The 'shark bell' in Dunedin.

Evening friends,

10 more days and counting until we leave NZ. We are a mixed bag about leaving, but will be glad to get back home. It feels like we've been living in a dream world since we arrived, but we always knew we'd have to leave, and we miss our dog Charlie. We've been getting pictures from our tenant at 234 Western Crescent, and Charlie has had it gooooood. He's looking like a brand new man- sleek and shiny. He's on a new diet, gets a bath regularly and there are rumors that he even has a girlfriend. Abby has set the bar quite high.

We have been trying to squeeze out every last ounce of fun that we can from this place in the last days that we have here. We've been keeping our geo-caching streak alive (40 days so far), re-visiting the places that we love and took a week to explore the area around Dunedin.

Dunedin is located inland of the Otago Peninsula, It's on the East coast of the South Island, about 3/4 of the way down the island. It's always about 5 degrees colder in Dunedin than Christchurch, due to the influence of the Antarctic. Because it's a bit colder, and less populated, there are species on the Otago peninsula that are hard to find anywhere else on the South Island. It's a bit of a wilder kind of place, and the surfing is epic. The area is much more exposed than Christchurch, and the waves are huge. A lot of people choose to live in Dunedin solely based on the surfing. With a university nearby, I could see Edie working out her life plan- If I came here for university, I could go to class, study and surf during my lunch break...

Sand Fly Bay, Otago Peninsula.

From our travels there, we discovered a Podcast called Wild Dunedin, and it explores the wildlife in Dunedin. We highly recommend it. We really liked the episode about sharks.

On the Otago Peninsula, we stayed in a place called Portobello. It was pretty central, and gave a great home-base from which to explore. One night, while hunting for a geo-cache at sundown, Edie described Portobello as the 'Weymouth of New Zealand' (Weymouth, NS was where we hid away for the first part of our Sabbatical year), I think it's fitting. It's the kind of place where you can't really be sure how people are making a living, and it kind of shows. An unpretentious, rough around the edges kind of town set against an incredibly beautiful backdrop. Our kind of place.

If you look closely, you can see the girls with the bird book trying to identify the birds in Portobello Bay, just across the road.

Heading from Portobello to the tip of the peninsula, we were able to hit the Royal Albatross Centre. This is a research centre dedicated to protecting the only remaining mainland Royal Albatross colony in the world. There is a larger colony of Royal Albatross on the Chatham Islands (400km east of the South Island) which is about 4 times the size of the Otago colony and the populations do mix. At the Royal Albatross Centre, there are 29 fledglings that are currently being taken care of in a protected area by Albatross parents who fly in with food every couple of days. A grown Royal Albatross can have a wingspan of 3m, and the chicks we saw were are about the size of turkeys- huge! At this point they are about 4 months old and are able to be left unattended in their nests without being preyed upon. Once the juveniles fledge in September, these birds will leave the nest and live mostly at sea for the next 4-6 years, and then will return to the colony for pairing up and mating. Incredible stuff. We loved this place.

'chicks' in the nest.

A closer view.

The red bird is the Royal Albatross wingspan.

Most of the rest of our time was spent exploring the peninsula, which pretty much always included a beach walk. One great feature of the peninsula is the abundance of New Zealand Sea Lions. This species is actually critically endangered, so getting rare, but you would never know it on the peninsula. We had to avoid them many times. They haul out during the day and take refuge in the most amazing places- like up in the sand dunes. Looking at them you'd think they could never make it across a beach, no less up a sandy slope, but they do it! The tracks across the beach tell the stories! All the beaches have signs warning people to stay well away from sleeping sea lions, and further from active ones. We were pleasantly surprised one day when driving to a remote beach, to find a family of sea lions resting in a salt marsh on the side of the road. It was an amazing thing to witness, there were young pups nursing from the mother, a big old dad bossing everyone around, and all right in front of us on the side of the road. At another location Tim was walking ahead of us out to a point of land when we noticed there were Sea Lions all over the grass. We went no further. These guys had to climb a 20 ft grass/gravel slope to get up to where we were! I have no idea how they do it, but man was it ever cool to be in a place where humans were so obviously outnumbered by Sea Lions being Sea Lions.

Big Poppa and the rowdy kids.

Sea Lion tracks on the right hand side.

Sea Lions by the cliffs.

Sea Lion sleeping in the background.

Sea Lion colony near Omaru. Look closely, there are heaps of them down there.

On the drive down to Dunedin, we stopped for a hike (tramp) at the Orokonui Ecosanctuary. This is 307 Hectare area of coastal forest that has been fenced off, rid of predators and invasive species, and re-introduced with native species of plants animals and birds. It's a sanctuary! It is awesome! We met really lovely and knowledgeable people who gave us great tips about where to spend time and what we might see. We learned a lot and saw a lot. Loved this place.

The endangered Takahe.

A very cheeky robin. Not to be confused with our European version. They are not related.

As we were leaving for the Ecosanctuary that morning, we stopped for a quick peek at the Moeraki Boulders. These are spherical boulders lying strewn in a cluster on Koekohe beach on the Otago coast. I admit, I wasn't sure what the fuss was all about, but when we did get there it happened to be sunrise, and we were pretty much by ourselves, and we couldn't believe how amazing that place was. Pictures do not do it justice, but, that's all I've got.

Another very cool adventure of the trip was in Oamaru, and involved a lesson in patience. We were waiting to witness very rare yellow-eyed penguins exiting the ocean to nest in the bush/cliffs for the night. Yellow-eyed penguin are endangered in NZ, and populations are in serious decline. I guess we expected to see a mass movement of birds waddling across the beach at sundown, but in over an hour of watching, we'd seen no sign. We were getting ready to leave, when someone spotted one tiny bird working its way on to the beach using the waves to get it there. Once free of the water, it toddled up to the edge of the beach and disappeared into the bush. We were really far away, these penguins are pretty small, and it was only a few minutes of action, but it was incredible to witness, and totally worth the wait. Points go to Edie who urged us to wait just a little bit longer, even though we were all ready to quit. We witnessed such a rare thing. Ahhh. New Zealand.

Today, we took a day trip to a place called Washpen Falls. It was a lovely bush walk, another gem of a place. If you've taken in "Our Planet" at all, you may be familiar with an episode that looked at the relationship between aphids, and honeydew secretions on trees. We witnessed this at Washpen Falls. Super cool.

Honeydew secretions on Beech trees.

The black fungus on these Beech trees gives the appearance of a burnt forest.

Our car is being handed over to its new owner tomorrow, and our remaining week and a half will be adventure on foot/or rental car if we get really antsy. We'll likely have one last post before we're back on native soil. Until then, stay well. Love to all.