DAY 12: Penguins

From NZ - DAY 12

OAMARU -- Most of my day was dedicated to my favorite animal the penguin.

Here there are two colonies of two different penguins.

The first was the yellow-eyed penguin and the second, the blue penguin. Conveniently the yellow-eyed penguins return to their homes two hours before sunset, while the blues return when it is dark.

Therefore I could watch both colonies come ashore.

I spent about 3 hours waiting and watching the yellow come in. I only saw about 20 of a supposed 800 come in. Some of them got really close. They amazingly climbed about 100 yards up a hillside to their homes where I was watching them.

From NZ - DAY 12

The blues were harder to get close to. In fact I had to pay 20 dollars to watch them come into a habitat that was designed for them. They did not allow pictures to be taken because it could scare them.

Penguins are skittish.

It was a cool penguin-watching day.

And just so you know that sign above is actually true. There is penguin crossing, its not just a cute sign.