Animals, New Zealand

Sealion

Yellow eyed penguins

Seals

Many seals

huskies

Valais sheep

Pukeko

Our trip to New Zealand in July and August last year was amazing in everyway,  but we were extremely lucky to see some wildlife too.

We went on two wildlife trips, the first was on the Otago Peninsula. We saw Yellow Eyed penguins, we got there to see them coming out of the sea and they climbing up a cliff back to their burrows/homes. Then some decided to go back to the sea for a short while.  We also saw sealions, there were 3 of them on the beach having a good old play fight. But there were many more hidden in the dunes.  It was quite an amazing experience.

The second trip was to Akaroa, where we went on a boat trip and saw many, many Hector`s dolphins. These are the smallest in the world and they were just so keen to swim in front of the boat. We were so lucky.

We also went to see Blue penguins which are the smallest in world. We were in Oamaru and they offer the chance to see the little penguins returning to their burrow. They start returning around 6pm and it is then dark and they just waddle their way on the beach and up to the grassy area. It was not allowed to take photos, but it was really amazing to see.

Alessio was very happy to see huskies at the International Antarctic Centre and then on our last day we went to Willowbank Animal Reserve. There Alessio got to feed some lemurs, they sat on his shoulders and he was so calm feeding them. We also saw some pukeko, native bird to NZ and finally we saw a kiwi too. It was in the night area, there should have been 5 but I guess they were hiding.

I guess the only disappointment was that we did not see any whales, while we were in Auckland we did a boat trip. The day before there had been blue whales in the area and had been spotted by the boat. That would have been so amazing.