We started today bright and early to head on out to a dolphin boat with the high hopes of finding some dolphins to swim with. They took us all around the bay and out towards some small islands where there are usually huge pods of dolphins and sometimes orca whales. Unfortunately for us, we ended up spotting only 3 or 4 dolphins and no whales. They blamed the poor conditions on the shipwreck of the cargo ship Rena, which crashed mid November on a reef outside NZ. Just a few days ago the ship finally cracked in half leaving oil deposits and containers in the entire bay area. The local people are quite upset about the crash and the way the authorities are responding with poor cleanup efforts. With NZ being the way it is, it doesn't surprise me the way the community reacts when their beloved area becomes contaminated. Despite not seeing much wildlife, it was still a nice day to go on a boat cruise in the bay.
Following a brief lunch at McDonald's we headed to do some white water rafting. The river we went on is only open for rafting 26 days of the year, and the rest of the days is damned up for hydroelectricity. The river featured rapids from class 2 all the way to class 5, and provided for quite the thrill. At the bottom of one of the rapids known as "washing machine", we had the unique and somewhat scary experience of having our raft tip over. We were all dumped out and I was stuck under water for a little bit while I struggled to find an air pocket inside of the raft. Fortunately I was able to do so and we all recovered safely. Looking back on it tipping over didn't seem like too bad of an experience, but during the moment it was one of the scariest things of my life. Our guide was having a bit of bad luck that day, as he had never tipped a raft on that river in 10 years, and the day we did it he tipped twice - once with us and once with another group before us.
Although we tipped on one rapid we still were able to enjoy all of the others. There were several commands for rafting and it was quite the job remembering all that we had to do when given orders by our guide. On one rapid we were allowed to jump out of the raft and float down ourselves, which I of course did and had a blast doing so.
After an hour and half on the rapids we had finally reached our destination safely. We dragged the boats out of the water and prepared for our trip to the next hostel. The hostel we're staying at now is right on a bay, so it's pretty sweet to be able to walk right on to the beach. Being pretty tired from the days activities most of us went to bed fairly early.
Tomorrow too looks to be another great day in paradise, with sea kayaking and bone carving in the agenda. I can't believe our time in NZ is almost up already - it's a terribly sad realization that I'm trying to fight off with the promise of more good times in Australia.
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