11 January 2025

I got up to go to the toilet at 6.30 this morning, and thought I’d be egalitarian and use the unisex loos. The first one the last man using it had left the seat up. The second one had paper all over the floor. I didn’t even check out the third one, I just went back to the women’s toilet (singular) and showers (three).

This morning we had to be at Golden Bay Wharf at 8.35 am, so there was the “am I going to sleep in…? Should I get up now…?” dilemmas. In the end, I got up just after 7.00pm, and went and had my wash. By the time I got back, Pen was up.

We knew from last night that a walk to the Golden Bay Wharf would only take us ten minutes, and we were got there right on time. In fact three minutes before the water taxi arrived. Even better, we were the only two booked in for this morning’s tour.

Our guide was Carly and the water taxi driver, Ty. We were the only ones on the tour, so we were taken on the ten minute journey across to Ulva Island. (I managed to bend my hand back as I was negotiating the way out because I didn’t let go of the handrail in time. It’s totally okay now, in fact I forgot about it for the day, but it felt a bit numb for a short time.)

Once ashore Carly guided us through the beautiful bush, and almost one of the first things we saw was a Rifleman/Titipounamu. These are New Zealand’s smallest birds and I’ve never seen one before. And I’ve never managed to photograph one. Unless this is it and not a cicada…

Carly is fortunate that her hearing hasn’t naturally deteriorated through age, so that she could still her the Titpounamu. Me? I couldn’t hear a dickie bird.

As we continued to walk through, Carly would point out various plants and birds of interest. The principal podocarp trees there were the Miro with its hammer-hewn bark and black ink; the Tōtara that tended to get hollowed out; and the Rimu whose bark looks like a “topical” map. And when you looked at a rimu, you could well imagine that it was embossed with a topographical map.

When we’d first decided that we were going to visit Ulva Island, Pen asked if we should get a guide, or if I would know enough to fill the role. I pointed out that the flora and fauna is different at the other end of the country to what I’m used to – plus, I can never remember all the facts I’ve learnt over the years. So, I was more than pleased to have Carly with us and I would never have seen half of what she was able to show us.

• We saw and heard Kākā.
• We were greeted by a Brown Creeper that had initially disguised itself as a Grey Warbler.
• We saw and heard Grey Warblers.
• The one Fantail we saw on the island, was hiding behind a bush, so I didn’t really get to see that.
• We saw a hole where Kiwi often sleep
• We saw Kakariki – principally the Yellow-Crowned, which is rarer than the Red-Crowned. (And which Carly was very excited about.)
• We heard and saw Kereru fly about.
• We saw Tūī squabbling
• We saw a family of South Island Weka.
• We saw a juvenile South Island Saddleback/Tieke. We know it was a Tieke, because it had its wattles. We knew it was from the South Island because it didn’t have its saddle. We knew it was juvenile, because unlike the North Island Tieke which are born with it, the saddle doesn’t appear for 18 months.

South Island Robins / Kakariwai

More South Island Robins / Kakariwai

Juvenile Saddleback – known as a Jack as it doesn’t have its saddle yet.

Carly also showed us some ferns that had been inhabited by leaf roller caterpillars.

We also saw Robin after Robin that knew full well that humans were quite happy to scuff up the leaf litter and reveal yummy grubs. We also saw juvenile Robins who were well aware of how to con us into feeding them and gathering their own food, and then the instant that mum or dad turned up, would revert to child “feed me!” mode.

And, we saw a juvenile Tūī that had yet to gain its parson collar and cloak. (I said it was pre-ordination.) At first, Carly wasn’t sure if it was a Tūī or a starling, but I thought it had a different head shape to a starling and still his the wider “feed me” mouth bits.

The Weka family, instead of consisting of two chicks, was made up of mum, dad, and three – THREE – chicks. And were totally unperturbed that three humans were nearby.

On the journey back towards the jetty, we stopped at a long drop and Carly gave us the option of using it. I decided to, and she asked for me to give it a rating as it was well looked after by the volunteers. Compared to our one at Rangitoto, it’s a ten out of ten, and if anyone wanted to airlift it to my bach to replace out one that’s falling down, I would thank them.

We were lead down to Boulder Beach and had a couple of minutes to enjoy the serenity as Carly went hunting for Tieke. (I think.) Following that we had the option of heading straight back to the jetty, or, if we were feeling up to it, continuing on the longer trail.

We were feeling up to it.

The forest on Ulva Island has, unlike Stewart Island, never been milled. So we were walking through first generation vegetation. Carly said that if an adult male can get his arms around a rimu tree, then the tree was less than 400 years old. There were a lot of unhuggable trees. There were also a lot of gnarly trees, some of which had been ripped by Kākā, some of which had rotted, some of which had fallen over and kept growing, and some of which had just managed to get intertwined with other plants.

We loved the entire tour, which took about 3.5 hours. It was well worth it.

Afterwards, we sat in the shelter shed at Golden Bay Wharf and had our sandwiches. We were also going to have a muffin each, but Pen couldn’t find hers and was blaming Scott for eating it. He wasn’t confirming nor denying the accusation.

Once we’d had our lunch and a bit of a rest, we were ready to move on, and did so by taking the loop track to Deep Bay (they have original names down here) and then back. When we got to Deep Bay, we celebrated by me breaking my muffin in half and giving it to Pen.

After that walk, we went to the Red Shed, and I bought one of those pens that have something that slides up and down in a water capsule. This one was of the Stewart Island/Rakiura ferry, so I bought it to add to the collection built up over the decades. Pen did some shopping in the 4Square, and I went ice cream hunting, but the place that did fresh fruit ice cream (i.e. where we had tea last night) was closed. So we stopped off at the Snuggery for a hot chocolate, before we returned to the Backpackers, and started going through our millions of photographs. (Or maybe 199.)

Thinking that it would be less crowded, I had my shower at 4.30/5.00pmish, after Pen. She borrowed my towelling slippers (that D.C. had got when we’d stayed in some hotel), but the way that the showers are set up – one cubicle per shower, with plywood doors to the outside world and a shower curtain behind which you hang your (hopefully) dry clothing), meant that the slippers were inadvertently wettened. And were even more wet after I wore them to the shower.

I left them outside to dry.

Following a bit more blogging, we went over to the Kai Kart for Fish and Chips (chicken burger in my case) for tea at about 6.30 pm. We were going to eat outside, but then it started clouding over, the wind started picking up, Pen went to buy some apple pie for dessert (and ended up with Aunt Betty’s self-saucing chocolate pudding) and it started to spit. So we took it back to the backpacker’s dining area.

And now we’re waiting for it to get dark enough that we can go and see if we can find some Kiwi.

10.30 we went out and traipsed up to Traill Park. We could already see some hopeful red lights on the other side, as well as some less hopeful white lights. – Which, unfortunately, was what we had, as I didn’t have a red filter for my torch to protect ours and any Kiwi’s night vision.

The other lights were moving along the edge of the park, but I figured we’d have just as much chance of seeing a Kiwi if we were to stay still, so we didn’t frighten it, and wait to see if it would come to us.

I don’t think it worked for anyone.

We did come across a couple of young ladies who’d been down Fushia Track and were sure they’d heard one, but had felt it was too creepy. So Pen and I walked down the path, me holding my torch at my hip to restrict its beam to just in front of us and Pen keeping her hand on my shoulder, until we reached the first lot of steps. These we sat on and waited, and had several people walk past.

Eventually, with the light drizzle and increasing breeze, we decided to return to the backpackers. We got back at 11.30pm and put the light out at midnight.

Steps = 21,620

Kilometres = 14.9