Matt has now finished his tour with some very happy folks now heading home. He writes the following about his last few days on tour…
DAY 19 Shortly after the ferry left Oban heading towards Bluff, we spotted a Fiordland Crested Penguin on the rocky shore, other birds on the crossing were lots of Common Diving petrels, Sooty Shearwaters, a lone Cape petrel and Fairy Prion, a Brown Skua sitting on the water and a couple of White capped Albatross.
A brief stop at Tip Lagoon south of Invercargill was very rewarding, in amongst the Grey Teal and Black Swans we soon found five Australian Shelducks, aka Chestnut breasted Shelduck. At least six of these vagrants have been in the area for while. We changed our view area and Bingo! there was the other rare vagrant in amongst the Australasian Shovelers was an eye catching drake Northern Shoveler! Other birds on the lagoon were Pied Stilts and Royal Spoonbills.
We put a few miles under our belts as we drove through Southland to Otago and our next stop was for lunch, spent with a very relaxed female NZ Seal lion, our first of the tour. Next a bit further up the coast we had an encounter with the rare Yellow-eyed Penguin coming ashore, next to a large breeding colony of Red-billed Gulls and White-fronted Terns, and not forgetting the NZ Fur Seals.
Before we checked into our motel for the night we had enough time to add another endemic to list, with great looks at Otago Shags.
DAY 20 Our final full day, and only one bird on our minds, as we left the coast and headed inland to Mackenzie Country, and by 10:30 we had not one but three mega Black Stilts on show! Fantastic, as we watched them feed in a small pool, we had Black-billed gulls whizzing over head and dainty Black-fronted Terns flew pass.
Lunch was spent with more Black Stilts at a different site that were joined by Double-banded plovers with chicks and at least two Wrybill.
Unfortunately Mount Cook was hiding under a thick cloak of cloud, but our next stop was outstanding as we arrived a male NZ Falcon flew over the van, and then we spent lots of time with two very showy first year Black Stilts and hunting Black-fronted terns, the cameras got a good work out.
As we sat in the pub for our final meal together snow flakes floated pass the window, we really had seen every possible type of weather on this trip!
DAY 21 Snow was all over the hills and mountains, fortunately the roads were clear, but the road to Mount John was closed due to the weather! Is it really summer! So our chance of Chukar had gone! I plugged Christchurch into the Satnav and we headed north, with a brief stop to add Mute Swan to our list.
We said our goodbyes to our new found friends with emails and phone numbers exchanged, the 21-day tour was over.
We had managed to find a respectable 154 species, had a lots of laughs and fun, and seen some incredible birds