Day 15 - Napier

Today we had a short few hours in Napier. I took a tour out to a gannet colony (gannets are closely related to the seabirds known as boobies.) Debbie decided to stay back and chill today. Napier looks like a cute town. It was partially destroyed by an earthquake in 1931, and rebuilt with much art deco style. The gannets were over an hour drive at “Cape Kidnapper” sanctuary. So I saw some nice NZ landscapes through what the guide said is the fruit basket of NZ. The gannets had 3 colonies on a cliff area. The colony we drove to had ~3000 gannets. Usually no fuzzy chicks this time of year, but we were lucky the weather has been odd and there was a small late batch of fuzz balls. If you look close you will see some fuzzy babies.

(Warning) Sad thing about gannets: when they are old enough to fly, they are not real good at “taking off” and need to fly for days without stopping to islands near Tasmania. (If they rest in the ocean at this age, they can’t get airborne again) Only a quarter of them will survive their first journey there and back. 😢Read more