Nature Time!

I always thought this was going to be a boat to some remote location, but I was wrong. It was a van ride to the peninsula point off Dunedin.

We left the hotel in town at 1:30 and arrived at the Royal Albatross Centre at 2:30. The drove for about an hour to the penguins. It was a full day of adventure as we returned after dark at 7PM to the hotel.













Some of us had paid for a close encounter with the birds, so off we go hiking up hill about 100 yards to the viewing tower.  From there we observed about 6 immature birds still sitting on their nests. They were almost full grown, but will not fly until about 8 months old. They are pure white. Every once in a while an adult flies in to feed their baby. The infant taps on the beak of the parent to show they are hungry and the parent feeds them what they have retrieved from the sea.

Here comes the parent in for a landing. What makes these birds unique is their wingspan and their landing technique.


From the viewing tower, we can see scores of cormorant adults and infants scurrying about, but their nests are all empty and appear to be made of mud like substance. Some fly about during our visit.

This is the view back to Dunedin Harbour from the Royal Albatross Centre.

We have just completed our walk to see the yellow eye penguins, all 8 of them.  We had to detour to the grassy dunes because a large sea lion was guarding a lone female.  While walking in the grass we came upon several sea lions sleeping and resting. They can be aggressive, but not today.

We spotted penguins hopping up this hill to their evening nests. It must take forever and they didn't make much progress while we were watching. The yellow eye penguin does not really have a yellow eye but a yellow eye stripe. 

This pic really does not show the steep the walk up and down to the beach.

The walk to the van was exhausting because this brace in my shoe does not bend properly for hill climbing and I'm out of shape. At the top of the hill everyone is looking at the flat tire!! We are in the farthest Eastern part of Dunedin peninsula with no phone or cell reception  and our guide does not know how to change it or where all the equipment is located !! Finally, a Japanese guy helped him get it changed and off we went in the dark. 

By saying these roads are winding and narrow does not really describe the trip. 

Overall it was an exhausting day of winding narrow roads and lots of up and downhill hiking. I fell asleep at 9:30