142: Oamaru, Moeraki, Katiki
11/05/06
The Drive to Oamaru
I left Mt Cook on the 11th of May with slightly sore legs from the hike up Mt Ollivier the day before;-)
The weather wasn’t all that bad, overcast but certainly no sight of the forecast heavy rain and snow for that day.
My first stop was the nearby town of Twizel which have a special Black Stilt Sanctuary, on of the rarest birds or so..
Sadly the visiting season was over and the center closed so I could not see the Black Stilt 🙁
There wasn’t anything else to do in this small town except for filling up the tankand topping up my food in a nearby shop (Mt Cook Village has neither Fuel Station nor Shop so I was running low on resources)
By the time I left it had started to rain and got worse the further I drove and eventually I realises that I was driving towards the west coast (which would explain the increase in rain). I must have taken the wrong exit from Twizel as there were two routes to drive.. I only noticed after about 40 km or so.. bother.
Eventually back on track I planned to do a little detour around an artificial lake, crossing the biggest Dam in New Zealand. The Dam was near Lake Benmore and the detour route which was supposed to be very scenic along the lake joined the main route towards Oamaru at Aviomore. (Yes there are many places with scottish names here)
Despite the fact that I was now heading eastwards the rain did not stop and so the scenic route around Lake Aviemore (i think) was a leasurely drive but I did not stop much and get out.. It was pissing down if I may say so..;-)
Arrival in Oamaru
As i got closer to Oamaru the sky cleared up and by the time I reched Oamaru it was nice and sunny.
The usual routine of going to the Tourist Information and sorting out Accomodation. I stayed Miller? Hotel, a former Hotel that got converted into a Backpacker Hostel.
Place was alright especially since they had free internet there which I made thorough use of. The only really annoying thing was that they had a silly timer attached to the electric heater (the tiniest heater ever) so the room would only heat for 30min at a time and then switch off. Considering that it was freezing cold outside (and in the room) I was not happy.
Luckily I had my “useful things” bag in the car which contained a screwdriver/volt tester that allowed me to safely (well kinda) rewire the timer switch to give me unlimited heating.. You have to know how to help yourself, right?
Well despite non-stop heating it was still fairly cold in the room but no doubt I was considerably warmer then the other people in the hostel 😉
12/05/06
Oamaru
.. is a small town which used to be a whaleing center back then I think. It is famous for a street of whitestone Victorian Houses along the harbour and Penguin Colonies, in particular the Little Blue Penguins which are the smallest in the world and very rare. Apparently they only exist around Oamaru, a bit further south and somewhere in Australia.
I walked around town a bit to look at the old buildings (but didn’t find them very exciting), went to the harbour area where I saw a lot of Spotted Shags and some Stewart Island Shags on an old pier. The hilltop viewpoint was quite nice opverlooking the town and harbour and not far away was Bushy Bay which has a Yellow-Eyed Penguin Colony though I had to come back an hour before sunset to see the penguins come back from the sea.
In the afternoon I made my way to the Public Garden in the center of Oamaru which was lovely in the afternoon sun. They have a Japanese Bridge there which crosses over a small stream, a lovely “hidden” garden around the stream, some Rose garden (which was out of season) and on the other end of the garden was a Duck Pond with a variety of ducks including White Ducks and Blue Ducks (though I am not entirely sure if it was a blue duck since my bird reference . I also watched a group of Silvereye Birds feeding on local plants. The small birds looked beautiful with their greenish feathers and white ringes around their eyes.. .
After the Garden I quicly went up to Bushy Bay again to see the Yellow-Eyed Penguins. Spent about an hour and a bit in the cold wind on the hill top to watch out for some of those Penguins but again the result was rathe roor with only a handfull of them turning up. Right aftrwards (the sun had set now) I went to the Blue Penguin Center so see those tiny fellas which only arrive from sea after dark. Sadly it was pertty quiet here too that night and I only saw three or four blue penguins. The night before they counted about 20. Bad luck;-)
When i left the center I saw a little Blue Penguin trying to cross the road but it got scared by the lights of the car and wobbled back towards the sea..
13/05/06
The next morning it was lovely weather again and I set off to see the Moeraki Boulders. I drove along a scenic costal route to Moreaki which is about 30km south of Oamaru. Moeraki Boulders are a number of large spherical stones dotted around Moeraki Beach. The Boulders have intersting patterns and “insides”. There is a legend associated with those boulders which I won’t repeat here (search google if you are interested) but the scientific explanation for the round boulders seems to be that they were washed out of the dunes behind the beach. Yet I have not found an explanation as to why they are such “perfect” round shapes..
I had lunch on the beach and then drive to nearby Moeraki Village. Went for a walk there to a Whalers Watchpoint on a Hilltop. Great View over Moeraki Bay and the Sea. Watched some Fishing Boats coming back from Sea with my Binos and noticed some Royal Albatros Birds circling the boats.. Amazing Wingspan (read later it’s up to 3m!) though they were quite far away. When they made their turns close to the water it looked like the tip of the inner wings almost touched the water.. wondeful to watch 😀
From Moeraki I drove to the nearby Katiki Point which is the location of a Lighthouse. I didn’t know this but when I got to the Lighthouse there were signs for a Yellow-Eyed Penguin Hide and a track for watching New Zealand Fur Seals.
I walked to the hide but it was too early.. only saw one Penguin 😉 I left and walked toards the Seals instead. It was quite a stretch of land pertruding into the sea from the Lighthouse, track going downhill. I did pass the fenced off Penguin area along the way and saw some of the penguins there but didn’t want to disturb them too much. I continued doen the hill to the farthest point of the land. There were plenty of New Zealand Fur Seals in the water having fun andon the rocks and beaches taking it easy.
On thing I didn’t know until then was just how incredibly smelly they are! Many meters away and I could still smell the fishy-sweet, heavy stench of them… I cannot discribe it well but it is something that is so strong and distinct that even a few molecules are enough for you to notice and a deep breath would probably make you look rather green in the face 😉
Tags: New Zealand, RTW 2005/2006, South Island
saschas
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