Death of a Car but saved by Dolphins.

I left off while we were in Greymouth. So that is where I will pick up the story! (prepare yourselves. This is a long one)

So we get to Greymouth and the hostel we had planned to stay at was expensive as what AND we had to bring our own linens for the bed. Who does that for a backpackers hostel? Well we went looking for a different hostel and stumbled on the greatest backpackers hostel I have ever seen. Amazing facilities, cheap laundry (since we had some wet stuff from the rain from the previous nights) cheap internet, free movies and a lot of them, and finally a nice bed, three of them. I was in heaven. We were all going crazy because up to this point, we spent so much time together and the night before was stressful... I guess?. But since we were eating like birds the whole trip, I also decided to treat myself to some steak, onions, pasta, and a 6 pack. Good night. Then we wake up the next morning, and now the drama begins.

The girls decided to name the car Stanley (first street we drove on) so if I say Stanley, you will know who/what I'm referring to. But this part of the trip was just a straight 3 or 4 hour drive to Kaikoura, where we had a reservation to swim with dusky dolphins. But NZ had different plans for us. I was driving through the Lewis Pass, about 2 hours from Kaikoura, and it had stopped raining about a half hour earlier. The speed limit was 70 kph and I came around a turn, and there lies a rock, NAY a small boulder in the middle of the road. Karl can: A- swerve into oncoming traffic but avoid the small piece of mountain. B- slam on the breaks and skid into the mountain or oncoming traffic and maybe even the rock. C- fuck it. Or better yet, hope the car could clear the rock... I picked C. I thought it was the logical thought. The girls were asleep and the decision was made in about .6 seconds so, like I said, I went for it. The worst sound and a huge jolt followed there after. I guess the question of "Could Stan clear the rock" was answered real quick. We started to drag the rock for a while then the engine started smoking. Touché New Zealand, touché. I pulled over and began my diagnosis. I couldn't see any liquids leaking, but oh hey, our friend the boulder was still with us! Little bastard made its way to the rear axel and was stuck between it and the road. Thank god we had insurance on the car. We then tried to call a tow company, then the rental company. But better yet, no one had any sort of cell phone service and the closest town... well no one had any clue. I hitch hiked my way about 5 km up to a small place that does obstacle courses and outdoor education stuff to use their phone. I made the call to the tow company and they said they would pick us up in about 45 minutes. So I hitchhiked my way back to the car and we waited. After drawing on the foggy windows for 2 and a half more hours, I decided to go back and call again.

Typical though, as I was gone, the truck came. Side note, as we were waiting on the side of the road, there were 3 other people that pulled over to see if we needed help on top of the first person that took me to the camp. One of them was a little old man in a camper who invited us in for coffee and cookies. Side note ended- now we had to get the car towed back to a town called Hamner Springs. As the tow man hooked the car up, he punctured the oil tank so Stan started "bleeding" everywhere. It was quite a sad site. And in case you didn't guess, by this point we missed our dolphin outing. But Hamner Springs... Cool little town, known only for its numerous hot springs, which we didn't get to experience. The car got dropped off, and the damage on the car... The oil tank was dead, and the transmission was completely shattered. Not just cracked, but done. And the front axel was jacked up. Score: Karl-1, Car- 0. After I got the tally, I called the rental company. They told us that they had no one available to drive a car up to us, so to get a new car we'd have to get down to Christchurch somehow.... somehow. After much debate with the man on the phone, they couldn't pick us up anywhere with the car, even if we hitchhiked a couple towns up.

here is the tiny BOULDER I hit...
stan bleeding everywhere.
This is when it was stuck between the rear axel and the road...

Break- get up, stretch, breathe.

