Dunedin to Waihola
Trip Start
Nov 01, 2009
1
106
123
Trip End
Nov 30, 2010
Waihola, Otago, New Zealand
Sunday, July 11, 2010
Gem found it particularly hard to get out of bed in the morning, however the prospect of eggs and beaNZ on toast for breakfast was enough for me to jump out the van with very little snoozing.
After a quick visit to Dunedin Beach, we drove into the city centre, which was pretty quiet because it was Sunday, but this did mean that parking was free and easy to find.
We first visited the tourist information to ask if there were any walks you could do round the city. We ended up buying a pretty poor map which had buildings of interest marked on, but all it said about the building was their name. We still however decided to follow the route hoping it would give us a good feel for the city.
We also asked at the tourist information how to go about seeing penguins. We had heard you could see them for free, but the guy behind the desk would not say this was the case and would only recommend a tour which cost $40 and another which cost $50 each. After reading quite a few leaflets however in the tourist information we found a walk on the Otago Peninsular which had a penguin hide on it at Sandfly Bay. So we decided to walk round the city and then head to Sandfly Bay later to see if any penguins were about.
Our walk took us round buildings from the late nineteenth century, constructed when Dunedin was on top of its game and a key player in the gold rush. The railway station was probably the most impressive with mosaic floors, tiled walls and stained glass windows with steam engines on.
The city reminded us a little of Scotland. It was built on a hill to start with, a bag piper busked in the street and thistles were carved in the masonry of the public library. The temperature also reminded me of a few cold visits to Edinburgh, and so we couldn’t resist going into a café for a hot drink. When in the café we couldn’t resist a boysenberry and hot chocolate muffin each., which was delicious.
If we were going to see penguins it was clear that we were going to have to leave the café, which we did eventually and drove to the Otago Peninsular.
On the way we tried to get a sneak peek at New Zealand’s only castle; Lanarch Castle, which we discovered was impossible unless you paid the $25 entrance fee at the gate. So we carried on to Sandfly Bay, surprised that the empty tank petrol light actually worked, and then concerned as I realised what this meant.
After I made Gem a ‘rustic’ sandwich for lunch which she sent back to the kitchen, we walked down to Sandfly Bay. We both agreed that the bay was beautiful and seeing a penguin would just be a bonus.
As we walked along the beach, the first thing we saw was a fury baby seal on its own, that came lolloping towards us. Not wanting it to follow us all along the beach, we moved on fairly sharpish before it got too close.
Next on the beach however were two massive seals, lying slap bang in the middle. It was impossible to walk past them while giving them the recommended 20 metre distance of respect. Some people on the beach obviously ignored the signs and were about 3 metres away, so we felt quite safe passing at 5 metres knowing we weren’t first in the line of fire.
We had to walk the length of the beach to get to the penguin hide which it was clear would take us past another four massive seals. Having read how endangered these particular ’yellow eyed’ penguins were, it almost felt like the seals were protecting them. To get to the hide you had to run the gauntlet!
While we were thinking how to get past these seals, wondering what the tide was doing and also thinking twice about disturbing the penguins, I suddenly saw one of the yellow eyed birds swimming in the waves. We watched and stood still for about twenty seconds, and then it vanished.
Being the only people on the beach, four seals between us and the hide, and worried we may have scared the penguin from coming to shore we decided to head back to the car. This was perfectly timed. As we turned Gem spotted a penguin coming out of the waves and waddling and flapping across the beach into the sand dunes - back to their burrows. It was an incredible sight and we felt very lucky.
As we continued to return to the car along the beach we looked back with almost every step. Eventually we saw another again coming out the waves. Again it was headed to the dunes, although it got flattened by a larger than expected wave as he tried to walk out the sea and also had to jump awkwardly up a particularly steep bit of sand dune, it was a classic case of two steps forward and one step back.
We felt very smug as some people walked past us who had just missed everything and we found it very hard to turn away again and head to the car.
We did leave however and while walking around the two seals once again on the beach, got the fright of our lives as another seal came bounding out of the sand dunes towards us before a switch seemed to be flicked and it just flopped on the sand near us. Clearly it had overdone things and continued to slob on the beach as we left.
We had to climb up a huge sand bank to leave the beach which was a real work out. By the top the cold air on the back of our throats was burning.
Once in the car we had a fairly slow and nervous drive to a petrol station, after which we drove in the dark for 40 km to Lake Waihola, on our route back to Queenstown, where there was a holiday park.
It was freezing and we sat in a huge kitchen with a few of the hobs on and a tiny ineffective heater, watching TV.
