Kaikoura
The lovely coastal town of Kaikoura beckoned us and we answered it's call. Arriving there we took a walk down the track to see the seal colony. We walked for a bit and couldn't see anything... until we realised that we were only 3 metres away from a bunch of sleeping seals. On a side note: you shouldn't get closer than 10 m to a seal since these things can move and if they have pups they will attack you... so me and Charly were pretty lucky that we didn't get jumped.
After that we decided to blow the budget and headed out to a restaurant to have the nicest food I have had since the Maori Hangi in Rotorua. Also gave a quick phone call to Mum since it was her birthday. HAPPY BIRTHDAY MUM!

Kayaks
Since walking the Abel Tasman didn't seem to do justice to the awesomeness of the scenery I decided to head out with Charlotte to do some sea kayaking along the bays. Our guide was a friendly kiwi named Ally who had some good banter. We cruised around the bays and stopped for lunch in one of them. Was a good day and pretty relaxing, despite Charlie locking her suitcase key in her case and me losing my hat on the bus.

Abel Tasman walk
Laura, Jenny and I all caught the bus up to the Abel Tasman national park. We then caught a slinky little water taxi that took us up to the top of torrent bay, around a 4-5 hour walk from the bus pick up point. I headed off from the girls to go north for a bit before turning back south to meet the bus. It was a lovely place and it's hard to describe just pretty the scenery was.

FEARLESS BBQ!
Got up this morning and my mighty body screamed at me for exercise so I jogged up to the centre of New Zealand and back down. Afterwards my mind screamed at me for some Kung-fu entertainment so I went along with a Canadian couple called Kenny and Carolyn to see the new Jet Li movie: "FEARLESS" A true Kung fu masterpiece!
After that I met up with Jenny and Tom to go buy food for a BBQ that we had talked about the previous night. I met a random English girl in the corridor and we got off to a rocky start but I invited her to join us for the BBQ anyway. Her name was Charlotte.
The BBQ was fantastic and I finished it off with my ever-popular hot chocolate sauce. A good night all round.

CENTRE. OF. THE. EARTH... sorta
Tom, Jenny, Laura and I took a walk up to the geographical centre of New Zealand... and therefore the Universe. It was an awesome view of Nelson.
We then headed out to walk down to Tahananui beach. The beach was really pretty and the banter was good on the way. Specially when we all jumped off the road to scramble along the rock pools for a while. Tom and I tried to run them on the way back and got a fairly good jog in.
Once back to the hostel we kicked back and relaxed and watched a couple of movies together.

Nelson!
Took a walk up to the Cathedral to see what it was like. Wandered around a little and had a look around. A nice little town in the end.
As I was chilling back in the hostel some familiar faces wandered in; Laura and Jenny. We got talking then went out to play some pool. After that we headed back to the hostel and got talking to a guy named Tom who was cool. We all chilled out and watched a movie together and talked about doing somthing the next day together.

Picton to Nelson
Took a walk along the snout track in Picton today and headed along some of the beautiful coastline and found the best bay ever... Bob's Bay!
I caught my bus to Nelson and met my room-mate who was a friendly wine-trading Kiwi. We headed out for a few drinks and by unmercifully flirting with the bar staff in one place we managed to get free food and free shots... amazing what you can do when you set your mind to it. We wandered around Nelson trying to find a decent place to drink but had absoloutely no joy.

Beer = Bad Idea
Terrible hangover today which made the ferry crossing a little less enjoyable than I would've liked. Arrived in Picton which is a gorgeous little town and checked into the extremely quant little Villa Hostel. The best point of the day was when the Hostel served us free Apple crumble with ice cream at 8 pm... Yummy.

Wellington
Now Playing: Katchafire, Jack Johnson
Arrived in Wellington and took a walk up to the cable car to ride it to the botanical gardens. I took a leisurely stroll around the place listening to some music I had on my Ipod.
I got back and got talking to my roomate, Alfie and we decided to head out for some Beers... which turned into quite a few beers and I came back a little more drunk than I would've liked.
To make it slightly worse our drunken Irish room-mate decided to come in at 5 am in the morning and wake us up to tell us how his night had went. Apart from that Wellington was a really cool city and I am looking forward to spending more time there.

Ready to go
Another day in New Plymouth. Andy and I played some pool and I made general preparations to head to the south island. Time to move on.