Day17 Interislander Ferry Wellington to Picton

First off a big thank you to Sue for getting me to Wellington with all my gear and an equally big thank you to Mike for dropping me at the Ferry Terminal.....I managed to leave a couple of things behind but nothing that in retrospect wasn't rather good that I had!!

Thirdly HUGE thank you to Interislander Ferry for supporting me by donating my ferry ticket with me and the bike - we had had many shifts ofd date and time and always met with a very happy to alter person at the other end so HUGE thanks for that - really helps reduce the costs of the whole cycle tour.

The crossing was the most extraordinary day and I took loads of photographs and videos of the crossing -including the opening of the ship when in port (as I was first off with my cycle - a first for that!). I can highly recommend anyone reading this that a must is this crossing- its like booking a cruise through the sounds just sheer spectacular scenery as you enter the malborough sounds and of course bifd farewell to my favourite city Wellington.

Picton was in good form and arrivingat 6pm I made my way to a nearby backpackers that I had seen on the net called "The Villa". Had a great night here meeting loads of travellers once again and enjoying good wine over an outside fire recounting stories of my adventures on the road and hearing of the experiences of all the others as they emerged from different parts of the world. A good night and made better by realising that my second ever royalties payment had come through and it was finally a decent amount - finally it felt like I was on the road to feeling that I could really develop this into a decent living. Perhaps one day all the hard work and the countless hours and often brow beatings would count for something - a world away from my relatively cushy lifestyle pushing buttons from 9 to 5.There was nothing easy about this road to working as a full time musician/songwriter but the rewards on the way and the immense feeling of satisfaction were completely unknown feelings to me from my previous life.....finally I felt there was a point to my life.

So in celebration of my royalties I sat on a park bench over looking the se, sitting eating fish and chips before buying a bottle of wine and sharing the open fire with new friends at the hostel.

Good times :-)