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New Zealand South Island Penguins

3. Yellow-Eyed Penguins in the Catlins

The next morning we got on the road over to the eastern side of the peninsula. The west side of the island does house the Yellow-Eyed Penguin Conservation Reserve, but we decided once again to skip the $33/person tour and go in search of free sightings. We had a bit of driving to do later, so after reviewing Phil’s list of recommended spots, we chose a shorter hike that might include Hooker’s sea lions which we had never seen. It was a nice hike but no sea lions or penguins were spotted. This left us without enough time to detour to Sandfly Bay, which has a blind for Yellow-eyed Penguin viewing, though we didn’t expect any luck there before 3pm anyway. So, back to the car and the drive along the peninsula, which was full of interesting bird sightings, including Royal Spoonbills, lovely little bays and lots more green sheepy hills before it tipped us back into Dunedin. After a brief tour of the town, it was time to head down the Southern Scenic Route to our camp in the Catlins.
The next day we retraced our route from our camp at the ridiculously cheap and very civilized DOC grounds in Papatowai all the way back to Nugget Point at the northern end of the Catlins with the faint hope of seeing elephant seals and Hooker’s sea lions. On the walk to the lighthouse on the point, we passed far above some sort of marine mammals in the rocks, but even with binoculars weren’t certain if they were more fur seals or sea lions. Out in the gusty winds at the lighthouse, though, we did finally see the huge sea lions out among the nugget rocks just offshore. From there we pulled into the nearby Roaring Bay which was a promising Yellow-eyed Penguin beach. It was midday so we weren’t very hopeful, but the sign at the carpark listed December as a time when they came intermittently during the day to feed chicks so we decided to give it a try. 

After lunching in the car while the wind attempted to disassemble the vehicle, we ventured down to the viewing blind. It was empty, as was the beach, and with no wind and a beautiful beach to look at we wished we’d thought to bring the lunch down there. After about 15 minutes of waiting and watching fur seals on the far rocky end of the beach, a penguin burst forth from the waves and began a hurried waddle across the sand toward the dunes. This solitary traveler was over twice the size of the little Blues we’d seen- they are the world’s 4th largest and wear proper eveningwear. With binocs in daylight, we were treated to a great show as the responsible parent dragged a belly full of fish back to the family hideaway. We felt guilty laughing when it tripped onto its face over a stick of driftwood, but laughed easily watching it hop up the rocks and fan its wings to dry. We felt quite lucky, especially when it chose to stop for preening in a very clear area facing directly at us. After a few minutes, though, it disappeared into the dunes to deliver lunch. We suspected that when it arrived home its partner would head out fishing, so we alternated between watching the dunes and watching the beach to see if we’d get lucky twice. Over the next half an hour or so, as a few other people entered and left the blind, two more birds came in from the sea, and two spouses headed out. Surprisingly, every single newcomer paused at least briefly in the small rocky clearing where the first had modeled for us. Eventually we had to put the camera and binoculars away and head into the thriving metropolis of Owaka for petrol and supplies before 5:00 closing time.

We ended the day with  a walk along the estuary behind our camp, poking in tidepools and harassing little crabs. The next morning was clear but dewy making camp breaking slower than hoped with Te Anau as our next appointed lodging and still more Catlins and Southern Scenic Route ahead. But the summer days were at their longest so we stuck with our plan and headed first to the petrified forest in Curio Bay. This proved to be a site that we found worth the detour, but which probably wouldn’t hold the attention of the kiddies. Parking on the cliff, we had merely to descend a staircase to the tidal level (covered at high tide) to immediately encounter dozens of 180 million year old stumps and logs. Most were of course long since converted to stone, but we were shocked that some bits still had the texture of wood. We watched most people return to their cars after just a few minutes. We stayed a little longer to look at the tide pools, watch the bull kelp churn, and see if we could spot any of the Yellow-eyed Penguins that the signs warned us not to disturb. Having no luck, we drove back to the adjacent point which was highlighted for Hector’s dolphin spotting. We were again unsuccessful, but not horribly disappointed. We all felt quite satisfied with the quality of viewings we had already managed to achieve for free, and there was no need to regret our choices as we took off to Slope Point and then the drive back up the West coast.

Resources

• The charming New Zealand Penguin Map using Google Maps at the beginning of this article is still in its infancy and not yet comprehensive, but has good info and is worth a look. You can click the penguins for more info about the viewing sites.
  
• You can order free brochures for the Southern Scenic Route and the Catlins from Visit Southland.
  
• Some of the tours we skipped were well recommended in Lonely Planet and elsewhere. The New Zealand Penguins site has a fairly comprehensive list of operators along with the free viewing sites under each species. 
  
• Here’s another site by an interesting group looking after the Yellow-eyed Penguins

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This article was written on Saturday, October 4th, 2008 and is filed under Destination. For more articles about: New Zealand (10), South Island (4), Travel (8)

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