Antartica, Willowbank and Kaikoura

We left Christchurch today. Collected our tiny toyota yaris from hertz and headed out to the airport to experience the thrills of the Antarctic centre. it was really interesting. They had lots of informative and fun things to do and see. the Monster and I got really excited at seeing some coal mined from Mt Crean (obviously named in honour of Irish Antarctic explorer Tom Crean). we got to dress up in Antarctic gear (lovely warm goose down suitable for winter weather in Ireland), watch Antarctic fish (weird creatures with massive heads & eyes and anti freeze in their blood) and pose with a stuffed leopard seal. The highlight for me were the little blue penguins - the smallest penguin in the world. They have a colony of 18 penguins who were injured in the wild and have found a home there. There was one called Elvis (because she likes to sing) and she was blind. She walked around the enclosure with her beak held out like a stick. her best friend is a penguin who was blinded and brain damaged by a fishing hook. The keepers said between them they had one eye and one and a half brains! The other highlight was going into the wind chill chamber where we experienced winds of -18 degrees. Reminded me of walking along the beach at port in December. I think they measure temperatures differently here, or else Ireland is colder than I realised. After the Antarctic centre we went to Willowbank wildlife reserve. they had lots of native and introduced animals. You could buy food and feed a lot of the animals and, as a result, they expected to be fed. The monster and I weren't feeding them, but they followed us all the same. At one time we had five ducks waddling after us looking for food. It was funny. As we walked along, roosters and ducks would come racing purposefully towards us. The scariest time was when a gosling raced after us calling, much to the dislike of its parents. for a moment the monster and I were afraid we were going to be attacked by the geese! we saw a wallaby with a joey in its pouch, tame eels (you could feed them too), lemurs (in a big huddle like in Dublin zoo) and hundreds of red eared turtles. The highlights for me were the native breeds (kiwi, tuatara, weiki, kea), petting a friendly sheep and talking to a sulphur crested cockatoo. we were walking past his enclosure and he said 'hello' so I said 'Hello, how are you?' he said 'all right.' I said 'We have to go now, bye bye' and he said 'bye now'. It was amazing. The kiwis were a bit more active than in Christchurch and I had the benefit of looking through my night shot camera. I finally saw the tuatara, couldn't see the third eye though. The weika, a kind of moorhen, were very curious and friendly. They had warning signs on the kea enclosure that they might land on you. the monster and I hoped this would happen, but they were too busy play fighting with each other to notice us. After willowbank we drove up to kaikoura, which was about 2 hours away on the coast. we got to see some of the 40 million sheep, and lots of interesting birds which I couldn't really look at as I was driving. the mountains were beautiful. think Long woman's grave x 100. at one stage the mountains were yellow were flowering gorse, it was quite a sight. First sight of kaikoura was amazing, driving down through the mountain pass seeing the snow capped mountains on one side, the blue green waters of the pacific on the other and the little town nestled in between. It is a small place with lots of whale watching, a fur seal colony and birds. we are staying in a lovely motel and I can hear the pacific lapping just outside my window (there is a road between the window and the sea). Looking forward to seeing loads of wildlife while we stay here.