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Published: March 7th 2006
From Te Anau, we drove across to the Catlins, in search of this areas native wildlife. Our wildlife tour went as follows:
We battled the high winds at Roaring Bay (hence the name!) and hid in the hide to try and spot the rare Yellow Eyed Penguins. It was freezing and so windy - but no sign of the little blighters! There are only 3000 of the left worldwide, and around 300 in this part of the world, so they are pretty thin on the ground.
Nugget Point was the next stop. It was a short walk along a narrow strip of land, leading to a lighthouse. The rocks either side of the walk to the point had tonnes of seals basking on them.
Our final stop was Surat Bay, a lovely beach and home of NZ sealions. To get to the beach, we had about a 20min walk through long corse grasslands and bushes. There was a sign up warning not to approach the sealions as they were dangerous, but we ploughed on, assuming we would easily spot them on the beach!! As we were walking through the long grass just before hitting the beach Spen nearly
stepped on a fully grown male sealion asleep in the long grasses! He whipped out his camera and started to snap away. Just as it started to fully wake up we both ran past to the safety of the beach.
Once on the beach we went for a long walk and came upon another sealion asleep on the sand - was quite dozy and placid. We took some pics and were thrilled to be so close to such a large wild animal.
As we were making our way back through the long grasses we kept on walking into sleeping sealions - they were effectively blocking our path over the dunes to the walking track and carpark!. One of them was particularly aggressive and kept on snorting and growling - what made it quite scary was that he was difficult to spot. We made a dash for it and got back to the car in one piece! Take note Sealions are NOT afraid of humans!!
Stayed at the
The Falls Backpackers near Purakaunui Falls, a working sheep and deer farm. They have a tradition of taking all lodgers photos on arrival! So if you ever go, be sure to look
us up!! They also had electric blankets on the beds! Fantastic!
Around 21.30 when it was completely dark, all guests at the lodge (8 in all) went out to the falls to see the famous glow worms. Drove down to the falls and walked with torches along a narrow track down to the water - very eery! Once we turned off our torches we were treated to a display of hundreds of little lights twinkling in the bushes and trees - spectacular.
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