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Well, the weather changed as soon as we left the north island, the Wellington to Picton crossing was calm though, which was good as we had been warned that it gets quite rough. We were faced with a wet journey down to Christchurch which was a shame as we were driving along the coast most of the time. We needed to get to Christchurch as we wanted to see Hazel Dixon as she was flying up to the north island the next day and we would miss her otherwise. We saw her for a short time at the airport on Tuesday morning. We didn't stay to explore Christchurch as we will go back there later when Mum and Dad are with us, so we headed down the coast to Oamaru.
Oamaru is best known for it's colonies of penguins so first we went to the yellow-eyed penguin colony, the yellow-eyed penguins are the second most endangered species in the world. The hide where you watch for them coming in from the sea is up high on a cliff side and the penguins are quite far away so you can't see them very clearly. However one of the volunteer workers whispered to us that there were a pair nesting under some bushes just close to the path but to look when no-one else was looking so they didn't get scared away so we saw them really closely.
We then went to the blue penguin colony. You sit and watch them come in from the sea as it goes dark, we were about 10 metres away from them and we saw about 130 in the time we were there, making their way to their nesting areas. They are only 30cm/12inches tall and are the smallest species in the world. It was quite amusing as there was a fur seal lying in their path on the rocky pathway as they came up from the sea. They would stealthily tip-toe their way past him and each time he raised his head or yawned they would hastily retreat, tripping over each other in their hurry to get away from him! The blue penguins are a bit nervous on land and don't like to be the leader, so try to push each other to the front, none of them like to be last either so there is a mad scrabble to be in the middle of the group. As we left there were two who had strayed into the car park a couple of metres away from us!
We drove from Oamaru to Queenstown and met Emily and Beth there (two girls we were on the Quito to Santiago trip in South America with). The drive there was very scenic and we were lucky to have our single sunny day that week on that day! We drove through mountains some of which had snow on top, beside lakes and rivers, and along the riverbanks and verges of the roads there were lupins which are out in full bloom now and very colourful. As we passed through Cromwell, Lake Dunston was perfectly still, with the snow-capped mountains reflected in the glass-like waters, it made quite a picture. Queenstown is beautiful as it has mountains surrounding it and is also next to a lake. We didn't have too much time to pursue any activities so wandered around the town and has a great evening meal of New Zealand Lamb.
We crossed back over to the east side on Thursday, passing Lakes Pukaki and Tekapo which although the weather was dull the waters were a brilliant turquoise colour. We spent four great days at Winchester convention and met many people there, including several of Joy's family. After leaving Winchester we stopped at Austin and Christine Booth's for coffee and a meal with them and their four children, Austin parents were there and also Nigel and Gina Gardner and their three boys.
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