Queenstown - Dunedin - day 63

We got up early again to take the Magicbus to Dunedin. The road took us through Central Otago and some nice scenery. The weather was amazing, it was really sunny! (eventhough it is still very cold) We got to Dunedin around 13h and enjoyed a quick tour of the city, passing by the Octagon, the Cathedral, the University of Otago (New Zealand's oldest university) and the amazing railway station building. Dunedin is the Gaelic name for Edinburgh; the city was actually founded by the Scots in the 19th century. We checked-in to our hostel, Penny's Backpackers, and then walked down Princes Street to have a quick lunch and then on to the Cadbury factory for a tour. The tour was interesting, but not that good. We didn't get to see as much as we'd hoped, but we did get tons of free product samples! From there we were picked up by the Elm Wildlife Tours company and taken to the Otago Peninsula. We saw some Royal Albatrosses flying around, which was rather impressive since they are the birds with the world's largest wingspan (up to 3,5 meters!!). The Otago Peninsula is the only place in the world where you can see an albatross colony on the mainland. We also saw tons of other birds. From there we drove over the green hills through some private sheep farming land and finally got out of the mini-van and walked through the fields to the cliffs to see a fur seal breeding colony. There were lots and lots of seals, especially lots of baby seals! It was fun to see, especially when one of the pups started bothering a seagull that was sitting on its nest. From there we walked back up the hill and then down again to see the sealions and penguins. We got very close to the sealions; they can be pretty scary cause their roar is very loud and they sometimes start charging towards you! We also saw a blue penguin, which is the world's smallest penguin. We saw lots of yellow-eyed penguins coming out of the water and hurrying up over the beach into the fields. They are the world's rarest penguin and are strangely enough considered as a type of flightless forest bird. One of the strangest sights ever was to see the penguins right next to the sheep! I don't think you can see that anywhere else in the world! We got pretty close to some of the penguins cause on the way back up the hill there were two that were walking out just in front of us. We also saw tons of sheep and lambs; it seems like there are two lambs per sheep everywhere in New Zealand; they say that it has been a particularly good season for the lambs... While we were out watching the wildlife, we were absolutely freezing! If you think that New Zealand is a warm country, think again!! After driving back to Dunedin, we had dinner at the hostel and then went to bed.

Weather: sunny in the morning, lots of rain in Dunedin, unbelievably cold all day