Cape Kidnapper

We spent a great day at Cape Kidnapper. Dave had a 9 am tee time at the golf course, and he went out as a singleton, with me riding along as photographer. The front 9 is largely inland, but has the odd view (below).

The back nine has a lot of spectacular views. The two below were taken from the same spot, just turned different directions.

I had fun shotting photos, and occasionally I even included Dave in the picture - in this one he's chipping on to the green.

We were done before 1 pm, and then had a sandwich sitting on the clubhouse porch, enjoying the view some more.

Just before 2 we were picked up at the golf clubhouse to take a tour to see the gannet colony at the end of the Cape. People can't drive there on their own - with good reason if you saw the roads, which, as well as being scary, are through a "station" (sheep and cattle ranch). Our bus took us out to the gannets, which nest clustered tightly together (see behind us - you get up close to them).The baby gannets get to be larger than their parents (notice some of the fluffy birds are just as big as mom or dad), apparently because they migrate over the Tasmin Sea to Australia as adolescents, and require the extra body weight.

There is another gannet colony down on the flat part of the rocks below, and a final one down on the beach (no photo of the beach one).

Quite fascinating birds, and fairly large. The odd seagull among them looks pretty tiny.

Once again it is a bright sunny warm day, with only a slight breeze. A cyclone was originally forecast for tomorrow, but apparently has veared off and won't hit Wellington (which is where we head for tomorrow). So our luck appears to be holding.