First stop on our journey across to Te Anau. These are the Moeraki Boulders - completely round, huge rocks scattered all along the beach. More bizarre!

Today we explored this weird and quirky little town, population about the equivalent of Knaphill and Brookwood, or King's Norton. It was the centre of the meat-packing industry in the mid 19th century, and those Victorians were never shy about building good, in-your-face neoclassical banks and civic monuments...!

We went to overlook this beach to see rare yellow-eyed penguins returning to their nests. There are only 4000 left in the world, so the local council closes this beach at 3pm to protect them, and you view from the cliff above. There were 8 or 9 fur seals lounging about, fighting, being cute when we arrived...that's the brown blobs in this stunning photo! Then excitingly one - just one! - penguin came running up the beach...yes, I missed him...but Andy got a blurr...

Glorious sunshine now - see, you never know who's reading your blog...!

That's how the Lonely Planet guidebook describes the road out to Akaroa, and it's well justified! The photo is the view from our apartment terrace...not bad for starters, New Zealand! What else have you got in store for us? (Maybe a tad more sunshine?!)