South Island Part Two ( I think there will be lots of parts!)

We left Wesport early so we could visit a seal colony. It was a bit late in the year so we didn't see many, but the walk there and back was as good as the seals. The amount of vegetation on the West Coast is truly amazing, and different as you head south. The 'flex' (pointy things), described by a gardener for the Department of Conservation, turned out to be flax. Sadly we were too late in the year to see it flowering, but it was still pretty impressive.

 The fur seals were no longer white and particulalry pretty, but they were fun to watch clambering over the rocks and swimming in a large rock pool. You can just about see one in this picture.

 We saw lots of these Wekas - very friendly non-flying, indigenous birds - on our journey down the West Coast.

I think I might have said before that birds didn't need to fly as there were no predators until they were introduced by the Maori and the Europeans. There are very few native birds here. I bought a bird book when we arrived and was surprised how thin it was! Many of the common ones eg sparrows, chaffinches,green finches etc were introduced to eat insects on crops, though it turned out they ate rather too much seed too!

We carried on to Greymouth and stayed in another Top 10 site which was large, a bit clinical but very easy. We met some NZ bikers who were 'on tour' with a 996 Porsche Targa and a 'dad' ( too old to bike any more, in a support campervan. Surprisingly, no pictures of the Porsche, but Graham did get to sit in it and was offered a drive (declined because he'd already had two beers!).  Really nice meal in an Aussie bar that night and then on to Fox Glacier. This was a long drive with several stops. The first was at Pancake Rocks, so called because.....well, you decide....

It's quote difficult to see here, but the soft layers of rock are being eroded away, leaving behind the hard 'pancakes' piled high. At high tide the water comes up through blow holes in the rocks and is said to be very spectacular. Like us, you will have to use you imagination.

We decided to drive down the coast to find a quiet spot for lunch and came across a fisherman an otherwise deserted beach. This is, apparently an elephant fish and he was going to eat it! It was about a meter long! I suspect this was where the sand flies got us! 

And so on to Fox Glacier....