© 2012 Elys. All rights reserved. The southernmost point in NZ

Day 275: Next Stop: South Pole?

Kaka Point – Catlins – Te Anau, New Zealand

Our first stop today is the Nugget Point light house, set on a cliff high above the ocean and reached by a short walk along a small trek with cliffs falling down to the sea on both sides. The Lonely Planet did not lie when describing this walk as breathtakingly beautiful. Far below we see fur seals perched on the rocks and also swimming in the water. Actually, the seals are so far below that we mistake them for logs at first… From one minute to the next the scenery is lost in fog coming in from the sea and head back to the car where I try my best to stick to the road in the white mist surrounding us.

Stop number two today is Jack’s Blow Hole which actually is a hole in the ground about 200 meters inland from the coast with a hidden underground connection to the ocean and definitely not worth the app. 30 km detour and 20 minutes walk one way to get there.

In Papatowai we stop to pay a visit to the Lost Gypsy Gallery but unfortunately find it closed for the winter. Like little kids standing in front of the closed candy shop we stare at the sign on the door to the brightly colored bus not wanting to believe that we cannot go in. We have to content ourselves with the few designs we find outside in the garden and spent a happy 15 minutes playing with the moving whale operated by a crank and taking videos and pictures of it all. (Note from Elys: This place is a must do for gadget and gizmo geeks!)


Down the steep serpentine road we head back to the coast and to Porpoise Bay where we neither find dolphins, nor whales, nor seals nor any other wildlife described in the Lonely Planet. What we do find here is a nice rest area set on top of a cliff with a great view over the ocean and we end up having a late lunch sitting on the edge and munching muesli and scrambled eggs.

Curio Bay, just around the corner from Porpoise Bay, is not only home to a supposedly very rare fossilized wood which looked to us mostly like any other rock on a beach, but also houses a similarly rare yellow-eyed penguin colony. We were just about to leave when one of these funny guys came back from his day out hunting and hopped on the rocks right in front of us where he spent 5 minutes thoroughly cleaning himself before vanishing in the bushes. We are ready to leave the Catlins now, but before we head on to Fjordland and Te Anau, we check out the most southern point in New Zealand, which funnily enough can only be reached by walking through several sheep inhabited meadows. Back at the car we realize that we have brought some not planned specimen from this excursion and end up vainly trying to clean our shoes in the grass before we get back in the car. The stink of sheep did not leave us that day and the next!

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