The spiders, the kiwi winemakers! Blenheim is New Zealand’s most famous wine-growing region. The fame has gone to their heads. You can’t buy anything for less than $20 in the wine cellars, and you can only get plonk wine from $10 in the supermarket. Our wine tasting is limited to supermarket wine. Australian wine wins hands down.
Windfinder gives good winds for Kaikoura, 130 kilometres to the south. We race over golden hills to the east and along the bright blue sea – directly into a thick rain storm. Shortly after a tornado hits Kaikoura, the sun shines again – in absolute calm.
To Uli’s delight, I have no choice but to do what everyone else does here: Look out for whales, dolphins, albatrosses and sea lions. Finding the latter is easy. Firstly, their colonies are even marked in the car atlas, secondly, right next to the coastal road and thirdly, practically everywhere. Powerful ocean currents swirl food up from the depths, which is why the coast is teeming with them.
Anyone who claims that sea lions are cute has obviously never seen them. Because at the latest when you can see them – usually a few hundred metres away – you can smell them. They stink to high heaven. The flavour of rotting fish farts. Holding your nose doesn’t help. You can even smell the stench through your mouth.
Frank Woelky, born in 1973. Kitesurfer since 1998. Since 2006, I have been combining kitesurfing and web design on trips lasting several months off the beaten track.