Huka Falls and Lake Taupō

Our bus trip was a little slow due to construction. It doesn’t matter what country you are in: summer is road repair season. It allowed us time to watch New Zealand go by, outside the bus windows.

I tried during the entire two weeks to get a good photo of the domesticated deer. Deer are the most recent wild animal to be successfully domesticated, and that is a huge achievement for New Zealand, who is responsible for the largest deer farming industry in the world. Large herds of Red Deer were seen along every stretch of highway, but never when I could get a good shot. I think the following is the only photo of a deer I have from the whole trip:

Of course there were many more cattle and sheep than deer. There were so many sheep that they became expected and I did not think to take photos of them till much later. Here are the only two photos of sheep I have from the trip. These two are from the South Island, you can tell because of the mountains.

New Zealand apparently has the highest density of sheep of any country in the world. There are over 23 million sheep in the country, and only 5.7 million humans. This discussion of animals led us to wonder what mammals are native to New Zealand. Our tour guide Josh told us later that there is only one native land mammal: bats. The only other native mammals are marine life: seals, dolphins, and whales. Every other mammal in New Zealand has been introduced, and often becomes a pest.

We got through the construction and were treated with a special stop to see Huka Falls (and use the public toilets). We didn’t get to see the final falls, which is a higher drop and is more dramatic. The part we saw was a series of small falls in a narrow river canyon that makes it look like a raging river. The stunning glacial blue and white froth made this stop worth so much for the relatively easy access off the highway.

I continued to have camera issues with overexposure and blurriness. This is a familiar problem and I have yet to discover what causes my Tamron lenses to have a shelf life, but there it is. My current lens is old, and is disintigrating just like my last one did.

We hopped back onto the bus for the final leg of the journey into the town of Taupō, on the shores of Lake Taupō. This was a lovely resort-type destination and the hotel was classy and comfortable. For Pedro and me, the Millenium Hotel in Taupō was our favourite of the entire trip.

Near our room was a small dock that attracted birds. In the grey, wet, dark afternoon, I had difficulty getting photos, but I think I found at least one more bird to add to my list.

Separate from the sunburn, I had developed a nasal drip and a bit of a cough. I felt absolutely fine: no headache, no sore throat, no fever. We assumed it was allergies. I don’t get allergies, so I’m naive about how to treat or diagnose it. But we had a free evening and went out to a pharmacy to pick up some cough drops, and when we passed a liquor store, found a bottle of local wine too. Naturally. We kicked back and relaxed in the unwelcoming weather. I began working on a blog post.

The improved weather somehow reminded us that we were hungry. Pedro went out and walked down the waterfront to Two Mile Bay Sailing Club and picked up two personal pizzas for us, and had a beer while he waited for them to cook. He sent a photo to me in the room, still working on the blog post. We opened the wine when he got back.

The balcony dried out surprisingly fast, and we sat out there and ate pizza and drank wine and I kept working on my blog. Pedro kept taking photos.

The health effects of sunburn and cough had wiped me out, so I went to bed early. I snapped this shot of Pedro outside and texted it to him and said goodnight:

Bird count: I had already spotted Mallards and Black Swans in Hobbiton, so one new bird makes a total of 14 New Zealand birds.