South Island Days 6-8 - Milford Sound Road, Catlins, and Otago Peninsula

Still Tom here.  After Doubtful Sound, we took a short trip up the Milford Sound Road.  We didn't actually go all the way to Milford Sound - we saved that for the next trip.  There were a few cool things to see up that way, though.

We took a quick forest walk.  Here is one representative photo:

We parked our car, allowing me the opportunity to add to my series of Corolla glamour shots, strengthening my portfolio for my eventual application to Toyota as official car photographer:

Aidan then ran wild through fields of gold:

Evelyn and Jasper followed suit:

This valley was really pretty incredible.  I took many photos of it.  Here is another:

Jasper welcomes you to his valley:

Aidan also welcomes you:

Jasper was so happy to be in such a beautiful place that he began defying gravity.

On another short walk, we spotted a robin again and used our naturalist friend's trick to get him to come close.  Here is a good shot of him.

Another cool photo of the mountains nearby:

Red beeches (but not true beeches - see previous blog post) were the predominant tree in part of the forest nearby, so we visited them.  They are humongous.

The next day, we drove to Dunedin on the east coast.  Several people told us we should take the "scenic route" through the Catlins, the area at the southern tip of the South Island.  It wasn't too much extra driving, so we decided to do it.  Not a great decision, in retrospect.  The day was unbelievably windy and cloudy and we actually ended up with driving hail at one point.

Here is a photo that looks way less windy than it is, looking south over the Pacific Ocean.  Next stop, Antarctica.  Imagine a relentless, deafening wind and you'll have something of the experience standing on that beach.

This was a troubling sign.  It does inaugurate another small photo series for me I am calling "Perils of Stickman."

OK, so the views were dramatic.  It was too bad the wind gods were trying to kill us.

Guest captioner - Aidan!

You couldn't stand facing the wind or you'd get blown away!

Guest captioner - Jasper!

It was so windy, I had to cover my face!  Good thing I had a windbreaker!

From Jasper - It was so windy, I was surprised the lighthouse hadn't been knocked down!

From Aidan - Why did the sea lion cross the beach? Because it was soooo windy!

It was seriously windy.  Here are a few photos demonstrating such:

Occasionally, it would clear and we'd get amazing views of the coast.  Make no mistake - it was still ridiculously windy.

See?

OK, maybe the scenic route was worth it.  The coast is beautiful.

Did I mention it was windy?

We finally got to the Otago Peninsula near Dunedin.  It continued to be very windy, but we saw some awesome animals, especially birds.  Here is a spoonbill:

Here is the northernmost colony of Stewart Island shag.  And you wondered how far north the Stewart Island shag nested.  Now you know.

We also saw the only mainland breeding colony of albatross.  Mostly, the albatrosses stay out at sea or on remote islands.  For some reason, a bunch of them decided to get their albatross on near Dunedin.  They are amazing birds.  They have ten foot wingspans.  Here are a few photos.  Look at their wings - they are super big.

Also near Dunedin, we found a church dedicated to Aidan's namesake:

Guest captioner - Jasper!

Uh oh, giant chocolate bunny at the Cadbury factory!  I wonder why it hasn't eaten itself...

This is the Dunedin train station.  It is quite an extravagant building to serve as a railway station for such a small city.  I think the city used to think it was going to be much larger than it is.  Still, very cool building.

The end of our time on the Otago Peninsula was a trip to the yellow-eyed penguin reserve.  This kind of penguin is one of the most endangered in the world.  These little guys like to shelter in the bush grass near the beach, so when farmers cut down the bush, the penguins have nowhere to breed and hang out.  One farmer decided to put back the native bush and the penguins came back.  He has now dedicated that portion of his farm to a reserve to protect the birds.  We took a tour.

Just in passing, we saw these awesome fur seals, playing near the ocean.

The weather was windy and stormy, and the ocean rolled in on violent waves over the rocks.  It was hard to imagine penguins out there.

We passed some small boxes with some baby blue penguins.  See them in there?

 Finally, we saw a yellow-eyed.  He was just lying there like a big oaf.  They fatten themselves up in preparation for the molt (at least that's their excuse for letting themselves go), so the ones we saw were pretty chubby.

Here is one waddling in from a day in the ocean.  See him down there?

Here is the reserve area.  Doesn't it look like Hobbiton for penguins?  Penguinton?  The rain had stopped for a few minutes, so I took a quick photo.

The farmer made all these trenches so that visitors can see the penguins up close without disturbing them.  Like Evelyn's poncho?

Once in the blinds, we could look right into some nests.  Here is a photo of a baby!  Staring right back at me!  Crazy!  I think he likes me.

If Penguin Place was in an episode of Dr. Who, I think it'd look like this:

Dunedin had a little market on the morning we were leaving, so we stopped.  Jasper found something to eat.

A last photo of the train station.  Can you spot the boys?