Kaikoura

Since there wasn't too much to see in Christchurch, we headed to Kaikoura (a 2.5 hour drive north) on February 20. Kaikoura is most famous for whale watching and because we didn't want to spend 3 hours on a boat to look for the sperm whales, we booked ourselves on a 30 minute plane ride with "Wings over Whales." It wasn't as pricey as a helicopter and was really the most efficient (and less sickly way) for us to see them.

We were supposed to be in a slightly bigger plane with 4 other people but it ended up just being us and the pilot

Kaikoura coast

You can't really tell from this perspective but the male sperm whale is 15-20m (49-65 ft) long and weighs about 36,000kg (80,000 lbs)

Having the boat in the photo gives you a better idea of how huge this whale is!

Blowing out his blow hole

Diving for food - they usually dive down 1000m (3000 ft) for approximately 45 minutes...but they are capable of diving for more than 2 hours and some whales even dive down to 3300m (10,000 ft)

Going down

Bye bye bye

Flying back