a bit about the place iv been calling home for 6 months...

My friend wrote a beautiful piece about Kaikoura....it's beautiful and very true :-) Iv added some of my recent pictures below...
Click here to read it for yourself :-)

Are you ready for the dusky display?

This is why i smile everyday (there are other reasons of course, a great team, wicked scenery and warm sunshine) but when these wonderful creatures decide to dance above the ocean i can't help but watch in awe! they are simply crazy...and bring smiles to the faces of people from all around the world everyday...we owe them so much!

 

beautiful birds and magificent mountains...

We've had a fresh coating of snow on the Kaikoura mountain range, its simply stunning makes the early mornings much easier :-)

A great day, crisp and fresh, clear blue skies and sunshine and some wicked wildlife. 500+ dusky dolphins leaping and jumping very close to the coastline and some beautiful birds...
We were lucky enough to see 4 species of albatross on our tour today, they included:
1. The wandering albatross, with an all white head and a pale pink beak with a creamy tip.
2. The Salvin's albatross with a grey neck and a black tip to its lower bill.
3. The NZ White-capped albatross with a white head and neck and a black patch from its eye to its bill.
4. Finally the Buller's albatross which was a treat as we hardly see this species, it is endemic to New Zealan, has a silvery white forehead and a small white crescent below and behind the eye, its beautiful and i think its my new favourite albert!

I managed to take a few snaps, focus and exposure isn't the best but hopefully you can see the difference (they are in order as listed above)...iv also sneaked in a shot of our beautiful view....man ill miss it!

a close encounter...

This species of dolphin has to be my new favourite, its the orca, also known as the killer whale sometimes due to its size, however its actually the worlds largest dolphin. This was a magic moment where we watched as two bull orcas steamed along at the surface of the water in Kaikoura. My boss Dennis Buurman managed to capture the moment on camera. My friend Ed also managed to get some underwater footage on the works GoPro. The orca decided to swim right below our dinghy, the water visibility was amazing and we watched as it decided to roll just below the surface onto its side and then back, it was simply awesome, a moment i will never forget. Knowing that they are completely wild and doing their own thing made the moment even more special! we're just pointing in its direction incase you couldnt see it! haha the picture was for thed olphin encounter website hehe. ilovemylife :-)

don't let your dreams be dreams :-)

So i had a really active dream that we were on a raft looking for orca, taking pictures, i woke up with a crazy head and neck ache, iv started dreaming more and more about marine mammals, one dream involved us finding sperm whale in a swimming pool!

Anyway back to my day...after a morning out with the duskies i returned to continue my land duties, then my ears pricked up as i heard the word 'orca' on the radio. I havn't seen them for about a month now, they're were back, and on a Saturday again, its Orca day! I asked Cara from resrvations if she had heard it too, she said, no but she'd listen out!

Then Cara came running through grabbed me and said "lets ask the boss if we can get out there" Ed was also on our side, Dennis said " well if you can persuade south bay at the jetty to get the rubber duck (dinghy boat) ready then we'll see"...I left Cara to work her magic while i continued with land, i then had a meeting when suddenly my phone started to ring, texts coming through, had to cut the meeting short, WE WERE OFF TO CATCH UP WITH THE BLACK AND WHITES!

the next thing i know we're whizzing down to south bay, jumping into a dinghy and putting on our life jackets...we picked up speed and squeeled and screamed at what was happening. The sky was grey and the sea slight. At first we stopped and found a dead dusky at the surface, being eaten by wondering albatross, giant petrels, cape petrels and blue shark. The blue sharks were stunning as they swam circles beneath the surface of the water.

We continued on and sure enough spotted a huge dorsal fin of a bull orca. We were at there level on this little boat, they were right beside us, and below us, just a wicked moment i will never forget. They were headed south and moving quickly...it was awesome. I managed to get a few pictures of the whole journey...

An incredible sunrise followed by an equally incredible day!

I'll admit it was pretty tough to get out of bed at 5am this morning, as soon as we got onto the ocean the sky was the focus of everybodys attention, just stunning. The sunrise out here off the coast of Kaikoura is amazing, pinks, oranges, reds and yellows lit up the sky. We started to encounter a few dolphins, beginning to pod up. I couldn't help but get a quick picture of the moment, but it doesn't do it justice...its stored in my memory though forever :-) as we prepared the swimmers for their swim the sun began to rise, they all slipped into the crystal clear water quickly surrounded by a very curious pod of 200 + dusky dolphins, with the odd fur seal drifting by, and albatross flying close overhead. One guy took his snorkel out put both fists in the air and shouted "this is awsome man" we watched as the dolphins created silhouettes against the mackerel sky, jumping and splashing. It was beautiful.

Yesterday was similar, the morning was stunning, it was one of our customers first times ever on a boat on the open ocean, he chose a great day! i said "isn't it amazing?" he replied "it's so wonderful it hurts my heart"....i thought what a lovely thing to say, he was speechless :-).

I had a funny feeling id see something big today, as soon as i woke up i thought to myself - i want to see a whale, as i hadn't had a whale fix for a while!

Throughout the day we had no sign of any whales, but huge numbers of dolphin. On our final trip i rounded up the talk and people thanked me for the information, i looked upto the helm and Mal (another guide) was peering through a large pair of binoculars....that normally means somethings on the horizon....so we started to make our way back to base, i was just returning the microphone when Mal mentioned there had been a sighting of a sperm whale and a blue whale in the area. I crossed everything and watched the ocean.

