Picton to Wellington

Today I wound up my travels on the South Island and got on the ferry to Wellington in the North Island. My ferry was at 1:15 PM and we were instructed to get there at 12:15 PM. I decided to go a bit earlier and got there at 11:45 AM. This worked out well because I was at the front of the line in a big group of motorcyclists who were returning from a rally in Queenstown, and not so good because the ferry was running late and I had to stand there for almost an hour.

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Waiting in the InterIslander queue.

 

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Securing our bikes

 

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All tied up.

 

When they signaled to us, we rode towards the ship and were guided to park in special motorcycle parking. This involved wedging the front tire into a triangular metal structure and using tie-downs to secure the bike on both sides. I didn’t  have any but one of the riders lent me one of his, and the ferry provided another one.

Bike secured, I walked up to one of the decks and found a spot to sit down. Since securing the bike took so long, I wasn’t able to snag a window seat. I was also super hungry exhausted by this time so I missed most of the interesting part of the ferry crossing as it wound its way north through the Marlborough Sounds. By the time I felt well enough to go outside, we had already crossed into the ocean. In the distance I could see mountains with windmills on them.

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Out on the deck.

 

About 3.5 hours later, we docked in Wellington. Then ensued a bit of a scramble to get to the bike.

I rode off and was met at the docks by my host Jeff Vickers who had come to pick me up on his wife’s GSXF. I followed him out of the docks and for a moment felt overcome by a pang of deja vu and homesickness as I felt like I was exiting the downtown Seattle ferry terminal but in reality I was in a totally strange city! They both looked so similar…

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