Ok, that title is a little misleading we have done lots of educational things but today was a focus on learning. Part of our reason for coming wasn’t just that we’re weirdo movie people but also because New Zealand has so many things to learn about. Today we did just that. We spent our morning at the Kiwi Birdlife Park (http://kiwibird.co.nz/kiwi/). Brandon found it on his morning jog yesterday and we knew we had to go. It’s a privately funded park that has a kiwi breeding program that releases the Brown Kiwi back into the wild. But it is so much more than that.
Our first stop was the Kea bird habitat and we’re met by T.C. The Kea and his friend, I don’t know his name. Aidan had seen a Kea in the wild at the Tasman Glacier which was amazing, but this was different. We were literal inches from him and could touch him if we wanted to (we didn’t). Kea are know to be a bit cheeky so it was fun to be up close and personal with them for a bit watching them hop, climb, and maneuver around there habitat.
After the Kea we head back for the Kiwi feeding at 10am. Brown Kiwi are nocturnal so their Kiwi house is completely dark and your eyes need time to adjust. We were met with this sign and I was worried we weren’t going to see any Kiwi.
WRONG! Very, very, VERY wrong. We were wrong about our assumption that we weren’t going to see any Kiwi. Let me paint a picture for you.
A dark room with red lights so humans can see but Kiwi can’t. This mimics night time so they will come out for all to see. First we see the male Kiwi pecking about looking for food. He is walking about searching hunting. What’s this the female appears. Also pecking about for food. As she nears the male his attention turns to her. He chases her. She turns and walks away. He follows her. She turns away. Eventually though she becomes distracted by pecking about and BOOM! Kiwi mating right before our eyes. Aidan whispers, “I think they should get a room.” Go ahead chuckle it’s funny. He also though he should turn away. But that wouldn’t be the last time the deed was done in our presence. When the kind lady came in to talk with us before she fed them, IT happened again. Only to the embarrassment of the male who fell off mid mating. There was a bit of a laugh and off she went to put their food in the home.
After our Kiwi foray we walked the rest of the park looking at other birds and wildlife from around New Zealand and even some of the sub-Antarctic islands
After the Kiwi Birdlife Park we headed down to the lakefront to the Underwater Observatory. It wasn’t much but it was cool when we decided to feed the fish and ducks. My favorite was the Scaup Ducks. They are a beautiful black color but under water they look like they are silver.
There were other things that we saw but I like the ducks so that’s all the pictures I have.ok not completely true here’s what else was in the lake that we saw.
After all of that the boys unhitched the bikes and went for a ride around Queenstown and Lake Wakatipu.
I will leave you with a few Legends of the Lake.
Wandering a Lighted Path 
Aidan is too funny!! I love that you guys stumbled across this place and were able to just go spend the day! Wow!
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It was awesome and that kid cracks me up. I will tell you more of what he said when the mating was going on when we talk.
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