Kaikoura to Masterton

July 27, 2009

We woke up, had breakfast and packed up, ready to leave Kaikoura. We had a ferry to catch in Picton and a 2 hour drive ahead of us so we headed out and drove north. I had wanted to stop at some wineries while in NZ so we made a point of stopping at some wineries in Blenheim. We came across Montana Winery, the largest winery in New Zealand so we stopped. We walked in and one of the employees was walking out. She smiled at us and walked out the door. No one was in the wine tasting area, even though they had just opened. We walked around the shop for a little while, hoping that someone would come help us. Finally, the same lady came back in and seemed surprised that we hadn’t been served. Apparently, there was another employee that was supposed to be helping us. Anyway, she was very gracious and let me sample a bunch of their wines. They sell wine in the US under the label of “Brancott” because they don’t want to confuse people with Montana. Raven wasn’t impressed with the idea of wine tasting at 10 am so she let me try the wines on my own. Since I have already exceeded the booze quota I can bring back into the US, I didn’t buy any but I did take note of the label and I’ll be sure to look for their label at home.

We arrived in Picton pretty early and had over an hour before the deadline for check in. We went to the ferry terminal and it was still closed so we drove into the heart of the town to go get some lunch. After all, the ferry food is disgusting in New Zealand. We decided on a cafe based on liking the name (of course, I’m writing this a few days late so I can’t remember the name... something to do with dogs ... bad sign). It was not the best lunch I’ve had in NZ, that’s for sure. I ordered a sandwich with salad and asked about the dressing (learning my lesson in Kaikoura). Sure enough, they only had that icky mayonnaise dressing so I skipped the salad. Ew. They had a wall with a map of the world on it. New Zealand’s place on the map had a 1 inch hole where the country should have been because people kept putting in pins of where they’re from. There was room for Olympia, surprise, surprise.

We headed back over to the ferry gate and were still early but the gate was open so Raven handed the lady our reservation. The lady handed it back and waved us through to a specific lane. Raven commented that she didn’t give a ticket to us. I figured that might be normal since we had our printed reservation and she’d confirmed our reservation but Raven commented that we got a boarding pass on the way over. Well, after waiting in the car for an hour it was time to board and she was right about that boarding pass. The guy taking tickets said we needed one to board, called the lady, she confirmed that we did check in and then made us pull over to see if the boarding pass fell onto the floor. We insisted there wasn’t one, looked on the floor and told him. He then said to look around the car. UGH! THERE WASN’T ONE! He let us through and we hurried out of the car and onto the boat to search for a seat with an outlet. On the way to the South Island, we were on a different ferry, one that had tables with power outlets, much like the States. We were now on a fancier ferry, one without power outlets and lovely tables by the window. It even had an elite area where only those who pay $40 extra per person can go. Ugh. Well, we finally found an outlet and two French guys were using it. :( There were no other ones accessible on the ship. We sat above them on a loft and a little ways into the trip, I noticed that they had left for a bit. Raven and I moved down there, unplugged their computers (yes, we did. LOL) and took the table next to theirs. They soon came back and looked quite disgruntled until Raven told them that we could all share the power with her power strip. Much better. I walked around the ferry a bit and I really didn’t like it as much as I did on the way over. It is a fancier boat but I’m a northwest girl and I like the other ferry, which has a closer resemblance to the ferries in WA. It didn’t even have a good deck to go outside and take pictures from so I mostly sat at the table and worked on my computer with Raven. We got close to Wellington around 3 or so and noticed that we could already see the ferry dock but we were suddenly traveling at a snail’s pace and it took forever to get into Wellington. We arranged to meet up with G for dinner so we drove over to her work. We were a bit early so we walked over to a drugstore and looked at magazines for a while until it was time to meet her. We went out for Indian food at a place next to her office and had a good chat before saying goodbye and heading out to the Rimutaka, a crazy, windy road between Wellington and Masterton, where Raven lives. I personally think Raven has become a pro at these crazy, windy roads especially after the roads we’d been traveling on all month. We made it back to Masterton, unpacked the car and I called it a night, staying in the sleep out trying to figure out how I would repack all of the stuff I had bought.