Boat trip and dolphins

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Slept in this morning. This morning i’ve just been relaxing and catching up on my journal. After lunch Carolin drove me down to the wharf to catch my boat tour. There was some really crazy wind all day and clouds had rolled in but they said the tour was still on but that we might not be able go to Motuara Island which is a bird sanctuary island at the end of the Queen Charlotte sounds.

We saw a colony of some Spotted Shags which are a bird that live on the rocks. They are cool birds and have bright blue faces. Then further along we spotted 4 NZ fur seals lying on the rocks along with the rare King shag bird. Apparently this bird is only found in this region of NZ. We got lucky and spotted 4 bottlenose dolphins who seemed to have a great time swimming around our boat. They swam around us for quite some time before we kept going.

We then spotted some dusky dolphins, which are a lot smaller then bottlenose dolphins and have distinct colourings. They are grey with blue streaks. They swam with us for a bit. They are fast and like to jump out of the water a lot.

We tried to dock at Motuara Island but it was too dangerous as the wind was just throwing the boat into the dock and the captain didn’t want to risk it. So we went to Ship’s cove instead which is more sheltered. We did a walk to a waterfall. Ship’s cove is a place where Captain Cook sailed into many times. It’s also the starting point for the Queen Charlotte track which is a 72 km hike along the sounds.

The boat brought us back to Picton and headed back for the hostel where Julia and Yvonne had a traditional german dish called Mehl Knodel waiting for us all to try. It’s like dumplings made out of flour, eggs and water and then you serve it with bacon and butter and sour cream. Was super yummy! Visited with the girls before heading to bed later that night.

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