Sunday was moving on day; to the South Island. It dawned another bleak day, cold and windy. The southerly had arrived. I was up early and managed to get my outside jobs done before the rain started. We took all morning getting sorted out, making sure our fresh water tanks were full and waste ones empty. Since it was the same price we were driving the car onto the ferry separately – less chance to damage the A-frame. At mid-day we headed down to the Bluebridge terminal and checked in. I had to go one way with Suzi and Wyn into another queue with the car. We ended up on different vehicle decks. I must have been on first because I managed to grab a two-seater sofa in the lounge with the laptop stations. We were lucky because it turned out to be a crowded crossing with lots of school holiday passengers who just kept crowding in.
Wyn set to on the laptop catching up on a few emails while I lounged about and read my book. We knew it wasn’t going to be a flat crossing, and it wasn’t. Once out into the strait the pitching and rolling started. A few passengers started being sick and the crew were wandering around with ice. We fared OK, but neither of us felt too good. Wyn gave up on the computer and took to the sofa and I had a look outside. It was rugged out there; I wasn’t keen taking more than one step without a hand on a rail. Back inside I took the opportunity to catch up on a few of my emails. Eventually it got calmer and we decided we were probably then in the sound. For all we could see we could just as easily been in Iceland – except the time wouldn’t have been right. We must have been in the right place because eventually they announced that we’d arrived in Picton. We’d been in the North Island for just over 6 months.
We met up down the street for a cup of tea, and started working out where we’d go for the night. About then I got a text from my sister Wendy who was arriving in Blenheim that day taking possession of motels there with her husband. She was wondering whether we could help with unloading boxes from a big truck. It seemed a good idea so we headed on to Blenheim and the Bella Vista Motels. There was indeed a big truck and lots of boxes and we made ourselves useful until the truck was empty. It was a good way to catch up and we ended up parked for the night in their back driveway.
