Wednesday 13 February

Otago Peninsula
It really has been another WOW day today. We left Alexandra and took a direct route straight down to Dunedin. Yesterday we had travelled to Alexandra on back roads and tracks. Today we were on the main highway. A compensation for that was the magnificent views over the countryside, beautiful valleys and folded mountains, forests and pastures, lakes and rivers. This country certainly has some of the best scenery I have ever see.
We drove through Dunedin out to the Otago Peninsular, a 35km long finger of land stretching out into the Pacific Ocean, indented with a series of bays. It is stunningly beautiful. We arrived early and spent the rest of the day driving some of the back roads. We went out to the far tip, Taiaroa which is an Albatross Sanctuary. About 200 Royal Albatross return to the same spot every year in order to breed on exactly the same place at the head of the peninsular. This area has been cordoned off, an information centre and a viewing platform have been built there. We were so lucky, we thought we would have to book but we just turned up and had a tour with just 5 other people, with a wonderfully enthusiastic young woman who obviously loved her job so much. The breeding period is very structured. Mating takes place in September, eggs are laid in November, they hatch towards the end of January, then the chicks are fed until they fledge the next September. So the chick we saw was 2 to 3 weeks old. It was guarded by one parent while the other one was out at sea getting food. Each parent goes for 3 to 4 days at a time, alternating with each other. Circling overhead we saw juveniles of 5 years or more. Once the chick has flown it spends the next 5 years circling the southern oceans, spending the entire time at sea. When it returns to land after this length of time it can hardly walk, and has to get accustomed to standing on it's feet again. It won't breed until it is 10 years old, but sometime in the preceding years it will bond with it's lifetime mate and they will spend time together at the place where they were born once a year, even though they do not mate. Once the pair have decided to breed they produce 1 egg every other year. If that egg produces a live chick which they see through to fledgling stages they then seperate and fly off to do their own thing for a further 2 years. If the egg isn't fertile or the chick doesn't service to fledgling, then they will return and try again the next year. It is a remarkable life cycle. We are so pleased we went, it was a truly unique experience. Taiaroa is they only place they breed on a mainland, their breeding grounds are usually bare rock outcrops in the middle of wild oceans.
We walked down to the foreshore of the promontory and were lucky to see basking sea-lions, a very rare member of the species, but I can't remember which one just now. Two got up and went to roll about at the waters edge.
We drove to the other side of the peninsular, to the most beautiful bay, called Sandfly Bay. We were lucky with the weather today, it was very windy, which was why we were able to see so many flying albatrosses, and there were no sandflies at Sandfly Bay. The blue surf was rolling in to a wide sandy beach, backed by enormous sand dunes, further back they were well covered by marram grass. This area is a breeding place for Yellow Eyed Penguins, who leave their chicks hidden in the sand dunes while they hunt for fish in the sea all day. Evidently at dusk it is possible to see them come ashore. We didn't wait for that, and returned to the Campsite to cook supper and think about what next.