Jen Hillam: Palmerston North to Picton

My adventure began on August 27^th, the Saturday of the beginning of the mid-semester break. A simple invitation I had posted on to facebook for some people to join me for the mid-semester break in the south island had been answered by 3 willing americans. Josh Miller, a 21 year old nutrition major from North Carolina, Marian Hudson, a 19 year old Art Major from Georgia, and Alyssa Miller, a 21 year old peace studies/phish major from neighbouring Colorado (Lakewood actually) were all keen. A combination of late night parties and a stressed few hours sleep (worrying about if I had everything I needed) resulted in a fatigued start but the excitement of the adventure to come kept my fuel gage far from empty. My breakfast and lunch consisted of all the perishable foods I couldn’t leave behind, but I didn’t mind having a vegetable filled omelette followed by 7 kiwis. As we all met at the bus stop in front of Massey the first sign of anxiety threatened to put our trip to a negative start, Josh forgot his passport and while sprinting back to his flat before the bus came he found a taxi that took him the about 2 km round trip journey. We all got a good laugh as his pulled up to the bus stop in a taxi with time to spare.
As I boarded the bus of course I headed to the back row because that is where all the cool kids sit. When I got there I found one of my good friends Kelly asleep in the corner. It was an unexpected and pleasant surprise as I gave her a little nudge to announce our presence. We all sat in the back together and had a good time during our 2 hour bus ride. We finally arrived at the ferry terminal in Wellington with a few hours to spare. We opted to stay there and eat lunch to be sure we would not miss our ferry. Kelly was boarding the same ferry and met her dad, CJ, at the terminal. He had just flown in to travel with her. It was so fun to see how excited they both were to see each other, he was pretty cool. Finally they called for us to board the ferry. The excitement bubbled inside me as I was actually going to the south island of New Zealand! We of course got right to taking pictures of the beautiful Wellington harbour, islands, and cliffs. It was our last view of the North Island for the next two weeks. It was a smooth boat ride and the ferry was huge! They had semi trucks, cars, and a few hundred people.

As we entered the Marlborough Sounds of the south Island we were filled with awe. Our first views of the south island were magnificent. We were met by a group of dolphins jumping and swimming alongside the boat. The sounds were huge and incredibly steep. We were envious of the few houses and boat docks we passed that clearly were only accessible by boat along the sounds. The water within the sounds was a smooth as glass in some places, water skiing anyone?

In a longer than expected journey through the sounds, we arrived at our first destination, Picton. We had pre-booked our hostel and owners were kind enough to come pick us up from the ferry terminal. As we settled into our hostel, Tombstone, and we were very impressed of the quality of it. It was definitely one of the nicer hostels, yet still cheap. We had our own room and there were new, thick down comforters to cuddle up with on our bunk beds. After we dropped our stuff off we headed into town to look from some grub and something to do. It wasn’t long after our 5 minute walk into to town we realized there was nothing to do here at night and not many food options. We opted out of a couple $25/plate places and found a small bar/restaurant Toot ‘n’ Whistle. It surprised me that such a major town for transportation was so small and quiet on a Saturday night. We gave up on finding anything to do and headed back to our cosy hostel next to the graveyard. With our tummies filled, it was time to hot tub. In the adorable tiki hut hot tub we made a new friend. This interesting fellow had been drinking a whole bottle of wine by himself in the hot tub and was in the mood to talk. He was a kiwi on his way to a navy base and he sure loved telling us about his crazy adventures. It made for an interesting night. We made it a fairly early night as we were excited to get an early start the next day and to see if Josh would sleep walk.