3 January 2025

We were so lucky yesterday. Whilst we didn’t awake to rain, it was heavily overcast and had been, and was threatening to rain. The Israeli family that we got off the train with were lucky too. They were going whale watching yesterday morning, before catching the train south again. They would have had perfect weather, unlike the day we arrived and today.

I got up, had a shower, and left Pen sleeping to go and finish off my fruit salad, and apple and cinnamon yoghurt. No photographic stops today!

Lady Penelope’s motto. Elegance, Charm, and Deadly Danger

We packed up our gear – why is it so much more difficult part way through a trip, even when you haven’t bought any souvenirs? We were then permitted to leave our bags in the lounge whilst we went out to the Emporium Brewing Company’s Escape Room, which had the advantage of being about four doors down from the Lazy Shag. If there was 100% chance of rain, we wanted a chance to remain dry. Which we pretty well did on our walk there.

Our original, pre-booked plan, had been to do the “Kaikōura Lights” outdoor escape room. We figured that this would be a way of seeing the town and having fun along the way, and the theme – about Kaikōura’s Dark Sky status appealed. Plus, I figured we may get some pointers for the Thames Historical Museum. But, we received a cancellation notice on the 12^th of the 12^th to say that the app wasn’t working properly, and they weren’t prepared to give any further customers a negative experience.

Pen had never done an escape room before, and didn’t really know what to expect. I’ve done one “professional” one, and one “amateur” one (at the Thames School of Mines). I’ve also played several Android operating system apps where you’ve got to try to escape a room, so it meant I had an idea of what to do to start off. The story was that “my brother”, Billy, had written a letter to me, which just didn’t ring true, so I’d gone to the school to try to find out what was wrong. Upon arrival we’d been “locked” in this room by the prefects. But, to our good fortune, Billy had left us plenty of clues to find the answer to what was going on. Those clues take the form of, say, a series of pictures and you have to count the number of people sitting in each picture and then enter that number into a combination lock. Unlocking that puzzle gives you a clue that will assist you to the answer of the next question. We had an hour to find out what had happened to Billy and his friends, and we did it in only 56 minutes. (The record was 26 minutes, but we wanted to get our monies worth. Ha. Ha.) We only required one requested assistance from the guy watching us via the CCTV camera. And also had him come in once as we had the right solution, but for some reason the lock wasn’t unlocking.

Two puzzles that I just have to record. On the wall was ten volumes of a Funk and Wagnall Encyclopaedia series. These were out of order, which to my “having done escape rooms before” brain, could have been in the order of the solution of one puzzle. Pen, with her (genuine) librarian’s brain, was itching to put them back in order. In the end, we compromised and she put them in their existing order on the desk, which I was on the opposite side of, which meant that I could see that there were words and numbers written on the edges of the pages opposite the spines. Even then I was unwilling to let her put them in order until I’d put two that I could see that clearly belonged together, together. Pen was then able to confirm that they were numbers two and three of the order, so she relieved her Librarian OCD and put them in order. And I was able to unlock the next combination.

The other one that I’ve got to record was that there was a weird-shaped, but otherwise unremarkable box on a couple of wall brackets on the wall. It was about 30 cm long, with each ten-centimetre segment at a different level to the others. Kind of like the Olympic medals podium. We gave it a push and a prod in case there was something mobile about it, but there was nothing. But then we started finding trophies: One for second place, one for first place, and, finally, one for third place. Upon placing these trophies in the required place, there was a sudden clunk. We both jumped about six feet in the air, (Better than six feet under) before continuing to push and prod the box and manipulate the trophies.

There was a voice over the intercom: “Look at the back wall.”

Oh-kay.

What’s different about that?

It was then we realised that one of the panels on the backwall had popped out slightly. Pen pushed and attempted to slide it, and then I suggested pulling on it. It swung open to reveal a normal door to a secret room.

As I said, we succeeded in 56 minutes, and had a lot of fun in the process.

And then we walked out into the rain.

Wanting to get something we could eat on the train, and something light for breakfast tomorrow, we went to the supermarket. And came to the conclusion that if Kaikōura’s ever in drought, they should hire me to come down and walk out of their New World.

We squelched back to the Lazy Shag where we’d stashed our gear, and did some blog catching up. And hour before the train was due to leave, we did even more squelching and walked to the railway station.

Kaikōura car drivers are very courteous. Both on the way back from the supermarket, and when we were dragging our bags in the rain and trying to cross State Highway 1 on a stretch of road with no pedestrian assistance, someone flashed their lights at us and stopped to allow us to cross. Thank you whoever you are.

I was glad that I was wearing my new raincoat and waterproof over trousers when we got to the Whaleway Station. (Yes, that the railway station is where Whale Watch Kaikōura is based and that is what they’ve called it.) But my shoes were soaked. And there was nothing I could do about it.

Pen was still Kaikōura T-Shirt hunting and she found a T-Shirt she liked and a “tie-dyed” hoodie with “Peace, Love, Whales” on it that she also liked. After a bit of hemming and hawing, she bought both.

And then the Coastal Pacific train from Picton arrived.

I’m sitting on the train when I’m typing this. And listening to the commentary when I’m aware that it’s due to pipe up – although I do wish that they’d got a narrator who could speak New Zealand English properly. The worst example of his speech bloopers, which doesn’t really come under the heading of New Zealand English, is that, apparently, the Victoria Cross is made from a cannon “liberated” during the Crimeraia War. And the town is “Chevy-ot”. And most small towns in New Zealand had a “senotaff”. And the train follows a rout rather than a route (root).

There are moments of (forced) humour. For instance, when talking about the wildlife on the Kaikōura Coast, the commentator said that if you saw a bird with a white front, it most likely wasn’t a penguin, but rather a shag. If you saw a bird with a white front wearing a top hat, then it was definitely a penguin… And you needed a nap.

The service now has helpful TV screens in the ceiling, so you can see occasional snippets of information. Like, the fastest speed that we were travelling at that I’ve seen displayed was 92 km/hr. Now, before you start saying that that’s proof why New Zealand should be concentrating on roads and forgetting about rail when the 3’6” gauge track clearly can’t match the speed of a vehicle on the open road; there are technologies that will enable trains on narrow gauges to go much faster than this. (Think Australia’s tilt trains.) What we don’t have is the political will, and desire to reduce greenhouse gases, to do so. And, (and I’ve just learnt this), the 3’6” was good for economies of scale, and the most practical for getting through mountain passes.

The train arrived in Christchurch in drizzly rain, and we probably could have walked to the Jailhouse Accommodation if we’d known/remembered where we were going, but we figured a $19.50 taxi ride was an investment if it meant getting out of our wet gear sooner.

He seemed to take a very circuitous route.

But we got there to be greeted by a sign saying don’t let the cat in and a cat sitting by the door. We were assigned to room 18, which was upstairs, and the guy on the desk carried Pen’s case up for her. I decided I was going to assert my independence and carried my own bag myself. (With Pen carrying my pillow.) It’s more awkward than heavy. Even with two Kaikōura stones in it.

So now we are locked up in jail.

And I’m up to date with my blog, if my computer doesn’t run out of battery first.

Only 8002 steps today

And walking 5.5 kilometres.