This morning was supposed to be a very early start as we were meant to be going sailing for the whole day and along the way seeing dolphins, however at 8am we discovered that the trip had been cancelled due to lack of numbers. This put a bit of a spanner in the works as we were all ready to go. However, due to my new found ‘it’s-not-a-problem-lets-just-go-with-the-flow’ attitude, no panicking took place and instead we had a look at the leaflets in reception which advertised other dolphin related activities. They all had different options and were not quite the same as what we were supposed to be doing, but we figured that it didn’t matter. We gave one of them a call and booked ourselves in for the afternoon trip.
That left us with the ability to mooch and not have to rush about, so we had some tea and then went for a meander into town. We had a good look at all the tat shops and at some of the not-so-tatty shops and formed a general appreciation for the quaintness of Paihia’s town centre! We then grabbed a bite of lunch by the waterfront as we waited for our boarding time. Eventually we saw the boat pull in, we went and waited, along with about twenty other people, to hop on ourselves. The boat was a catamaran and was initially a little confusing as the stickers it was emblazoned with suggested that it was going to give us a tour of Auckland! It turned out that their Paihia boat had broken down so they were borrowing one from the Auckland branch.
Once on board we found seats up the top next to where the Captain was sitting. He introduced everyone to the crew and explained that due to weather conditions we wouldn’t be able to go to one of the stops on the tour – the ‘Hole in the Rock’. He warned us that the water was a little choppy but that we would go out as far as possible. We set off and within a few minutes I was able to see what he meant by a ‘little choppy’! I realised that the experience in Cairns must have knocked my sea-legs for six and so I felt somewhat ropey. Thankfully this time I did not have to feed the fish but instead just closed my eyes and tried to forget what was going on around me, letting the movement of the boat lull me into a doze. I certainly didn’t want to go out on deck as it was so windy and not conducive to my sea-legs!
After a bit, the choppiness subsided, as we had entered the Bay of Islands itself and so the islands protected the boat from the waves. The Captain gave us a little tour of some of the bays, telling us about Captain Cook’s arrival at the Bay of Islands and how he had used it to shelter from the high waves. We continued our search for dolphins, with the Captain calling and being called by other boats in the area who were also out looking for dolphins. Not a bean. Nor a dolphin.
We took a half hour stop on Urupukapuka Island where we sat and had a coffee, looking out to sea. Despite the choppy water, it was rather sunny, the wind caused the chill. The island itself is a small resort with some accommodation and a bar, so there was not much else to do other then enjoy the view. Our stop over, everyone jumped back onto the boat and we began heading back to Paihia. Again, the water was choppy at times, but as long as I kept my eyes closed during the worst bits, it was all good! When the rocking calmed down, I would open my eyes and look out of the window to take in the views, then close my eyes once more.
I was brought around from my semi-slumber by the sensation of the boat slowing and as I opened my eyes, the Captain announced that there were some dolphins ahead. I braced myself and looked out the window; sure enough I could see something in the water. We filed out onto the deck with everyone else and soon the dolphins came over to the boat and frolicked around the hull. It was a pod of five bottle-nosed dolphins, including one baby. We watched and snapped away, as they rolled under the boat. They were very large, like the ones I had seen when diving in Paihia before, and they seemed to enjoy coming over to the boat and swimming close, looking up at us looking back at them. They didn’t do any exciting tricks or anything, but then again, they aren’t trained dolphins in Seaworld! After about ten minutes, we had to continue our journey back to base so we left them behind.
We were all pleased we had seen at least one dolphin, even if it had been right at the end of the trip! The Captain then told us that the company guaranteed a dolphin sighting, otherwise if you don’t, you can take another trip for free and would be given a voucher which has no expiry date. He felt that we had not really had the sort of dolphin experience that we should have had on our four hour trip, seeing as we hadn’t made it out to the ‘Hole in the Rock’ and that we’d only seen five dolphins, doing rather little, only five minutes (literally) from being back at the wharf. For this reason, he told us that he’d five us the voucher for a free second trip, only we weren’t to tell anyone we’d seen any dolphins! Everyone jumped at the chance! So please don’t tell anyone I saw some dolphins!
Having gotten our voucher and disembarked, we went back to the town and shopped for tat (having looked at all the tat earlier, we knew where we wanted to go back to!). We were rather bemused when the town was suddenly filled with the deafening sound of an air raid siren. I have to admit, I was a bit scared – I had no idea what the sound meant and remembered someone, somewhere, sometime, telling me that the air raid siren was used to warn of an incoming tsunami (and let’s agree that I have not had a good track record for natural disasters during my trip so far!). I was in a shop at the time and on looking around, no one seemed to be running around in panic, so I began to think that perhaps the siren was not signifying a tsunami. I went outside and found Mike, looking across the road – towards the fire station. It turned out that the siren was an alarm for the fire service and as we watched, it made us laugh that the people in the station were moving really slowly! There certainly seemed to be no sense of emergency! Casually, they slid open the big doors for the fire engine to come out, then it pulled out slowly and someone very unhurriedly closed it again, before eventually they meandered over and climbed in to head off. Weird!
The excitement over, we went back to the hostel and chilled for a while. We decided to go back to the same place for dinner, mainly because it was the only place open! There were quite a few people in there, I guess for the same reason that we were there – it wasn’t like there was a big choice of places to go! Back at the hostel, there was time for a bit more chilling in front of the tv, looking for news on the election, but there was nothing really on. We figured that if anything interesting had happened so far, they’d be reporting it, so we’d have to wait until morning when they might have something to say! Instead we watched some strange US shows and found an episode of Family Guy, which was cool.
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