Guest Blogger: Lelu
Lemme start out with a fun lil’ fact about myself…
I AM TERRIFIED OF THE OCEAN.
& so I signed up for a program that spent 50 days on the ocean. Makes sense, right? NOPE. Buttttttttt I DID IT!!!
Sea Kayaking took up 31 of those days. And let me tell you, it was incredibly beautiful/amazing/terrifying/awful/rewarding/alllll the above. It tested my limits to the very extreme, but honestly was the best thing for me. I CAN DO HARD THINGS… even if they’re all things scary and awful and you convince yourself that a shark is following you half the time.
Side note: If you love beautiful places, the Marlbourough Sounds + Queen Charlotte Sounds should be at the tip top of your bucket list. IT IS AMAZING. Soo so much beauty in one little place.
Since pictures are (again) way more fun than words, I’ll let them do most the talking.
About to head out on our first day sea kayaking!! Such little did I know..
Off we gooooooo. So much pretty. This was the day we had to practice “rescues” (it’s where you purposely flip over and then try to get out, needless to say, it was not my favorite thing.)
Practicing our proper strokes. (It took until DAY 19 for me to master this one… better late than never?) 
Fun fact #327- I LOVE the sky. Literally every night in the Marlbourough Sounds looks like this.
I found a cute lil’ starfish
Our instructors surprised us one day and took us to a trading post for some ice cream. I WAS SO HAPPY. This might be in my top 10 happiest moments… not even kidding.
Creepy red shed penguin camp festivities included watching cyclone Cook all day every day for six days straight. This was the biggest cyclone to hit New Zealand in 40 years! We didn’t find that out until we got back to civilization. It was quite the experience waking up in the middle of the night to our tent snapping due to the high winds. Oh, and the mating penguins at night made it all the more memorable.
March 22nd. DOLPHIN DAY! Hardest but best day ever
My grandma hands- 3 bug bite infections, and lots of sun exposure
We were the FIRST EVER NOLS New Zealand crew to make it to ISGE during the sea kayaking section, which meant we got to kayak for 3 days without our instructors. It was a huge accomplishment for our group to make it this far considering no other group ever has!
Took this the very last night of sea kayaking at elephant rock. I was stoked outta my mind to finish!
31 more days later, we completed our sea kayaking section.