Christchurch ==> dunedin

13 April 08

Set off early in the cold cold morning. Was a long long drive. 4 hours plus. Got to get to Dunedin by 1.45pm and catch our wild life tour.

Me and Onyx. Thats James behind. He's from Hawaii. Hmmmm.. interesting place.

Some sea we saw along the wayNew Zealand is seriously underpopulated. Look.. there is NOBODY on the streets! I think this is a very heartwarming scene. Mum pushing baby on pram, grandma pushing grandpa on wheelchair. The love for a child, the love for a man. Thanks to Aik Khoon we reached Dunedin on time. Grabbed some bread and off to the wildlife tour. They gave us a binoculars to spot some special birds! Highlight was to spot the Albatross, a big bird with a wingspan up to 3m!

Otago Peninsula

Thats the albatross! It looks like a normal bird because it is so far away. But when i was looking through my binoculars it was like "Oh my god! There is a huge bird flying towards me!!"Me and Aik Khoon. Do you see a tiny white speck in the water, somewhere near the rocks? Thats 2 seals playing! Was so excited when I saw that. The only time I see seals are in a zoo... Havent seen wild ones before.After the Albatross, we went on to another place to look at penguins, seals and sealions in their natural habitats.

Look at the picture. Sun shining, sight blurry and 2 white horses. Perfect time for my Prince Charming to appear!

The larger horse looks too scrawny. Grass here isnt packed with too much nutrients I can see. This pony looks like it will grow up to be a good looking horse though. Putting a good looking rider up there will make the picture perfect.

Prince Charming's Perferred Mode of Transport.

Seals!

The black thing is a seal too. Pools like that are for seal pups to learn and practise swimming in the sea. I saw a pool much further away with many many seals having their swimming lessons. Too bad I cant take a picture through my binoculars.

Had to climb down this steep hill to see the seals and up again, cross over to another hill and climb down to see the penguins. Lots of climbing. Thats physical fitness training!

Sun was bright, air was cold, hands were full (holding the big binoculars, my camera, my bag...), hill was steep. What you see is not the gradient on the slope. It is just the horizon.

While walking down another hill we realise we were walking beside the sheeps! Because there were sheeps everywhere, there got to be sheep's dung everywhere. Somebody should toilet train these creatures! Everybody finally gave up on trying to avoid stepping on sheep dung after some time. It is everywhere. You'll be depressed for the rest of the day if you fall down on those grass patches.

Yellow Eyed Penguins! Looks small but thats as far as my camera zoom can go. Heard they are really shy creatures. Oh... That sounds like me!

Sea lion. They are huge. Not like seals.. small and cute. I always thought sealions are gentle animals which eat fishes and balance balls on their noses. Ok, the Singapore Zoo is instilling a very wrong impression of sealions on innocent visitors like me. Sealions will sometimes swim to the seal habitats and try to steal a pup for their meal. HORRIBLE. They will then kind of swallow the whole thing and vomit the skull and bones out because they cannot be digested. EEkks.

Amazing how close we can get to them. A dead seal pup. Suspected to be the doings of a sealion... probably being dragged up by one but not eaten. Poor thing!! I feel so sad for it. Nice scenery. Again, my camera cant capture the colours of the sky. There was a pinkish and purplish hue. Lots of birds on the beach... Thousands of them!Went back to our backpackers after the penguin sightings. Everybody was soooooo hungry. 1 piece of bread isnt enough for battle the cold winds and conquer 2 hills. Had instant pasta that night.. was the WORST pasta I have ever eaten. Really, I can make better ones. Dont buy instant canned pasta. Ever.

Aik Khoon very pleased with her nachos. It was pretty yummy!

The heater! My best friend. Tiny as it may be, kept us warm throughout the night.

That night we went to explore the town as usual.

Abhay and James had beer.

The rest settled for some nice and warm hot chocolate. Was fairly pleased with it until we remembered we each had 1.5 glasses of chocolate milk in the morning. Haha.. Anyway I still think I like hot chocolates!

Back to bed after the hot chocolate. The boys wanted to try their luck at the casino. In the end, Ian took the job of a gentleman and escorted the girls back instead. Thank you!