Up high

We did a hike the other day from Queenstown (more on Q-town later) Here are a couple of photos from the top.

another type of penguin

A lesser known type of penguin in NZ is the one who frequents little bars and plays live music on "jam nights". These penguins often wear tight jeans, have long hair and enjoy playing epic guitar solos. We happened upon one of these "penguin habitats" in Omaru. The bar was tiny, beer was 3$, and the waitress was a volunteer. These penguins also did a Kiwi version of Lynard Skynard's "Sweet Home Alabama". In two words: bad idea.

Did you say Penguins?

Penguins!!! We finally saw some. In Oamaru...we paid $16 each and were ushered into a covered seating area with about 200 other people. At around 6:30pm the first little blue penguin swam into shore. Then he hopped and flopped and scurried up the rocks. It was hilarious. After he came in about 50 more swam into shore. They live in a Conservation area, there are a whole bunch of protected nest boxes for them. This time of year they are molting, and starting to get ready to mate. Some of the males were producing very sexy croaks and quacks. It was one of the coolest things ever. Penguins....we love 'em. Unfortunately we don't have any photos as the little guys are too sensitive to flashes...but we do have a photos of this road sign for you to enjoy.

arf!

Seals are great- they are fat, noisy, mean and they lie around in the sun all day.

Queen Charlotte Track

A wilderness experience like no other....

We knew that the terrain would be easy (75kms in 3 days) and that the track would be popular. However, we didn't know that we would end our first day sitting at a large resort drinking pints in a manicured garden. In fact, we didn't know that we would later enjoy wine whilst sitting on white leather couches. Yes, this was wilderness.

As it turns out, there are upwards of 20 different lodges, resorts, and hostels along the way. The mandatory water taxi to the start of the track includes transport of your luggage. This means we hiked with our day packs while our large packs were boated to our campsite. At the end of the day, all we had to do was pick up our packs on the pier, and set up camp.

We were of course the only suckers who camped...everyone else munched on 4 course meals and sat in the spa!

Weka Weka

Allow us to introduce the Weka. The Weka is a native bird of New Zealand, and is only found in New Zealand. It is large, clumsy and dumb. It is a wonder they are not extinct. They are, however, hilarious. The Weka is extremely inquisitive and will stop at nothing to get at various human items. The Weka in the photo pecked Andrew's book, leaving a small, beak-sized indentation. Don't worry we didn't feed him anything... but he wanted us to....really, really, badly.

Important Team CanAm Update!

Christine can now sing "The Star Spangled Banner" start to finish! In other news, Andrew has also learned to sing "O Canada" although he cannot carry the tune very well. Team CanAm has discovered that learning new national anthems is a great way to pass time while on long hikes or car trips.