We took the opportunity of being in South Island’s largest city, Christchurch, to do some shopping for items to use in the campervan. We also shopped at a large grocery store. We are really limited in space in the refrigerator, or I would have stocked up for a week. As it is, we can only shop a couple of days at a time. We did buy a small cooler and some ice bricks for beverages. We're good to go!

The four hour drive to Oamaru was scenic; lots of pastoral farm land. Oamaru is a pretty town which was settled by Europeans in the 1850s. The town prospered due to refrigerated meat shipping. The town is known for its “whitestone” buildings made of limestone which are still standing.

As soon as we checked in to our Top 10 Holiday Park, we booked a guided tour to see the Oamaru’s best attraction, their penguin colonies. We cooked a quick dinner and met the tour at 6:45. First, we toured through town seeing the imposing white buildings and learning about the local history, including the town cemetery which our guide described as the “dead center of town.”

At dusk, we went to Bushy Beach to watch the Yellow-eyed penguins return from their day at sea to feed their chicks. The Yellow-eyed penguins are among the world’s rarest. We saw 6 of them; there are only 30 of them that nest in the area. Bob was able to get some photos from our hide several hundred yards away. I hope we get to see more of them as we tour the South Island.

Then the tour went to the Little Blue penguin colony; these penguins are the most numerous in town. We waited in a grandstand under protection from the rain until it was almost dark, and suddenly they all swam into shore at about the same time. They were so adorable as they scurried up the bank in single file. Many of them had mates patiently awaiting their return, and the spouse would pop out of its little nesting box as their returning mate would arrive. They seemed to say, “Honey, I’m home.” I was just enchanted watching them; we saw over a hundred of them arrive. As we left the complex at 9:30 we saw many other Little Blues come ashore in a different spot; they would walk right up to us. Unfortunately we were not allowed to photograph the Little Blues.