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| Just before sunrise in Northland |
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| Sunrise |
Paul woke up very early and managed to catch yet another sunrise - mean while I got us ready to get on the road and planned our route to take us to Whangerai. It took us about an hour and as had plenty of time before our appointment we headed just out of town to the Bird Sanctuary and Kiwi house.
The Sanctuary was closed because it was the Sunday, but we were lucky enough to get a sneaky peek of our first Kiwi - unfortunately it was camera shy - I do have a very poor quality video if anyone doesn't believe us!
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| Kiwi teases us with a little show then hides from the camera (ISO 4000) |
We sped off through the country side to Zion Wildlife Park - many people have seen the place on TV's Lion Man. Paul had arranged a Big Cat tour which was a two hour walk around with the keepers of the rarest collection of cats, including white lions, and tigers, a black leopard, a gibbon and two wild cheetahs.
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| Suzy's favourite - Tigers! |
I was spoiled - given that tigers are my favourite cat I was very surprised at the size of them up close.
We were introduced to Ash - the main keeper from South Africa and he explained very clearly and concisely the history of each animal, their likes and dislikes and the plans for the future of the park.
I was slightly upset given that the animals needed larger enclosures. The park had recently acquired land and there were plans in place, however, all of the cats were used to human contact. Sadly, in consequence to the death of a keeper this was now prohibited.
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| Feed me... |
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| ...feed me...now |
At the end of our trip,our group had dissipated and we waited to feed the baboon. It was only Paul and me left and as a result we were treated to a cheetah experience. It was their turn to be fed and in we went.
I have never been so scared, so in awe, so completely in an unsafe situation... needless to say, whilst the keepers fed the male cat the female basically pinned Paul and me to the fence until she was fed - by hissing and growling at us.
We had to get down low so we didn't threaten her, until Ash put bloody great steak of meat in my hand. Before I knew what had happened the cheetah delicately took the meat and ran off - phew! Then she came back for more and it was Paul's turn.
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| OK |
We left the enclosure and headed in to the baboon's cage to feed the female ex-circus animal. She only liked male attention and wasn't happy with me as I gave her some medicine. She loved Paul though who had to sit and groom her for a while.
We finally left the Zion Wildlife park at about 5.30pm - I was ready to drop everything and work there forever - so was Paul. I still might go back for a volunteer post - you need a month minimum though so we pondered this and found yet another camp site by the sea at Whananaki.
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| Camping by the Sea |
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