Family holiday on Tiritiri Matangi 2017 pt 2
On Saturday morning, the first morning of the holiday I was up early as normal and I got to read my large Tuatara book in peace and quiet which was nice before people including the boys got up.
As there are currently no DOC volunteers on Tiri all the volunteers staying overnight have to do their bit to help out, so we are cleaning and refilling the water troughs around the lighthouse. There is 6 of them and took us about an hour, and the boys loved doing there bit to help the endangered birds. I then headed down at 10-10am to do my guiding bit for the day, and I had a great trip with lots of birds including several kokako – shame Nadia was not here today, but this clearly demonstrates that Tiri is not a zoo and it is up to the animals if they want to be seen or not.
Robin maning the end of the hose, Luke is in charge of the tap end.
Working hard.
At 12-30 it was amusing to pass Julianne and the boys with my guiding group as she was heading in the opposite direction back down to the beach. The guiding finished around 1pm and I dashed back down to Hobbs Beach to join Julianne, Robin and Luke for lunch. A relaxing couple of hours was spent at the beach swimming, reading and playing beach cricket before heading back up to the bunkhouse.
Julianne spent the afternoon starting a new tapestry which she has not been able to do for a while, while I did even more reading and more games with the kids.
The boys playing cars while I read my book in the sun near a damn out the back of bunkhouse
The excitement of Tiri has worn out a little man while I read my tuatara book.
More frisbee
Setting sun on Tiri
Julianne went out with Robin this night while I stayed with Luke, and they saw two tuatara and excitingly for Robin a real live wild kiwi – which is great news. The main thing Robin wanted to see was a kiwi and it’s great that was achieved only on the second night.
Sunday was a similar routine in the morning with reading and then guiding.
Luke playing in the morning with his cars waiting for others to wake up.
During the afternoon I spent more time reading my detailed tuatara book while Julianne disappeared to have some alone time. That night I went out and saw 4 tuatara, I now know a lot more about tuatara and where they are nesting here on Tiri but no luck on finding any kiwi.
A tuatara, photo taken using red light