Ulva Island

Okay, funny story. On Sunday, when we got up before the sun and started the hike back to Halfmoon Bay, we intended to try to catch the earlier flight back to Invercargill. So we really pushed ourselves and made it back before 11 am, making the 5 hour hike in just 3 hours 45 minutes. When we weren't yet back to civilization, Dan said to me, "We should go to Ulva Island instead of catching the earlier flight." Argh! We were so tired that the thought of even more hiking wasn't really a welcome idea. Dan argued that we probably wouldn't have another opportunity to see Ulva Island which is supposed to be an amazing bird sanctuary. Well, it turned out the decision was made for us. When we stumbled into the airport booking office the earlier flight was already booked so we had 5 hours to spend before our flight. Ulva Island, here we come! At least we were able to drop off our big backpacks at the airport and stock up on chips & soda at the dairy before catching a water-taxi to Ulva Island.

Ulva Island is a small island situated in Paterson Inlet; the water-taxi took 5 minutes to bring us there. The island is only ~260 hectares, and you can walk from one end to the other in less than 1 hour. It is designated as a bird sanctuary, and all boats and bags are checked for rats & seeds to prevent anything from destroying the fragile environment of the island. That big bird above is the New Zealand Pigeon (Kereru) which is about the size of a chicken.

We walked along the really easy paths on Ulva Island (sort of stumbling along since we were so sore and tired from our 12 km hike in the morning). We saw the whole island in about 3 hours and spotted a lot of really beautiful birds. This bright green bird is the New Zealand Parakeet (kakariki).

This little guy was so cute: the Stewart Island Robin (toutouwai). It looked like a cartoon bird; huge head, big eyes, and small round body. It followed us around for a while waiting for treats.

This is a Stewart Island weka, and we saw several while on Ulva Island. They are flightless and the size of a small chicken. They followed us around the island and were really curious - they poked around at the bag I had looking for food.

After walking all around the island and checking out the birds, we sat down at the pier and waited for our water-taxi to bring us back to Halfmoon Bay. The weather was amazing, and Ulva Island was really beautiful. We barely saw any other people while we were there. The only thing somewhat disappointing was that we didn't see any kiwi birds. We were told that they are very rarely seen being quite shy, but we had hoped maybe to see one.

While waiting on the pier, Dan couldn't resist the clear, blue water and hopped in for a quick splash. Of course the water is just above freezing so he was out in no time. Too bad we didn't get any pictures of his dive. Soon after that the water-taxi picked us up and brought us back to Halfmoon Bay where we caught our flight back to Invercargill and then drove back to Dunedin. I have to say, the burgers we picked up at Burger King on our drive back to Dunedin were just about the tastiest things we've had in a long time...something to do with camping & hiking for 3 days.

What a great trip. Lots of good sunshine really helped us enjoy the hikes. We are looking forward to our next big adventure - we just need to decide what it will be.