Nov 1st – Our ferry ride from the North Island to the South Island was via the Aratere a large ship capable of transporting people, cars, trucks and even rail cars. We turned our Ford Monteo in at the ferry terminal and boarded the ship on foot. Because we weren’t returning the car to the north island, the car company automatically arranges for a new car to be available on the other side. This ensures that all the rental cars don’t end up on the South Island.

Before we were out past the Wellington headlands, we were able to watch two planes land as we passed the airport on one side of the peninsula and two others take off as we passed the airport again on the other side of the peninsula. A most unique experience.

Our seat mates were two NZ ladies – one from the north island and her elderly aunt from the South Island. We were playing scrabble to fill the time and since neither of them had seen the game before we engaged them in each of our moves. How surprised we all were to have the game end with Nancy putting down a seven letter word (& picking up seven vowels) and then George putting down a seven letter word to win the game. We’ve never seen that before. Part way through the voyage we were served tea and fresh scones (with the obligatory jam and cream). Yummy.

The scenery through the Queen Charlotte Sound was stunning. Since the weather had been fairly wet that day out in the Sound, it wasn’t really nice enough to be up on deck for an extended period of time. We did however venture out once we saw the sun and were greeted with a full-on rainbow beginning on shore and ending in the water. Gorgeous.

We were fortunate to have made it across on the Aratere when we did. Just this week we heard on the news that it lost a propeller on a recent trip and has been taken out of service. Folks are quite upset since they are going into the busy travel season with restricted access between islands.

Once we arrived on the other side we picked up our new car. It really was new (only 150 km on it) but even more special is that it’s a Toyota RAV4 with keyless entry. Just keep the key in the purse and everything works fine – except that you have to remember to touch the handle when exiting to lock it.