Blue Penguin Colony

I hade to return soon to the Blue Penguin colony at Friendly Bay because I had booked the "behind the scenes tour" there. In contrast to the Yellow-Eye Penguin colony the colony of the little Blues was human protected and the birds partly nested in manmade nest boxes. The tour started at 7pm in the early evening. Our guide guided us trough the colony, told us about it's history, explained us the aim of providing a safe predator free habitat for the Penguins and showed us a nest box as well as a few month old chicken, the last which didn't leave the nest up to know. That was the first time I had luck on my journey. The second time, what I didn't know at that moment, will come soon!

Anyway, after the tour trough the nesting area our guide offered us to go for a short walk on the coastal walkway, which was, how you know, washed away and started right behind the colony. Of course I sized the opportunity and I didn't regret, how I later realized! In any case it's a pity that this walkway no longer exist. The first part of it, witch I saw, was really great! There was a lot to see and to discover.

I saw pillow lava forming which forms when molten basalt flows over the sea floor. Water quenches the outer margin, forming a glassy crust. The center cools more slowly and is more crystalline. In three dimensions the pillows have a tube-like form and "nested" one on top of another. In addition, in the fossils, which I found on my tour at Boatmans Harbour, was limestone between the ancient pillows representing original sea-floor sediments.

Then the way lead me along the coast and all of a sudden I saw right beside the walkway the entrance of a penguin nest hole. So I saw a natural penguin nest too, not just the nest boxes and I thought it really starts well my travel: It was the second time, I had luck, isn't it? Anyway, I didn't know what was in store for me at that evening of my first travel day and also in other places!

It was not so easy to take the photos of the penguin nest and the pillow lava, because it was already getting darker. That's why I thought at this moments, that I had to be on the terraces on Friendly Bay before dark. The spectacle of the home coming penguins starts short after the sunset and the commentary begins before this time, you know. After having taken the photo of the penguin nest, I decided to go just a little further and turning then back. So I came around the next corner and arrived on a stony beach, where I found a petrified shell. It was just there where I entered the beach and it almost looked like somebody would have placed it there for me.

I picked it up and when I straitened up I suddenly saw two about 60 centimeter high adult Yellow-Eye Penguin. They where just standing there and waiting, about 20 Meters away from me! I slowly took my camera and took a photo, before I tried to approach. I approached very very slowly, what was not so easy on that beach with not sized stones laying around everywhere. I came close enough that I could take a photo of the whole penguin and turned then back because I was sure, that this bird was not as happy as I, when it saw me!

Anway, I took my photo without flesh (the flesh scares the birds) and turned then back to the colony, where the spectacle of the homecoming birds began soon.