Scaup duckling

Drove to Te Anau this morning to do a few jobs.  Top of this list was to buy a new phone charging cord as the old one somehow attached itself to the coffee pot and subsequently got fried when it was put on the stove top!  Oopsie.  Other jobs were the usual domestics - water, waste, gas, fuel and rubbish.  Manapouri is a lovely wee village but it's simply not large enough to support much by way of services so the 20km drive to Te Anau is one I'm sure many local Manapourians make often.  Te Anau itself is rather larger and supports a host of services not available in Manapouri, but in itself, it's still not a very large settlememnt having a resident population of about 2970.  It was when driving into Te Anau I saw a sign to a bird sanctuary I had no idea existed.  It's run by DoC and essentially is a rehabilitation centre for birds that can't be released back into the wild.  Whilst I totally accept the principle and reasoning, I still find it hard to see birds (any creatures actually) caged.  These birds had relatively large enclosures and some don't even have rooves (is New Zealand the only country in the world that has flightless birds??).  These scaup had a large pond which was behind a low fence, but with no roof I did wonder whether these wee guys were free to leave if they wanted (scaup do fly).

After my morning chores (which took longer than anticipated because the only woman at the only LPG gas refill station in Te Anau had just gone on her lunch break when I turned up!) I headed out of town towards the Mavora Lakes.  These were recommended to me a few years ago but this is the first time I've actually visited.  A 40km long, dusty gravel road slowed the driving a bit but first impressions on arriving at the camp area are very positive.  Tomorrow will be an exploration day.

In COVID news there were 22,454 new cases today; 742 people are in hospital and 19 in ICU.  Sadly, 4 deaths were also reported.