Today we’re headed out to see the yellow eyed penguins commonly found around Dunedin at a penguin sanctuary. We started the tour by seeing the penguins that they are rehabilitating or chicks they are helping to gain weight and catch them up to their penguin peers.
Next we drove down to the coast to see the penguin nesting area. There were 14 active nesting pairs of yellow eyed penguins and another 30 nesting pairs of blue penguins. We could see the little penguins in their nests but it was hard to take any pictures of the chicks in their hidey boxes.
After walking around on the ridge area where most of the nests were, we walked down to the beach area where there were trenches for observing the penguins.
Unfortunately, we didn’t see any penguins near by and only observed a chick and parent thru binoculars. So after waiting 20-30 mins to see penguins we journeyed back to sanctuary and headed out. I found this cool flower, so I took a random pic.
From the sanctuary we drove to Allan’s Beach to go on a walk and see the seals. It didn’t disappoint and we saw several seals as well as a pair that were doing the dirty. There was a group of people enjoying the show so it was hard to miss.
After our walk we got back in the car for the long drive to Te Anau. We ate dinner on the road and got to our Airbnb late.