The journey from Milford Sound to the Otago Peninsula, just outside the city of Dunedin, turned out to be quicker than expected, some 6 or 7 hours. The campervan was feeling reliable and with our top speed of 100kph and little traffic on the road (sometimes we felt like the only people driving in New Zealand) we made great time.

The Otago Peninsula is renowned for its wildlife including albatross, penguin, seals and sea lions which we intended to see! Our early arrival time meant that on our first evening we were able to head to a beach where blue-eyed penguins come ashore at dusk to rest after a days fishing. We arrived at the beach around 6pm and waited, a seal turned up to entertain us for a few minutes and we waited some more. Night was drawing in around us, the light was fading badly and the cold began to bite. We waited a bit longer and just when we were about to leave after 2 hours of waiting, just as the light had almost failed, a group of around 8 penguins finally popped up out of the water and waddled across the beach. The light was so bad that we could just about make out their silhouettes, hence no photos. Gemma was pleased that we had persevered, Craig was sure that we wouldn't be doing it again.

First thing in the morning we were up (after a scrambled egg breakfast) and driving towards Larnach Castle, New Zealand's only Castle, built 1871. It had spectacular tower views of the peninsula (check out our photos) which were quite breathtaking and beautiful gardens with an Alice in Wonderland theme. The views afforded at the castle couldn't be overstated and were the most beautiful scenery we'd seen so far in New Zealand.

After the castle we went around the peninsula checking out its numerous beaches, some of which are great for sea lion spotting. The beaches are sandy, but devoid of much human activity which encourages wild sea lions to come onto the beach to sleep and rest. After a scramble down a 30 metre sandbank at Sandfly Bay to reach the beach we weren't disappointed, finding two sets of sea lions one set sleeping on the beach, the others roaring and fighting amongst each other. We got within 10 metres of these enormous beasts and the buzz was unique! Then we went to Allan's Beach and saw more sea lions, camouflaged as rocks or sleeping on piles of seaweed. It was easy to walk right past them without realising it.

Our time in Otago over, we jumped back into the campervan for the next leg of our journey.