomorrow. C'est la vie.
On the way to the cinema we see what must be the world's smallest alcohol free zone. NZ can hardly be taking street drinking seriously, we assume that if you are carrying any liquor you have to be able to leap across this section of pavement to avoid a fine.
P.S. Film was 'The Giver' with Jeff Bridges and Meryl Streep. A bit weird but quite engaging, as was the attendant in the foyer.