Day 1 Auckland
Asked to use up my annual leave by the hospital, and with no list in private this week, I decided to take the week off and take the girls for a cruise around New Zealand. I’ve been afraid to tell people what I had planned, for fear of sounding like I was showing off (we never had much money growing up, and being better off now still seems strange). Luckily for the past week the weather predictions for our trip have got worse and worse, which has helped combat any appearance of being too fortunate.
The cruise line is Dream cruises, who I think are based in Asia somewhere. Certainly most of the photos on the website are of Asian people, looking very sophisticated and having a good time. Our ship is called Explorer Dream. The trip is a week long, all up and down NZ, starting and ending in Auckland. On the first day, we just checked in, and didn’t sail out of Auckland until midnight. We struggled to find somewhere on board to eat, as by the time we were hungry, there were long waiting lists everywhere. They limit entry to the buffet so it doesn’t get too full, which makes for a more pleasant experience once you finally get in.
The check in process was pretty smooth and typically Kiwi, it made me feel quite proud.
The staff a little desultory about trying to sell the various drinks packages. I expect they cannot conceive how anybody could possibly drink enough to make it worthwhile without falling into an alcoholic stupor. I tend to agree, although my husband thinks they’re a great idea.
Day 2 Bay of Islands
Terrible night’s sleep, not sure why? With the engine thrumming smoothly below us and a gentle rocking motion of the boat all night (I’m sorry my brain only seems to be able to think in cliches), I thought we should have all slept well. Disappointing. A warm but cloudy day, very nice for exploring. The first thing we saw from our balcony was dolphins playing around in the water, showing off to oohs and aahs from the crowds. I hadn’t booked us onto any excursions so we just spent the day exploring Pahia and Russell.
The Pompellier mission house, with associated printing press and tannery was a great museum that I would highly recommend. It’s amazing how many phrases in the English language come from printing industry jargon. Upper case and lower case (from where the containers of type were kept), making a good first impression, to coin (quoin) a phrase, for example.
I sat in front of a man on the bus transfer back to our cruise tender (ferry back to the ship), who spent the whole time talking on the phone about how sick he’d been on his excursion out to the famous hole in the rock, and how anxious he was about getting back on the ship. Then there was a sad old Chinese man who spent the entire tender trip back to the cruise ship vomiting into a succession of sick bags.
It’s lucky this isn’t a novel or I would have been worried that this was foreshadowing.
We also got far closer to a sticky noisy toddler on the trip back than I would have ideally preferred. She was scarily entitled, kicking our seats and prodding us while her parents looked on fondly. They were only encouraged by onlookers who also seemed to think this behaviour was cute. This happens far too often with today’s youth. Not impressed.
Back on board that evening, we again struggled to find somewhere to eat. The girls told me off for being rude to the tiny little Asian hostess who told us we were going to have to wait another hour to be seated but by then, having been turned down at another restaurant already, I was getting quite hangry. We ended up eating at a Japanese restaurant which was expensive but at least we got in straight away.
Day 3 at sea
Today we are continuing our journey down the country on the Western side (I think) in order to get to Milford Sound at first light tomorrow. The captain warned us yesterday that the sea could be quite rough today once the storm finally hit, so I’ve been very nervous, and annoyed with myself that I didn’t take the opportunity in the Bay of Islands to buy some scopoderm patches. However, it hasn’t been too bad so far. Overcast and rainy, with some gentle rolling, and getting steadily colder.
I think I have figured out the story with the restaurants. There are probably two sittings each night, early and late, and we just keep turning up at the wrong time. Will put this theory to the test tonight.
The captain just made an announcement. I can’t work out whether we are through the worst of the storm or not. Certainly tomorrow will be windier.
Just had dinner with a lovely elderly couple from Cambridge sharing our table. Funny the conversations you have with people you wouldn’t normally meet and will likely never see again. Quite a bit more detail than is probably warranted but interesting nonetheless. Plan on going to the show tonight. Not sure how you perform acrobatics when the stage is rolling around but I guess they know what they’re doing.
The show was awesome. It was called Magical land, or something similar. Very impressive staging and costumes, and the performers were very talented. Lively and varied music and dancing. Spectacular. I had no idea what was going on but enjoyed it immensely.
No nausea at all – so far.
Day 4.
Milford Sound, Doubtful Sound.
Set the alarm for 6am which is when we were due to enter Milford Sound. Able to sit in our pjs, fat pants, dressing gowns and slippers on our balcony to watch. Beautiful cool sunny day although windy as predicted. Very proud of my country looking so impressive in the morning light. It all looks very prehistoric and you can absolutely understand why they filmed the Lord of the Rings down here.
0930 now, moving steadily along the coast. Bizarre to have just eaten our eggs Florentine for breakfast in a huge classically themed dining room with the rugged coastline a few hundred meters away.
Haven’t signed up for any of the hugely expensive WiFi packages, which will probably annoy my husband greatly but it’s quite restful being cacooned from the outside world for a while. We are in Dunedin tomorrow, I’m sure we can slip into a McDonald’s somewhere. You used to be able to rely on Mickey D’s throughout the world as a place with clean toilets, but more recently it’s the WiFi that is the real selling point. Thus I can’t be too cross with the company in spite of it being the epitome of white male corporate oppression.
The ship makes all sorts of creakings and other odd noises. There is a heavy man in the cabin above us who walks around in his stiff leather shoes on the polished wooden floor at all hours of the day and night. Which is weird as every cabin is carpeted.
Doubtful Sound is also beautiful but somehow less awesomely majestic, I think because the mountains reach less steeply down into the water. We saw no wildlife at either.
Now we are just motoring towards Port Chalmers.
The show tonight is by a magician. The girls aren’t very keen – my daughter is distrustful of anyone who knows more than she does – but we’ll see how we feel tonight.
Went to the magic show and it was OK. Far too much audience participation ‘pick a card, any card’ and not enough slicing up of glamorous assistants for my liking.