Over Easter we took advantage of having a four day weekend and planned a trip to explore some more of the South Island. We assumed that this would be our last late summer trip and so decided to head south to see a few sights before the weather got too cold.
Our first stop was actually a place we had been before, the Moeraki Boulders a few hours south of Christchurch. The Boulders are large spherical rocks that are scattered along the beach and are particularly noticeable at low tide. We were able to time our visit to arrive once they had already emerged from the water.
The boulders themselves are actually concretions; mud, silt and clay that have been cemented by calcite and erode at a slower rate than the cliffs in which they are located. In addition to the boulders along the beach it is possible to see some of the boulders that are just being exposed from the cliffs behind the beach.
After spending some time exploring the boulders we headed to the nearby town of Moeraki to visit a restaurant we had been to before, Fleur’s Place. We were a little early for our lunchtime reservation and so wandered around the town a little.
Fleur’s is the little tin shack you can see on the point above, but don’t let the slightly ramshackle exterior fool you, the restaurant serves delicious seafood. Eric and I enjoyed the mixed fish plate which consisted of variety of fish fresh from the local fishing boats. As well as the usual vegetables, the fish also came with some delicious flavoured dipping sauces, the spinach oil was our favourite.
Full from our tasty lunch we continued our journey south, stopping next at Shag Point. The weather was getting a little stormy, but were were still able to make out a few shags (cormorants) clinging to the rocks off of the point. Leaving the windy headland behind we walked up the coast a little way to a tidal shelf that contained more of the concretions we had seen earlier at Moeraki.
As the tide had already started to turn, we weren’t able to get all the way out to the shelf, but we were able to see the craters left behind from some of the boulders.
We spent a while watching the waves break over the rock shelf as the tide came in and the storm came through. We weren’t alone, as we made our way along the rocky shore we were surprised to see a fur seal!
Luckily this one was much more interested in scratching his itch than worrying about us, although we still kept a pretty good distance, just in case!
We headed back to the car and continued our drive south towards the city of Dunedin and the Otago Peninsula where we were staying overnight.