We stayed overnight in Kiakoura, a town halfway between Picton (northern end of the South Island) and Christchurch. It has a deep undersea trench that provides a unique environment in which seals, dolphins, and whales thrive. At the southern end of town there’s a large seal colony; you can just drive out and see them sitting on the rocks 100 yards or so from shore. The place also has a large number of seabirds that feed on the small fish that get stirred upward from the trench by schools of large fish.
So today, we swam with the dolphins! It’s a fairly involved process. First, we had to get into wetsuits and be fitted for hoods, flippers, masks, and snorkels. I had a sleeveless suit and then a jacket that went over it, giving me two layers for warmth; the girls had a long-sleeved and long-legged suit, then a short suit over that to keep their core body temperature comfortable. Katy said she felt like a huge rubber band. Next, we watched an orientation video while sitting there in our gear. Then we took a bus to the dock and boarded the boat. They had suggested that we might take some ginger tablets to prevent seasickness, so the girls and I each took one, but Glenn was OK without. Perhaps I should have considered taking more. . .
Within only about ten minutes of leaving shore, we could see the dusky dolphins leaping and playing in the distance. Within a few more minutes, Katy, Beth and I made ready to get into the water with them—Glenn wanted to watch and take pictures from the boat. The water was shockingly cold at first, but the wetsuits soon insulated us from discomfort. Katy, Beth and I had ever snorkeled before, so we were slow to put our masks into the water. But when we did—unbelievable! The dolphins were swimming right under and around us! We had found a pod of 300 to 500 dusky dolphins, and they were quite amused by us. The orientation had shown us that these were wild creatures, and they were only going to come swim with us if we seemed to be entertaining; so we needed to swim in circles with them, or sing through our snorkels, or try to be as dolphin-like as possible. I think this amused the onlookers on the boat as much as the dolphins.
I made the mistake of taking out my mouthpiece to say something to the girls, and when I put it back in, I got a bit of seawater in my mouth. That, combined with the rolling motion of the water, did me in. While all the swimmers came back to the boat, I made friends with a bucket. There was a second opportunity to swim, so Beth and Katy got into the water again, but I stayed onboard with my bucket close at hand, and Glenn took lots of pictures. When I recovered a bit I took as many pictures as I could, but I was trying to focus on the horizon while aiming the camera in the general area where the dolphins were, hoping to catch them on film as they leaped and flipped out of the water.
After that swim everybody shucked off the wetsuits and dried off, and the boat stayed near the pod so that all of us could watch them and take pictures. The dolphins swam right up to the boat and sometimes raced alongside. Looking across the water, I could see hundreds of dorsal fins.
We were told that because dolphins have to be awake to breach and breathe, they rest half their brains at a time. Apparently they rest midday, so the boats have to leave the area between 11:30 and 1:30. It was an experience we will never forget, and even though I was seasick, I’d do it again in a heartbeat—though maybe with a bit more ginger first!
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