Kiwis getting fed, Kiwis descending for a wedding

Oh hazy memory of details of this day! I know DS and the rest of the wedding party had to be at the race course at noon for the rehearsal.

The rest of us headed up to Mt Bruce....

...a wildlife sanctuary devoted to kiwi preservation.

Only saw the whole of one kiwi...

...a baby kiwi being fed. Or at least, a sleepy kiwi resting its beak on a lump of raw meat. If it was a human baby, I'd suggest unwrapping it and rubbing its back to wake it up more. We also saw the rear end of a white kiwi disappearing behind a log in an exhibit. There was a fascinating movie about them capturing 50 kiwi somewhere in NZ, tagging them, then releasing them all with the comment "I hope we can capture them all again in the morning". None of us was quite sure why they had to catch them twice. They did get them all the next day and then flew them to Mt Bruce where they released them into the wild. I guess they are trying to spread kiwi back across NZ to prevent a dodo-esque fate.

The weather had been sunny and lovely at the cottages, but Mt Bruce was under the edge of clouds extending to the north, so we were cold by the time we'd walked around for a while. Only DC and MC could face staying for the Feeding of the Eels. The rest of us huddled in the van. We therefore had to catch up on the eel news. The eels are apparently wild, they live 80 years (!), breed once at age 60 (!) by suddenly setting off from NZ all the way to Tonga, a distance of 1400 miles (assuming they go in a straight line)...

They have their babies there and die of exhaustion some years later. The eel babies drift in the ocean currents back to New Zealand. Just astonishing!

We headed back to Featherston, I think. Then CS invited us over to a wedding-eve casual gathering in Greytown with all the bridesmaids and assorted friends. It was a lovely time with lovely people in a sunlit flower garden right on the main street in Greytown. Wish I had a photo of it, but somehow I don't seem to have a single one!

Then back to the cottages to eat up a random collection of things from the fridge and pantry!