South Island Road Trip Day 10

Day 10: Travel day through the Southern Tip

This was a pretty cool day because we were able to drive through the Southern part of the South Island. Originally we were just going to go straight to Dunedin, but decided to take a little detour on the way. We drove for most of the day just looking out the window and enjoying the rainy (yet mysterious) views, but also had two main stops. We first stopped at the petrified forest at Curio Bay which is about 170 million years old. After reading some of the signs it said that the forest had been turned into stone in just a matter of months after being impregnated with a massive amount of silica. Courtney is a geology major so she was in rock heaven and got wicked excited when she found a leaf fossil. They say this forest of rocks was proof that New Zealand was once part of Gondwanaland, which is crazy! A funny moment was when we totally thought we saw a penguin and then as we were taking pictures it flew away..haha not a penguin at all. Unfortunately we were never in the right place to really see them and once in Dunedin all the beaches where they nested cost a ton of money and you could only see them on a tour. Totally silly in my opinion, but they gotta make money i suppose. Our next stop was at the Nugget Point Light House. It is funny how the lonely planet and others only mention this place in passing, because it was very awesome. It was cold and windy as we made our way along this winding path to the edge of the steepest cliff where this tiny little light house rested. At onoe point we were able to look down on the path and see a bunch of fur seals playing at the bottom. They were really cool, but only specks to our eyes. Once we got to the edge of the cliff, the view was amazing with jutted rocks coming out of the water and seaweed swaying lazily in the waves surrounding each formation. Birds were abundant and flying between them as some waves crashed and sprayed fountains. It reminded me a little of our three sisters expedition only we were so high up looking down over them all. My camera died on this day, so I will have to use a few pictures that some friends took!