After a good nights sleep I was optimistic this morning that we would have a nice and relaxing day which included my sailing back over to Wellington. Getting up bright and early the morning was simply spent in the common room catching up on various things before heading back to my room to pack. In terms of weather this morning is was pretty moderate with just drizzle, a good sign after some of yesterdays ferry's were cancelled due to the weather.
Come 8.45 I was all ready to leave, although there was a bad sign as the stray bus driver, the rival company, came in and told all his passengers that he would not be driving today as the road was closed! By this time I got a little worried and everyone soon realised after this that yesterdays storm had cut out all phone lines and internet connections, meaning we had no idea what going on.
In the end my bus driver arrived around half an hour late and told us that he was going to wing it, although when coming inside to pick up the three of us staying in the Lazy Shag he bumped into the stray driver and his attitude soon changed. Instead of telling us our bus was cancelled however, he went with the stray driver in our hostel owners car to see what was going on. God knows what he did with the bus though as it had a coach load of people onboard!
With little other to do than wait for the driver, as he told us to stay put in case we could go, we just sat and waited in the lounge area. It was nice talking to this couple who are going to the world cup as the next part of their travels! In the end we hung around waiting ages for our driver to return, although they eventually did where he told us there was no way of leaving Kaikoura due to a landslip along the coastal stretch of road. This was really frustrating as I had plans for the evening and with no forms of communication I immediately knew it would worry a few people later.
After checking back into the hostel which the owner was really nice about giving me a discounted rate and no key deposit, I had little else to do other than go downstairs and watch a film. I timed it just right going down catching the tail end of monsters inc, before watching this film called Poolhall Junkie or something. It was basically about some guy who gambled at pool. When finishing the film and returning upstairs I found out that the road had reopened and that the stray bus was leaving, although as it was gone 3 by this time the kiwi bus decided to wait until tomorrow. As far as I was concerned a night in bed was better than a midnight ferry departure and a bus ride by this time!
With little else to do I got so bored I turned to do my laundry, which was a smooth process for once. It was nice talking to some of the locals whilst inside the public launderette. Whilst doing the laundry I headed up to the supermarket which was for the second time today to try and get WiFi, although all communications were still down which was frustrating.
Once finishing the laundry I headed back to the tv room to watch another film, this time Shaun of the Dead which was actually a pretty good film. By the time this finished I went into town for a drink to try and end a pretty rotten couple of days, although to top things off I found out that good Friday in NZ means they cannot open. When arriving into town the whole place was pretty much a ghost town as all the atms were down, most shops were closed, and takeaways were shutting early as their eftpos didn't work.
Instead I went to a takeaway where I had a breakfast burger and chips for dinner, although many people had no cash which meant they were going hungry. Some people even failed to get accommodation meaning they had to sleep on the streets. My hostel owner was pretty nice though because due to the fact she had my yesterdays bus load of people here, and also another bus load of people today, she let people sleep in the tv room with their sleeping bags. Apparently these were scenes reminiscent of the earthquake!
When finally returning to the hostel there was yet more rain, although I ended up watching another film. I was optimistic I would get some form of communication back by this point but was without luck when finally getting to bed. Our driver put posters up round the hostel saying we have an 8am departure tomorrow, although it maybe 6am so tomorrow could be interesting!
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