We were up with plenty of time this morning (amazing how its so much easier to get up when there’s something you want to do awaiting) before arriving at Cadbury world at our report time on the dot.
As you walk in there’s various displays on the history behind chocolate production as well as Cadburys itself.

For example, as with Speights, Cadburys was founded by an Englishman by the name of John Cadbury, of who was at one point the official chocolate maker to the queen. It was as a result of this royal connection that the colour purple has become a trade mark of the Cadbury brand as the queen saw fit to ‘assign’ the royal colour to her own chocolate maker. This stuck and is obviously widely recognised today.

This particular factory here in Dunedin was originally a chocolate and biscuit making factory founded and owned by a local before eventually being bought out by Cadburys. Today the factory produces the most confectionary products of any in the world and can boast as being the home of the ‘Dream’ bar that is now produced worldwide, of which was the idea of an employee still working here today.

So after looking around the various displays and sampling a cocoa bean (which is really bitter) our guide arrived and began by assigning us all a hair net along with a plastic bag (to collect our goodies along the way). He even gave us a freebie to get us started (a Cadburys Fish bar).

Finally we were told that we would not be allowed to take cameras into the factory itself and that the giant chocolate fountain (similar to the one in Willy Wonka) was broken so would not be running today. As a result however we would be getting a free king sized chocolate bar each at the end of the tour. Fair enough, that suits me! (look at chocolate or eat it. Tough choice!).

Our tour consisted of a walk through of the factory and an explanation of the various stages of chocolate production. This was mainly done via DVD presentations however due to various health and safety restrictions preventing us from accessing the area’s ourselves.

All in all, during the tour we saw a box of Cadburys Moro bars being boxed and one box of Crunchies come down the production line past us, other than that the machinery was either not working that day or we were not allowed to see it.

Slightly disappointing really and not what either of us had imagined the tour being like. On the plus side however the tour guide was a nice guy and wasn’t shy in giving away chocolate bars as he would reel off various facts about the company before firing the question at you a few minutes later. Those that remembered the answer got a bar each.

For example, the percentage of cocoa in Cadburys dark energy bars is 40 whereas in Dairy Milk its 25. The melting point of chocolate is 35 degrees…

This quickly became a battle of shouting the loudest.

Let’s just say we got one or two freebies!

Interestingly our guide here at Cadbury World had never heard of Cadbury producing biscuits of any kind (“We stopped biscuit production in the 70’s” was his response when asked if they produced any here) and had also never heard of Cadburys Fingers.

Never heard of Cadburys Chocolate Caramel Digestives?? This guy is missing out BIG TIME.

Overall the guide made the tour quite enjoyable (along with the bag of free chocolate) but it was not as good as we had imagined beforehand unfortunately.

So after departing from Cadbury we decided to head to the I-Site to see what the practicality of doing some of the Otago Central Rail Trail would be. The now abandoned railway runs the from Clyde to Middlemarch and was used by the gold mining industry. Obviously now that all the gold has been excavated the railway is no longer in use and lay abandoned for years until the Department of Conservation decided to spruce it up and it is now used by trampers and cyclist year round. With stunning scenery and a relatively flat track, due to the fact the train could not run too steeply, the track is really popular. Unfortunately, yet again, the weather was not on our side and as we drove to Middlemarch to see about hiring bikes we were soon confronted with snow and sleet. The snow looked about a foot deep in some places, although the roads were clear we didn’t really fancy cycling in it as we have no waterproof trousers or anything so our plans went down the pan.

We decided to head straight to Omaru where, with any luck, we might actually see some penguins!! Along the route we stopped at the Moeraki Boulders which are on a beach. Most of the boulders are perfect spheres which have been uncovered as the banks have eroded away, and at some point in the past there were hundreds of them of all sizes but unfortunately all those small enough to carry have been taken and probably placed in peoples rockeries and gardens!! So only those too big to carry remain, which most people (us included!) climb on for a good piccie! The tide was in (or coming in) when we arrived so not all of them were clearly visible, but we had a good laugh at trying to pose with them whilst trying to avoid the massive waves crashing in. At least we had the sense to remove our shoes and roll our trousers up, unlike some Indian chap who attempted to run to a boulder for a quick picture without getting his jeans and trainers wet….soaked to the knee and if you look at the picture of me on top of a boulder you can see my amusement!

