Bird (Church and Ulva Island)

 Sunday 5th January

At 8am we woke up with the alarm. Breakfast was made odd by the pesto flavoured milk after a transportation mishap. But we all had coffee together at the Snuggery, which made up for it.


We got ready and headed into town to go to the DOC centre, where we got info about the walk planned for tomorrow, bought sunnies for one of the boys, got a mankie of the Rakiura Track to somehow become the bow of our wreath.




We headed up a steep hill to church for a 10:30 start. We got in, greeted with a hymn book and a piece of paper. We found a pew, sat down and enjoyed the service. It was a lovely time with all 17 of us in the congregation, and thought provoking, but it also sent us into fits of giggles at one point.


We blame the complicated and unknown Christmas in the Picture Book hymn. It was unknown to the whole congregation and admittedly a tricky one from the organist. The first run through was a few steps above abysmal, but not great. So encouraged by Rev Barb to give it another go with gusto, “Rakiura’s got Talent”. Well, in full voice a rogue note hit, which meant one laughed, then another giggled, then the next and the next.



Unfortunately, we were now in a time of reflection and prayer with all of us trying our best to calm down and BEHAVE. We somehow made it to the end of the service without discrediting ourselves too much and were invited to have a cuppa. We had great conversations with the locals, and and also various itinerants who do the summer stint on the island.


Back down the hill and we decided that there was no time to see the museum probably. Well, no time for Dad to go through a museum, even quickly. So back home for lunch and to pack our bags for the next adventure. We left plenty of time to walk up and over the hill to catch the water taxi to Ulva Island. We got there and had to make sure we didn't inadvertently join a cruise ship line, and found our taxi ready and waiting for us. The taxi ride was a bit bumpy, but after a short 6 minute journey we had made it!


(Jonty starts writing) We arrived at the island looked at a couple pamphlets and we were off. We had the plan to explore the entire island, but as we were walking to Boulder Beach we got sidetracked by a path full of trees and missed the turn, instead going to Sydney Cove. It was the nicest beach we went to on the island. It was full of rocks, sand and water. At one end there were quite a few rocks leading out to a point, Dad and the boys were feeling adventurous. Leaving Mum behind, we went and scaled big rocks and made it to the point. We took some pictures and looked at the view.


After we made it back from the rocks Mum explained that she found pyrite. Very cool. While walking along Sydney Cove we spotted a sealion and we made sure to keep our distance. Back on the track, we saw and heard lots of birds like kaka, greens, robins, yellow heads, tuis, fantails, etc. We liked hearing lots of birdsong including one with a machine gun sound.

We were stopped in our path because of a weka, and after a 20 minute walk through the bush we had made it Boulder Beach. SHOCK there were boulders, lots of them. Big ones, tiny ones, uncomfortable ones. We had snacks on a small outcrop that was quite easy to traverse.



We got to west end beach (Jonty has given up writing)


It was a great time on the island. We used all the minutes we had to explore, see and do.

Dinner was fortunately enhanced with fresh fish after mum being in the right place at the right time, scoring the
left over spoils after a fellow traveler's fishing trip. Dinners need to use up as much as they can since we are
leaving soon enough and don't want to fly it back home.

The boys headed out after dark for kiwi spotting. Lots heard. None spotted.

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