Last night at dinner was pretty hillarious. Wade was so tired from the trip riding so far that he literally fell asleep at the dinner table - not once, but twice. Now when your dinner companion falls to sleep at the table, you gotta take a good look at yourself and ask, "Am I really that boring to talk with at dinner?" But I was pulling out some of my best material: "Would you for a million dollars..." and recounting things from the trip that had us in hysterics laughing. So I think he was just really wiped out. Er... I think. Anyway the waitress walked by the table and pointed and laughed. Wow do I wish I had a camera on hand that was funny. By the time we got back to the hostel we both crashed immediately.
Today we woke up and went to sleep in the same town - Christichurch, which is the biggest city on the South Island. We drove out to Akaroa (~ 90 km) which was a French colony during the Brittish monarchy rule of New Zealand. They were the first place in New Zealand to generate electricity, grew timber prized for shipbuilding in the early 1900's, and were known for some kind of grass they made popular used for grazing fields for cattle. Oh, and most importantly they are known for the best sportbike roads on the South Island. Yes, finally after six days on this island I found where the leather suit, 150 mph plus, liter sportbikes hang out. It looked like Highway 35 outside Alice's on a Bay Area Sunday - and it was awesome riding. New Zealanders call the road to Akaroa, "the racetrack."
We had lunch in Akaroa, then booked a trip to swim with the blue dolphins (a small New Zealand type of dolphin). Pretty wild, you can actually swim with wild dolphins. They boat you out for thirty minutes, ten people at a time, then dump you in the water with one to thirty dolphins swimming around. The dolphins aparently love playing with the humans. Sadly we didn't get to find out. Wade suited up in a wetsuit (which made him look like a seal and I'm sure shark food) and got on the boat - but the weather turned on our boat out and we had to turn back. Got some good pictures of this I'll post later when I can get battery and Internet connection and connection cables for things.
Walking around Christichurch looking for a dinner spot we wandered into a tourist trinket store, I had Wade (and store sales staff) doubled over laughing at the lamb and kiwi bird hand puppet show I put on. Turns out the lamb was a pretty good dancer - again wish I had a camera or video to watch Wade crying his eyes out laughing. I'm sure we're quite delerious at this stage of our trip, while there's another week or two of things to see here it's good we're headed home tomorrow.
In other news... I've been practicing all week and I can nearly stand upright on my bike and ghost ride the whip. Trying to bring a little bit of Oakland to New Zealand. We've been getting hifey with it - and I hella love Oakland. Oakland on three... ONE... TWO... THREE... OAKLAND!
Pictures later - running out of time here and have things half packed up to head home.
