My last day on the island, and because the ferry was to leave in early afternoon I wasn’t able to do any final hikes. I actually had to pack up and leave the accommodation because a few more backpackers were coming over on the ferry so I was kicked out with a few hours to kill. I went back to the café for a bit of an early lunch and got another muffin, this time a blueberry muffin that was almost ridiculous in size. The top of the muffin was as big as my hand, I know because I could not palm it. I guess they ran out of muffin tins and were just cooking these things in pots or something because it was enormous, and still only $2… It wasn’t bad either, but of course it was nothing compared to Nana’s blueberry muffins. I killed a few hours in the café reading, and then biked over to the ferry a little early, which of course ended up being rather pointless because it left like 30-45 minute late anyway (I had trouble keeping track of time because my only time-telling device was my camera which is a little inconvenient).
I was really not looking forward to this ferry ride, especially since it was cold, overcast, and there had been a few scattered showers, and it was going to be dark by the time the 5 hour ferry ride was over, so if my seasickness forced me outside again I was going to be really miserable. To try and preemptively strike against my nausea I laid down on the passenger section and tried to just not focus on my spatial orientation. It was pretty tricky in the beginning, because we were getting even rougher waters then the trip over. The boat was actually creaking after some of the more dramatic dives and bobs. The captain actually came on the intercom about 15 minutes in to inform us that we were facing a strong headwind and that it would probably delay us by at least a half-hour and make the seas rough for a while. You can imagine how that brightened my spirits.
Thankfully despite the rough seas I was able to hold off my nausea, and toward the end up the trip we made it into some calmer waters, so I was able to sit up and move around a bit. It was a long trip, but in the end I wasn’t quite glad to be back on shore, because I had a long uphill bike ride in order to get back to my dorm, and after two days of intense hiking and a draining ferry ride, I just wanted to curl up and go to bed.
When I finally did make it back in my room I had just unpacked my clothes and started thinking about a nice hot shower when I had a knock on my door and my friend Johannas, a German native came in to discuss our plans to head to the Coromandel Peninsula (to the north-east of Auckland) the next day. The first thing on the itinerary was a 2+ hour ferry ride to the town of Coromandel which left at 9:00 in the morning. I was so excited (not). We reviewed all the plans and I was able to have a shower and go to bed early to gather my strength for another adventure…