Stewart Island

Our friend Elizabeth just returned to Dunedin for the first time since December. In the meantime she was in the U.S. and then in Suriname. We convinced her to come to Stewart Island with us, so we met her in Dunedin on Tuesday. It felt nice to return to a place we were so familiar with. We spent the night at Elm Lodge (where we worked in October) before leaving Dunedin early Wednesday morning. Dunedin (45°52'28.42"S, 170°30'12.20"E) is pretty far south in NZ, but the ferry departure point in Bluff ( 46°35'54.84"S, 168°20'21.98"E) is still 3 hours further south. We just barely got on the 11:30 am ferry to Stewart Island (46°53'49.62"S, 168° 7'37.35"E).

The water separating the South Island and Stewart Island is the Foveaux Straight. The ferry was MUCH smaller than the Cook Straight ferry between the North and South Islands. The ferry to Stewart Island was a catamaran and we could see all the passengers (and the captain and crew) in the one room.



It turns out that this was the most exciting boat ride of my life. There were 2-3 meter swells with the wind against the tide. That basically means that being on this boat was like riding a roller coaster. All of the passengers even gasped and screamed and then laughed nervously together. There were at least 20 stomach-dropping falls as we went over the waves. The crossing took about 70 minutes (slightly longer than usual) and the first 30-45 were really rough. Lots of people on the boat got sick, but the three of us were ok.

When we arrived on Stewart Island the weather forecast really wasn’t looking too good for tramping. It was cloudy and windy with plenty of rain in the forecast (and snow at higher elevations). Our tramping schedule was pretty tight because Elizabeth had to be back in Dunedin on Saturday so she had to get on the early morning ferry back to Bluff. We were planning to take a water taxi to a hut and then hike to two more huts for Thursday and Friday nights. We were misinformed at the information center when the lady told us the watertaxis weren’t running that afternoon that we arrived, which put us a day behind schedule because we couldn’t start tramping that day.

Instead, we spend the night at a hostel in the little town of Oban. It’s the only town on Stewart Island and its year-round population is about 350. I think they have at least as many tourists as residents!

On Thursday morning we changed our hiking plans because of the weather and our schedule. We arranged for a water taxi to take us to a nearby island bird sanctuary, then come back a few hours later and take us to Fred’s Camp, a hut along the trail.

Ulva Island (46°55'48.25"S, 168° 7'45.86"E) is a predator-free sanctuary. No possums, stoats, rats, mice, rabbits, or deer. This makes it a great place for some of New Zealand’s more sensitive birds like the saddleback. Matt and I were excited about bird watching so we walked the trails pretty slowly and spent a long time staring into the trees. Poor Elizabeth wasn’t nearly so captivated, but insisted that she was having a good time watching us fall off the path. The weather wasn’t very good though. There was a constant light drizzle and it was cold. I don’t think the birds liked the weather much more than we did because we didn’t see as many birds as we had expected.


Elizabeth did have fun on the rope swing. What a view!

After a few hours of walking around Ulva Island we met the watertaxi to take us to Fred’s Camp (46°55'46.95"S, 167°58'39.26"E). This was exciting boat ride #2. It was a tiny little boat and the inlet was quite rough. The boat lurched wildly front to back as we went over waves and sea spray often obscured the view. Every time we smacked into a wave it was jarring to the spine.


This picture of Elizabeth and Ian (our excellent water taxi driver) hardly demonstrates the turbulence, but you can at least see that it was a miserable day in a small boat.

We made it safely to Fred’s Camp and found that there were already 5 people in the hut- three hunters and two kayakers. We knew from the DOC office that the hunters would be there but it was a fuller house than we expected. Instead of trying to hike to another hut through knee-deep mud and water, we were just going to spent two consecutive nights at Fred’s Camp. We decided we’d better get on good terms with the hunters right away since we’d be there with them for two nights and a whole day. That night cards were played and Speights was drunk until late in the night by all, so everything was ok.


Fred’s Camp during a moment of sunshine.

We slept in on Friday since the weather couldn’t seem to make up its mind. It would go between sun and hail and drizzle. We saw dolphins swim past the hut twice (going one direction then the other) but didn’t get a close enough look to see what kind they were. That afternoon we went out for a hike to look for kiwi and stretch our legs. No kiwi, but Matt found a kiwi poo and some beak holes in the ground. I found a different kiwi poo about 50 meters down the trail with more beak holes in the ground. This was just 5 minutes from our hut so we decided to sit and wait for kiwi on Friday night. We sat there in the dark in a fine drizzle listening for kiwi snuffling sounds for an hour and 15 minutes. We heard two kiwi call to each other but they were far away. Somewhat discouraged, we turned in for the night. I’d read in a book that Fred’s Camp was a good place to see kiwi, but for us it was just a good place to see kiwi poo.

A water taxi picked us up from Fred’s Camp at 7 am on Saturday morning so that Elizabeth could catch the 8 am ferry back to Bluff and then take a bus back to Dunedin. It was just after sunrise, so Matt and I asked to be dropped off at Ulva Island again. We thought we might have a chance of seeing a kiwi there and at least we’d hear and see more birds.

We started a loop around the island at 7:15 as Elizabeth headed to the ferry terminal in the water taxi. The dawn chorus was starting and we walked quietly with our eyes peeled for kiwi. Amazingly, Matt spotted one off the trail among some ferns. For a split second when he was trying to point out its location, I was terribly afraid that I wouldn’t see it at all! I saw it when it moved again and we watched for a minute or two before it disappeared over a rise. Success in less than 30 minutes on the island!

Matt decided to name the kiwi James, after his friend James Brosch who has a certain affinity for these flightless birds.

The weather was much better for this second visit to Ulva Island so we saw many more birds. I think we’re getting really good at identifying saddlebacks. We also saw 11 wekas. Wekas are also large brown ground birds so they are mistakenly identified as kiwis by the uninformed tourists.


The New Zealand Robins are very curious (and rare). They like to eat the bugs disturbed by our footsteps, and they can be attracted even closer by moving aside some leaf litter. They land within inches of you. I was moving aside leaves for one and left my hand resting on the edge of the trail while it pecked at bugs a few inches away. Then it hopped over and bit me on the knuckle! The same one later pecked at Matt’s shoe. I’m not sure if it was telling us to move more leaves or if we seemed edible.

After returning from Ulva Island we went out for lunch in Oban to celebrate our kiwi sighting. Then we did the only Geocache on Stewart Island. We had to go at low tide to keep our feet dry. The tide pools near this Geocache seemed particularly colorful and exciting. We found tons of beautiful shells and interesting critters.

On Sunday morning we caught the 8 am ferry back to Bluff. It was much smoother than our first crossing! We didn’t mind one bit. We stopped at the Tuataratarium (as Matt likes to call it) in the Southland Museum in Invercargill (46°24'19.41"S, 168°21'11.86"E) to see the tuataras then spent the rest of Sunday and Monday exploring the Catlins (eg. 46°27'2.62"S, 169°49'12.73"E). We met Elizabeth for lunch on Tuesday in Dunedin and now we're back in Waimate. Phew! Thanks Mom, Dad & other devoted fans for reading the whole thing.

Carrie