There and Back 2005

So before I go into the exciting things that Andy and I have been doing since we last wrote, I need to spend some time aquainting you with the car market. Now that I start writing, I am wishing we had taken a picture so you could all get the full effect, but since we didn't my description will have to do. It's basically a big garage. Rectangle in shape so about 10 cars can fit in a row, but once all the cars and the people are in, it's a bit of a challenge getting any one particular car out for a test drive. Along with the cars, the garage contained two toilets, a shower (broken), a washer and dryer, old car seats lined up along the wall (party cental for a group of sellers who spent all day camped out there waiting for someone to buy, or even glance at, their car), and garbage (lots of it and all over the place). It was very apparent that whoever owned the car market didn't care much for its condition. Oh, and there was a backyard that fit about 10 more cars, maybe less. So, Andy and I went to check the place out last Friday when we got to Christchurch and then returned early on Saturday morning to begin the selling process. We even brought some muffins and orange juice with us in an attempt to lure potential buys to our car. Didn't work. I'd say there were three people selling a car for every one person buying and if three people looked at our car in the seven and a half hours we were there that was a lot! But our hopes for success on Sunday remained high and on Sunday we made the bold move to swap muffins and orange juice for beer, sure that the enticement of a free beer after a test drive would do the trick. Didn't work. We drank the beer ourselves. But Sunday was not a complete loss because #1, we met a bunch of really cool people and #2, we first recognized what I am going to refer to as "The Great Phenomena of the Backpackers Car Market." People don't leave. Even after they sell their cars, they don't leave. We witnessed one person after another sell their car, and remain in the garage for hours afterwards. And here's the best part---not only did people stay well after their car was happily off in the hands of a new owner, but they came back the next day just to hang out! I'm not kidding. We must have witnessed at least five or six cases of this phenomena in the past two days! Of course, this group of loyal car market fans made the place feel like home for themselves--plenty of music and food and even a camp fire in the backyard of the garage after hours. But still, here were a good number of people who opted for spending hours sitting in a garage over spending time outside in a great city in beautiful, sunny weather. And I'd bet that they are all there right now. Singing, dancing, eating ramen noodles, and watching other people attempt to sell cars to the infrequent buyer who dares to enter the car market. I, on the other hand, will be very happy not to return the "Backpackers Car Market" tomorrow (assuming all goes well, of course). Although, I must say that I am looking back on the garage with a bit of notalgia. The place allowed for some very intriguing observations and we met some great people. We even had some of our fellow car sellers over for a few beers last night. And a very delicious bottle of champagne. So all was not lost. As long as the transaction tomorrow goes smoothly, that is!

So as for our other adventures in the past couple weeks....we did a great tour of the wineries in the Waipara Valley (about an hour or two north of Christchurch) and then we spent a few days in Kaikoura (a little farther north of Waipara Valley). Kaikoura was great, I loved it! It's small town, right on the water and we stayed at a really nice, little hostel called Dolphin Lodge. We went to the beach and Andy walked the penninsula. Saw loads of seals. And albatrose. And the other people staying at Dolphin Lodge were really fun so we hung out with them at night. And here's the best thing about Kaikoura---I went swimming with dolphins! It was probably one of the coolest things I have ever done! I was lucky because I had called ahead to reserve a spot for myself on one of the "Dolphin Encounter" tours and was told that all the tours were booked until March 24th! The best I could do was to go on a waiting list and pray someone set to go didn't show up. So that's what I did. Only thing is that in order to see if I got off the waitlist I had to go to the Dolphin Encounters office a couple hours before each tour was set to leave and wait around to see if I would be able to get off the waitlist for that tour. Day one on the waitlist I had no success. I was back at Dolphin Encounters at 7:15am on day 2 and the guy working said, "Okay, we'll definitely get you on today. The seas are rough so there is a good chance that someone will not want to go." So I waited and at 8:45am my name is called on the intercom and I am so excited I fly to counter, but the guy behind the counter doesn't have the most promising face on. I was preparing myself for disappointment when he says, "Look, everyone booked for the tour showed up and wanted to go, but here's what I can do for you. You can pay less for the tour and go on as an 'alternate' swimmer." By law, only 13 people can be in the water with the dolphins at any one time, so I was the 14th on the boat. Deal was that if anyone didn't want to swim for whatever reason, I would swim in their place and if I didn't swim I got most of my money back. I was desperate so I took the deal. With my wet suit on and flippers and snorkel in hand I get on the bus bound for South Bay where we got the boat out to the dolphins. We were on the boat for about 45 minutes (saw some seals and two albatrose on the way) before we reached this HUGE group of dolphins. There were literally hundreds of dolphins. I'd never even seen this many dolphins in one place in a picture, nevertheless in real life! And the dolphins were jumping out of the water doing spins and flips in the air. It was really amazing--good thing I forgot the camera! And it must have been my lucky day because a couple people had gotten sea sick on the ride out and had decided not to swim! So there I am swimming with loads of dolphins. They were dusky dolphins--relatively small ones (a large one is around 140 lbs) and the second most acrobatic species of dolphin. There were times when there were dolphins to my left, to my right, and underneath me. And sometimes they would come so close that I was eye to eye with them, maybe not even 6 inches from their faces. What a rush it was!

I think I am going to end here and leave the rest of our stories for Andy to write about later. I just realized it's almost dinner time and Andy is probably wondering where I am. Hopefully Andy can post some more pictures tomorrow, too. Don't think we have taken too many recently, but there must be some good ones we haven't put up yet!

xoxo.