Otago Peninsula & Stewart Island

---

Hello everyone!

It's been a while since we updated our blog, and we've done a lot in the last few days so thought it was about time you all had an update!
On arriving in Dunedin, which was about 4pm, we decided to head straight to the end of the Otago Peninsula while the weather was good. The scenery is lovely here, and we managed to book onto the 6pm Royal Albatross tour, located at the tip of the headland.
This was brilliant - we'd never seen Albatross before but had always wanted to. See the picture attached. They average around 1m tall, and with a wing span of around 3m, so they're big birds! The Royal Albatross centre have an observatory to look out on the nesting birds and we were treated to a lot of flying displays, teenage parties(!) and nesting birds within metres of the observatory. After this wonderful tour, we drove back along the peninsula as the sun was starting to set.

The next day, after having a look round some of the historic buildings in Dunedin, we drove to Bluff to get on the ferry crossing to Stewart Island. Bluff was a very windy place with not much to it, although we found a place for a late lunch (turbot and chips for 5pounds a go!) so we got ready for the catamaran crossing. The ferry crossing was quite stressful (for me anyway - Tabs) as it was pretty rough and we were getting bumped around all over the place. As soon as we got on, the safety leaflet had ways of preventing sea sickness, so that got me worried from the start! The crossing is an hour but it seemed a lot longer as there was quite a few people being ill around us. Luckily, we were both fine, but I wouldn't want to have to do that often!

Stewart Island is a very windy place as we found when we got there. We were staying in a lovely cottage which was hidden up a tree lined path in the hillside. We had a log burning fire and our own lounge and kitchen. That night, we'd booked onto a Kiwi spotting walk, weather permitting, so we needed to get tea quickly and then meet down at the wharf for 9pm. We met a older man who was our guide and skipper - extremely knowledgeable about the Kiwi, and clearly an experienced sailor. He took us in his boat for about 40mins across to a remote part of the island, where we moored and waited until the sun had gone down. We then had a walk across the bush with our torches (there were 10 of us) looking for these unusual birds. We saw several during the 4 hours (see pic). We later met a farmer who had lived here all his life and had never seen a Kiwi, so we realised how lucky we were!

The next morning we went on a guided walk of Ulva Island to see birds, though it wasn't quite as exciting as spotting Kiwi, but we enjoyed the day. Our ferry crossing back was at 8am the next day, so we were hoping it would be a bit calmer.....it wasn't really! We picked up our car and headed for Fjordland.

---

Photos

The Kiwi
You may have to look closely or try brightening the screen!

Tabs and female elephant seal!
Forgot to mention this in the blog!