to the south island, ho!

today we left wellington, boarded the ferry, and sailed our way to picton. from there we hopped on the kiwi bus again and made our way to nelson, with a pit/snack stop in havelock. the "ferry" was hardly a ferry at all! more like a cruise liner. it's very big as it can also take vehicles across. we even saw a bus being transported. the ferry ride is really boring so i slept through most of it. they even have a movie theatre inside if you wish to pay to watch. they were showing "meet the fockers".

ferry ride to picton

while we were gathering our things at the hostel this morning, we realized some of our food had been stolen. we had stored our food in the kitchen common area, where everyone else stores their food. yesterday morning we had cleaned the food bag so we realized what was stolen was stolen the very first night! fuckers! i don't know if i'll store my food in the common area from now on. i'll be weary of this for awhile.

photo taken in the town of havelock

as we were arriving in nelson, our bus driver told us that the weather will be crap. it was a bit rainy in wellington. this weekend is also a holiday weekend here. new zealanders take their holidays very seriously. any excuse not to work! most things will be closed on friday for good friday and on sunday for easter. there's also the easter monday holiday so some shops will be closed friday-monday. sucks for us. we have to do all our grocery shopping tonight if we want to eat this weekend.

we're staying at the prince albert hotel, a backpackers preferred by kiwi experience. i had wanted to stay at a bbh because we have bbh cards, but the preferred hostels that kiwi uses never seem to be bbh hostels. i had looked on the map for the more central bbh hostels and considered their reviewer ratings. the first choice of mine was a place that wasn't available so i decided to just go with kiwi's choice. we're lucky because everyone else on the bus using the kiwi choice is at another place! we requested a twin whereas everyone else requested a dorm room. the other place didn't have room in a twin. where we're at isn't so bad and it seems relatively empty.