...Then sure enough this huge blow was spotted at 9 o'clock on the port side, a Blue whale was gracing us with its presence, the largest mammal on the planet right there with a backdrop of the mountains. It was about half a mile away so i was unable to get my camera in time to get a picture but i watched as a huge back rolled at the surface eventually showing a tiny dorsal fin.

The blue whale is a cosmopolitan species found in most oceans it is described as gigantic but graceful with a maximum length of 33.6m! Its blow can reach 9-12m and its straight up! It then disappeared and i scanned the horizon again, i spotted it again at 7 o'clock towards the back of the boat, gosh they can move, they don't hang around! The animal blew 3 more times and then vanished....awesome!

We all smiled and continued with the journey home, the sea was slight, very calm, perfect conditions...then i spotted another blow at 12 o'clock dead ahead of us...this time characteristics of a sperm whale, bushy blow out to the left hand side...we watched as this 20-55 ton whale breathed at the surface for a few seconds before taking a deep dive and showing us his tail fluke...it was such a treat! i apologised to the passengers about my excitement and explained to them, this is the reason i wanted to work here!


Today made me realise that if you wake up with a wishful thought, however big or small, ridiculous or unlikely it seems just hold onto it and you might just be rewarded!
:-)

A treat from the deep :-)

Today we had an awsome sighting of a sperm whale, a female because of it's rounded dorsal fin came to the surface to take in some air and then sank back down into the depths of the ocean. We were 15minutes into our trip, i had just finished a snorkelling lesson on the back deck when Jess interrupted her talk about the Kaikoura canyon to explain that their was a sperm whale up ahead. I was so excited and sure enough i captured her breathing at the surface, just incredible, like a dinosaur of the deep. I frantically reached for my camera - NO MEMORY CARD! as i had taken it out the previous night to upload pictures, i panicked a little as they only stay at the surface between dives for about 8-10 minutes, then i realised i had a spare, luckily!

They have an angled bushy blow out to the left. They have wrinkly skin (like me!). These guys prefer deep water greater than 2000m near areas where there are deep under water canyon systems like Kaikoura, where these sperm whales are resident all year round. There is no other place in the world where this species is routinely found near to the coast.

The sperm whale diet consists of mainly squid, but they will also feed on sharks and rays. They feed using clicks and echolocation to locate and possibly stun their prey. After a few moments at the surface the sperm whale took a huge dive. Unfortunately she did not show her beautiful tail fluke, but she disappeared as if by magic. The dives can last up to an hour, so if we had been 10 minutes later we would have missed her breathing at the surface. We would have been completely oblivious to feeding beneath us.

As our tour continued, i couldn't help but wear a huge smile on my face, i explained to the customers that in the 4 and a half months iv been working here i have never seen as sperm whale on one of our tours, usually they are found much further offshore about 6-10 miles, so this was a real treat.

We spent the rest of the day watching 500+ dusky dolphins being extremely acrobatic at the surface, iv named it 'dolphin fireworks!' they put on an incredible display. The Easterly winds picked up for our afternoon tours, the ocean turned into an incredible natural rollercoaster.

So that was my day and it was fabulous and i didn't stop smiling. I'll never forget what my dad told me before i came here "take a camera everywhere with you Jen, you never know what might appear" anything can happen keep your eyes open! x

An evening spent in search of penguins :-)

At work we had heard that a species of penguins not often found in this area was seen down by the cliffs near an area called sharks tooth. So my friends and i made it our mission to head off for the evening and find this little guy.

We made our way accross the base of the cliffs, making sure we were not going to be there at high tide. There was a stench of seals in the air, and sure enough we crossed many on our way, mindful to stay a good distance as the New Zealand fur Seal can be fairly dangerous.

Gregory went off to check out a small cave, he told us to all take a look and sure enough in the safety of a small dark cave we came accross a small penguin. We realised it was a Little Blue penguin. This is the smallest species of penguin. The Blue penguin is the only species of penguin to come ashore after dark to its nest or to moult. At sea they feed on fish close to the surface but they can dive to depths of 50m. This was a great sighting as iv only really seen them at sea. The little guy looked very lonely and cold, but im sure he was fine. The Department of Conservation have given the blue penguin a "lower risk - near threatened" status as the population in areas not protected from predators has been declining. We left this little blue in peace for the night. Some of the team continued along to look for the other species which had beed seen in the area a few days ago.

"guys iv found it" we heard a shout from Stephane, we clambered over ridges and limstone crevices, by this time it was getting dark, and we could still smell the seals. We put on our torches and helped eachother along, the moonlit ocean looked stunning.

Eventually under a small eroded limestone feature we found him, he was very cute and fluffy. There was some uncertainty as to which species he was, after a week of debating on encounter kaikoura's facebook page it was decided he was a juvenile Fiordland Crested penguin. The juvenile has thin eyebrow and whitish chin and throat. They come ashore to moult in caves on rocky areas mainly in the South Westland and Fiordland, they are rare and endemic to New Zealand.

I've decided penguins are one of my favourite types of birds, they always make me smile. We managed to get a few pictures and then realised it was pretty late and dark, and we had gone further than we expected. We knew there were some steps back up towards the peninsula somewhere so we went in that direction, through grasses, accross pebble beaches where shells glistened in the flashlight of our phones and head torches. Eventually we found the steps and luckily didn't have to dodge too many seals. We climbed upto the peninsula. It was a great walk, a great way to spend an evening. Its amazing to think that these little penguins just sit there under the cliffs and surrounded by the walls of dark caves waiting for the sun to rise for the next day. It made me realise that there is so much you can still see beneath the stars, you just need to go to bed later and open your eyes.