A Nation of Birds and Lizards

Before I start I should explain I have been calling our friend "Moses" Joshua up to now. This was because I introduced him before I locked down this journal and now it just seems silly to give him an anonymous blip-name. So Joshua is Moses or Mo. 

His ACTUAL name is Tristram. No-one - not even Mo - knows how or why he acquired the nickname Moses. He has a theory that it has something to do with sandals, but it's just speculation.

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My Dear Princess and Dear Friends,

Bo was up front. Mo was taking the rear. The were both deadly silent as they led us through bushland. Each member of the group moved carefully through the darkness, each one of the eight of us hardly daring to breathe. 

Bo held out her hand and indicated that none of us should move. She glared at us and pointed into the bushes. 

This was serious.

Mo switched off his red-light torch, leaving just Bo's illuminated. But even she covered the faint red light with her hand and moved stealthily through the undergrowth. And I was left there with the others in the pitch dark. Listening to the night time sounds all around us, with the only illumination, the stars above. 

"I think I saw a fat bum disappear behind a tree," said Caro.

But I'm getting ahead of myself. Let me start at the beginning.

Mo turned 50 last year. His parents bought him a very considerate present, knowing his love of travel and adventure - a 2 day trip to Kapiti Island, just off the coast here at Paraparaumu. I'd been threatening Caro with a glamping trip there for literally YEARS. Ever since we got to Wellington in fact. 

So it seemed to make sense to combine his trip and my threats and turn it into an adventure for all three of -

"Oh my GODDDDD! PLEASE can I come?! I'd love to come!" said Shenée.

Make that all FIVE of us.

(In actuality, she had said that to me months ago when I mentioned that I wanted to go someday. So Shenée was the first person I thought of when plans started to emerge.)

We tried to book tents, but they were all taken. Instead we booked cabins for all of us and have been counting the days since the start of the year. 

It was VERY exciting. 

It meant an early start of course. Mo came to pick us up at 8 and we hooked up with Shenée and Craig at the beach about 10 minutes later. Shenée already had a guide to the animals and birds that she might see. 

"Eeee! Eeee! Eeee!" she said, pointing at one after the other.

(This is a typical Shenée-excited noise).

"Do you think they'll realise I'm excited?" she asked me. "And will they ask why I keep wiggling my bum?"

We then had to go through a rigorous bio-security check to ensure we were not accidentally introducing any "critters" to the island. 

This involved rooting around in our own bags to scare out any stoats, rats or mice which were squirrelled away in there. Also squirrels. 

After this a boat came to pick us up. A strange sea-tractor on stilts came to drag it up onto the beach so we could climb on board. The boat itself had a "grunty" engine as Mo put it. What this meant is reality is that 

BBBBRRRRRWWHHOOOOOOOOOOOOOSH!!!!

- as soon as it started I felt like I was going to knock Caro out of the back of the boat. We BOUNCED across the waves like we were on a pneumatic pogo-stick or a space-hopper filled with helium. 

Ow. Me bum.

We arrived at the beach on Kapiti Island for an induction and an introduction to the island. A department of conservation guide explained to us that for millennia Aotearoa was "a nation of birds and lizards" which meant that flying birds who got bored of being picked off and eaten by native falcons and eagles decided to quit flying and to turn into the bird versions of small furry mammals like mice and voles.

When the Māori people arrived, they brought with them dogs and rats (they were a good source of food on long sea trips) and then when the Europeans arrived six hundred years later, they brought MORE dogs and rats. Also cats, rabbits, stoats and hedgehogs. 

And the flightless birds didn't do so well. Even here on Kapiti Island, they were very nearly wiped out. 

The island itself was a key strategic point for Māori tribes and it was captured by the Ngāti Toa at the start of the 19th century. Their leader, Te Rauparaha fostered good relations with European whalers and this helped him establish dominance over the Wellington region. 

In the early 20th century, the New Zealand government finally realised that they had sort of effed up the ecology and declared Kapiti Island a nature reserve and bought up nearly all of the land. But one of Te Rauparaha's descendants refused to sell her portion of the land and the reason for my long introduction is that it was on her family's land that we would be staying with for the night.

Stoats and possums were only eliminated from the island in the late 1990's and ever since then, the island has been a sanctuary for a whole bunch of native birds. For example, as soon as we arrived we were greeted by a naughty weka. I've started to think that wekas may be my new favourite birds. They are cheeky and naughty and they have learned to un-zip backpacks so that they can steal your sandwiches. I've included a picture of a weka, and I just love their hairy little bushy feathers. 

Mo, Shenée and Craig went up the steep track to a lookout point, whereas Caro and I took the easier loop track where we saw wekas, tūīs, tiekes and kakas. It was a beautiful sunny day and we took it nice and slow. 

Then the bum-bang boat took us further up the coast for dinner and a chat about that evening's kiwi spotting walk. Kapiti Island is home to kiwi pukupuku, the lesser spotted kiwi, which is about half the size of the brown kiwi. Manaki the guide held up a kiwi egg and it was HUGE. 

"This is because they need the chick to develop in there for two months - much longer than a typical bird," he explained. "This is so that when it hatches it is ready to take care of itself right away." He went on to say that, if the egg were compared to a human baby, "It would be like giving birth to a six year old."

"Holy mother of Jesus," said Shenée, looking uncomfortable.

But Manaki's presentation was interrupted at frequent points by this noise....

WEEE-OOOOO-WEEEEE-OOOOO-WEEEEEE-OOOOOO!!!!

His name was "Harrison". He was a noisy five year old with extremely indulgent parents who didn't even seem to HEAR the interminable - 

WEEE-OOOOO-WEEEEE-OOOOO-WEEEEEE-OOOOOO!!!!

Seriously. Harrison never stopped. He was relentless.

So be sure to stay very quiet, we were advised, because kiwi pukupuku are extremely shy birds and - 

WEEE-OOOOO-WEEEEE-OOOOO-WEEEEEE-OOOOOO!!!!

"We're a group of seven," interrupted Shenée when the guides said they were going to split us into groups. Actually we were five, but she grabbed two random Germans from Christchurch. 

"I do NOT want to be in Harrison's group," she muttered. 

Which brings me back to the start. The seven of us followed our guide Bo, as she led us through the dark on the trail of nervous kiwi pukupuku. We didn't see any for AGES and Bo started saying things like, "Well, we can't GUARANTEE you'll see one..." 

Not only that but we bumped into HARRISON'S group and HE had seen one! 

Not that I'm bitter. 

Fortunately at that point we saw TWO. Not at the same time. At first we just saw a fat little hairy bum disappearing into the undergrowth. And then about five minutes later a kiwi stumbled right across our path. 

It turned and looked as if to say WTF and then scrambled back into the undergrowth again. But that was enough! We were all ecstatic! Bo high-fived us all and then we split up, happy and tired after our big day.

Caro and I made our way back to our cabin and it was really sort of romantic and lovely. It felt so nice to be a lovely adventure with her. Kind of like going back to our backpacking days. 

But no. We were both really tired. There was none of that. 

I was a bit concerned about sleeping in a strange place, but it was so dark and so peaceful and we were so worn out I simply conked out and dreamt about birdies.

S.