Once we thawed and dried our toes we set off again to get to Omaru in time to hopefully see both the penguins coming ashore. We checked the guide and figured we could go and watch the Yellow eyed coming ashore for an hour or so and then make a dash to the blue penguin visitor centre and watch them coming ashore aswel…fingers crossed!

We parked up at the yellow eyed colony and walked along the viewing platform which was raised up from the beach, unlike previous ones we had visited. As we looked down at the beach we spied yet more seals and sea lions but no penguins yet. The signs around us recommended using binoculars to view the penguins down below so we began to panic that we would miss them again! As we stood there some kind of guide approached us and asked if we had spotted anything yet. He explained that as the tide was so far in tonight we might not be so lucky but did mention the fact that where we were standing is usually a walkway to some of the penguins that nest nearby. I was quite shocked to hear that as we were probably around 10+ metres above the beach and I didn’t realise penguins would climb this high to nest. Anyway after the man left we carried on gazing down to the beach with our eyes peeled. Some caught the corned of my eye nearby and I soon realised that there was a penguin just below us in the bush, ruffling his feathers. We couldn’t believe our luck and with no one around us we watched in peace for a while before he disappeared into what we thought was his nest.

A few people came by and stood with us for a while before losing interest and shuffling off back to their cars. As we carried on gazing down at the beach, wondering if we would be lucky enough to spy another pingu nearby, out popped our little friend from the bush and stood in front of us! We were both so shocked he was so close that we stood and watched in awe as he began scuttling up the path next to us. He stopped abruptly and we worried that he may have spotted us and was preparing to escape before we could get a picture, but he simply stood there, taking in his surroundings and cleaning his feathers. We must have watched and photographed him for about half an hour before I attempted to drag Mark away as I was worried that we were preventing him from going back to his nest. As I backed away I heard a loud sckwawk next to me and when I investigated I discovered another penguin in the shrubbery. This one was much shyer than our little friend and hid behind the branches so we couldn’t quite see him. Anyway after I pried Mark away and we began to walk back we looked back and our little friend was gone out of sight so hopefully we didn’t scare him too much. He would have fared much worse if a group of chinkys had spied him anyway :o)

We were so pleased with our encountered we just hoped that we weren’t too late to see the little blue penguins coming home. Lady luck was on our side, for once, and we were soon sat in a amphitheatre type place in the visitor centre at the blue penguin colony, waiting for the little guys to come ashore. The visitor centre was set up by the Department of Conservation in order to protect the penguins, therefore no photography was allowed (as the flash scares them) and the guides make sure everyone stays hushed and in their seats (so everyone can see!). They have also provided the penguins with some nesting boxes and they make sure no predators enter the colony, i.e stoats, cats, dogs etc. When they began their work they had 33 breeding pairs and by 2006 this had increased to 133, they also count the penguins in each night for one hour so they can give people an idea how many are currently using the boxes etc. The night before they had had 45 in the hour so we were pretty hopeful! Before too long a ‘raft’ of penguins were ascending the ramp in front of us, all the while battling with the waves which were again, ferocious! The poor little things were trying desperately to waddle up the rocks before another huge wave came over them and swept them away. Thankfully the waves weren’t managing to reach up to where we were sitting although the lady guide did say that sometimes the sea is so fierce it can hit the back panelling behind us! In the hour we were there we counted in 49 altogether but more could come home through the night.

We drove to our campsite that night, ecstatic that we had managed to see both the penguins in their natural habitat. Think I forgot to mention above that the yellow eyed penguin is the rarest in the world, whilst the blue penguin is the smallest.