Tiritiri Matangi Island

Calm waters upon our arrive

Bird feeding station for Bellbirds and Stitchbirds

Kereru/Native wood pigeon

Tui

The lighthouse was built in England and shipped in panels to New Zealand in 1864

Part of the ancient Pohutukawa tree estimated to be 800-1000 years old

Towards Rangitoto Island

Saddleback/Tieke feeding on flax flowers

Choppy whitecaps ready for our departure

Yesterday I had an mini adventure.  My aunt is out from the USA, so I caught the train into the city, met up with her and some other family and friends and we went to Tiritiri Matangi Island, You can only get there by ferry, so it was a little bit of an early start for a 9am sailing.

From the website:

Tiritiri Matangi Island is a wildlife sanctuary and one of New Zealand's most important and exciting conservation projects. It is located 30km north east of central Auckland and just 4km from the end of the Whangaparaoa Peninsula. A hundred and twenty years of farming had seen this 220-hectare island stripped of 94% of its native bush but between 1984 and 1994, volunteers planted between 250,000 and 300,000 trees. The Island is now 60% forested with the remaining 40% left as grassland for species preferring open habitat.

In conjunction with this planting programme, all mammalian predators were eradicated and a number of threatened and endangered bird and reptile species have been successfully introduced, including the flightless takahe, one of the world’s rarest species, and the tuatara. There are few places in New Zealand where you can readily see and walk amongst so many rare species

We had the most beautiful weather after days of thundery cold storms.  We opted for a guided tour for the walk to the top of the Island.  The volunteers who do these are full of knowledge about birds, the island history and the plant life.  While I didn't get to see a Kokako, I did see lots of other birds, I had never seen before,including, Kakariki/native parakeet, Hihi/Stitchbird and Popokotea/Whitehead. Unfortunately not all were co-operative for photos.  

Fabulous views can be had from the top of the island and many of the coastal tracks, and it was just beautiful to be surrounded by native bush and bird song.