Moeraki, Oamaru, Akaroa, Christchurch - the classics of the East Coast

With the days at Mount Cook, the inland was first explored, next it was back to the coast. In Moeraki, the quite famous boulders are lying (Boulders) on the beach, and of course we also visited them again. But here we found the much lesser known breeding ground of the yellow-eyed penguins at - now called Katiki Point - lighthouse (former: Moeraki Lighthouse) actually even more interesting, because during a previous visit we were able to observe some of the animals up close there. In view of the current scarcity of yellow-eyed penguins (we mentioned it - the molting), we were also very happy to see at least one individual here again, even though we had to puzzle for a long time whether it was actually a penguin (the pictures finally showed that the head was hidden behind a bush, which made it look a bit strange (namely headless) - and it was unfortunately also quite far away). However, the resident sea lions were not far away either, so we had to slalom around them again. The desired 10m distance simply could not be maintained, because if you had kept the distance from one sea lion, you would have ridden the next one...

Oamaru is a very pretty place with a larger number of historic buildings (everything older than 100 years counts here), but especially with a little penguin colony almost right in town and a slightly outside yellow-eyed penguin 'colony' (yellow-eyed penguins live more solitary, which is why the term colony is somewhat misleading, but there are several breeding pairs residing on a beach). We lurked for nearly 2 hours for the latter, and indeed here came a single penguin swimming ashore, walking along the beach and disappeared - after a little rest and preening - into the bushes (and thus out of sight). Shortly afterwards, typical greeting sounds were heard, but nothing could be seen anymore.

With the little penguins, things are easier: As already practiced in various places (2x in Australia, 1x on the Otago Peninsula), we paid a (unfortunately not quite small) sum and got the little creatures landing after dark - illuminated in a light harmless to penguin's eyes. Here, too, there is the annoying topic of molting, so only a counted 17 specimens appeared on the viewing surface. Photography was forbidden here, so we have no pictures of them ... but on the following evening we strolled through the adjacent harbor area again, and here a little blue also came ashore, who - after a longer break - crossed a fairly wide, lit by street lamps, spot and came quite close to us. Finally, he waddled across the road and disappeared into the bushes - the 'Penguins Crossing' signs are still there for a reason. By the way, the little penguin colony could also be visited during daytime without an entrance fee - somewhat surprisingly, we saw not only the ubiquitous sea lions, but also a little penguin whose internal clock may have been damaged. But this was the opportunity to see one in normal daylight - very unusual.

We continued northward along the coast, our next stop was Akaroa on the Banks Peninsula - a nice little town in a volcanic crater, which has been flooded and has access to the sea. Here we took a boat tour, which unfortunately failed to track down a special type of the little penguins - the white-flippered penguins - but instead brought up a considerable number of Hector dolphins (the smallest dolphin species in the world, only up to 1.5m long). Otherwise, we enjoyed the landscape here, but soon continued...

... to Christchurch. We were last here in 2009 - and therefore before the devastating earthquakes of 2010 and 2011. Right on our first visit to the city center, we found that the level of recognition was near zero - so many empty spaces, and in some places new buildings (which were not quite to our taste) - very sad, the city has lost a lot. But the next day we found that it has also gained in many places, and we still managed to take a good number of pictures.

With Christchurch, the East Coast was explored for now - now it's back to the Southern Alps. But that will be the topic of the next post...