Akaroa

I was awoken by the sounds of the tenders being lowered. I though this was a good sign – it could mean that we were preparing to abandon ship, but more likely it meant we had anchored in Akaroa, and they were getting things in place for us to go ashore. I looked out the window, and there were beautiful green hillsides all around us. Yes, we were in Akaroa, and nothing could stop us getting to the penguins.

Clutching our tour tickets, we went to the Royal Court Theater to wait for our Akaroa Nature Cruise to depart. The excitement was mounting. Dada from the tour office stepped up to the podium and I was expecting her to let us know it was time to go down to the tender. Instead she informed us that the tour had been cancelled due to bad weather L. I was most upset as I really hadn’t thought that the weather was that bad. Feeling extremely unhappy we went to the Chart Room, I had a nice cup of tea and a fruit tart, I cheered up a bit, but I had really, really, wanted to do the nature cruise. I was even wearing my new penguin socks I had bought at Universal Studios in Los Angeles for this trip. Well, you simply can’t count on the weather.

We took a tender ashore and spent a few hours wandering around Akaroa. It is a beautiful little town surrounded by hills, with plenty of restaurants and gift shops (although none of them looked great), and free wifi. We did some shopping in a fantastic little shop that has great sewing, knitting, and craft supplies along with the souvenirs. Lunch was at a waterfront restaurant called La Thai – we have been having wonderful meals for the last 2 ½ months, but sometimes you simply have to have Thai food. The food was delicious, and the wifi free and fast, so we thought it was a good find.

We took a tender back to the ship in good time to take photos of the beautiful hills surrounding us. It really is a spectacular port. So even though I missed my last chance to see penguins this trip, all in all we had a good day.

Synergy played for our sail away, and dolphins were seen as we sailed out into the open waters, heading for Wellington. Life on Queen Victoria is good!