OK, lets go. Next we went to the i-site. For those of you who don't know, an i-site is this sweet thing that NZ has EVERYWHERE that all they do is help you. They book you trips, tell you about campsites, hikes, attractions, tours, buses, you name it, they do it. We went in there and asked about a bus back into Christchurch. There was only one a day and it was at 2 pm, so we had about an hour and a half to hang out. We asked them to book us a place on the bus so we didn't get robbed a seat. The girls had also decided that they didn't want to do the dolphin swim anymore. They would rather save the money and not go through the stress of getting there. Me, on the other hand, well when am I ever going to get this opportunity again? So during the wait I had the lady book my Dolphin Encounter. Fast forward now and the shuttle finally gets there. We bring our bags over and the driver tells us that the bus is full. Apparently they booked 3 people on a different bus but they were suppose to be on this one. And they already took 2 other kids who just bought a ticket at the curb. So all because they booked some people on the wrong day, we were screwed. Bullshit, I know, but thats how the dice fell. Bad news 1- I needed to get to Christchurch to get the car to get to Kaikoura because now that I put in my reservation, if I didn't show, I would still be charged. Bad news 2- We had to get to Christchurch by 6 pm before the rental place closed to get the car. Bad news 3- This was the last shuttle out of Hamner springs until the next day at 2 pm. Bad news 4- Hilary already booked the hostel and we couldn't get a hold of them to remove the reservation. Bad news 4- We couldn't find a hostel in Hamner Springs reasonably priced to lodge for the night. How did we resolve this conflict, you may wonder... Well I will tell you. The employees at i-site are saviors. I made friends with them as I was waiting for the shuttle and the girls were getting food. They heard about the predicament we were in and all 5 of them got together to try to brainstorm ideas. Everything was thrown around, and I mean everything, until we landed on a final solution. One of the employees was leaving at 4 pm. She was taking the company car to Anberley, a town a half hour outside of Christchurch. But the catch was was that because it was the company car, she couldn't drive us into Christchurch. So we could only get 3/4's the way there. Then she decided that she could take us to her parents house in Anberley, we would leave our luggage there (bags wouldn't fit in her car), hop in her own little car, go to Christchurch, get the new car, drive it back out to her parents' place, and pick up our luggage, then sleep! Well it didn't work out quite like that but this was the point it started getting better. I called the rental company again and she told me that if they closed before we got there, she would leave the car outside in the lot with the keys in the glove box. So we were on our way, got dropped off at her parents house (nicest people in the world) who then told us to just take their car into Christchurch. They wouldn't let us pay for gas or anything. They figured that if their kids were in a situation like ours, someone would help them. So why shouldn't they do the same... take note everyone. But we were able to stuff our bags and ourselves into the parents' car and go to Christchurch. Finally we were at the hostel and everything was settled. Better yet, I was going to swim with dolphins!

So we slept like babies and I woke up early to get to Kaikoura. They said it was about a 3 hour drive and my swim was at 12:30pm so I left at 8:30 am. Well I actually made it there in 2 hours, but the drive was amazing. Passed a bunch of vineyards, stopped at a sweet lookout spot over looking the town, and best of all, I finally got time to myself to listen to my own music in the car and drive without 2 other backseat drivers. Heavenly, I know. So I got into Kaikoura and I had time to look around the town and have some lunch. It is a real small town, and it's only there because of the whale, seal, and dolphin populations. So there wasn't much to do but oddly enough I ran into a friend from my orientation group in a cafe. Small world. But my time came and I went and checked into the Dolphin Encounter! They gave me a wet suit, mask, snorkel, fins, booties, and I rented an underwater camera. We watched a video telling us how to interact with the Dusky dolphins and other tidbits of info. Such as... they can't guarantee there will be dolphins, we are in their habitat, don't reach out to touch them, they like it if you sing (yes, sing) and they LOVE eye to eye contact. So we got out to the boats and drove out to the pod. Our lucky day, it was a beautiful day with a huge pod of around 400 dusky dolphins. Truly breathtaking. We jumped right in and everyone started singing. You could hear it through the snorkels. The dolphins were the most majestic things I 've ever seen. Powerful yet graceful, agile, quick as what, and playful. They love to investigate things so they would swim circles around us to check us out then just swim away. Also, they are they jump A LOT. Apparently they do it to show off so they were just jumping and going crazy the whole time. We swam with them for about 40 minutes, following the pod, getting in the boat, jumping back out, etc. The experience was life-changing. I even had one dolphin who I guess you could say had a connection with me. He (or she I don't really know but I'm going to say a guy dolphin) swam circles around me and I tried to stare at him. He went to swim off but didn't do it real fast like usual. He did it real slow so I followed him. Then I caught up to him and he swam circles around me again and then slowed down. And yes I was looking into his eye the whole time. This went on for about a minute and a half. I was astounded. I tried to take as many pictures as possible but the camera was tough to get used to and the dolphins are so damn fast thats its tough. But here are all my pictures... There are plenty. And I apologize if there are so many pictures/ videos of the dolphins, they were just that incredible.

this was my buddy.

After we swam with the dolphins, we got on the boat and they boat drive around and let us take pictures from the surface and see the dolphins in another light. They also provided ginger snap cookies and hot chocolate. Great great day. Like I said, it was one of the most rewarding and amazing experiences of my life. So after about 4 hours of seeing/ swimming with dolphins, I drove home during another amazing South Island sunset. Then the next day at about 10 am, I flew back to Welly. That was my trip!

All of if was so much fun. Between the glacier's, the bungy jump, getting a ticket (which sucks now and is actually 170 bucks, not 120), destroying a car, and swimming with dolphins, it was the trip of a lifetime. I will leave you to watch all the rest of my videos!