Familiar face

"Do or do not. There is no try"
Yoda

I'm not absolutely sure what he was telling me here today.  Something about 'get out of my way I want to get to the pup pool '  I think. 

Another grey day but one which was - at least early on - only grey, not wet.  As planned I tootled off down to Cape Palliser, took a few deep breaths then climbed the 253 rather steep steps to the lighthouse (see extras) I was certainly puffed but it wasn't as bad as I'd built it up to be.  I've been here before and oddly, the weather was grey but wet then!  At least today was dry :D

On the return I stopped at the seal colony - the largest colony on the North Island apparently.  The area has changed - a lot!  There's a gravel road leading to parking areas that I'm pretty sure weren't there last time.  There are stands of bushes with gravel tracks weaving between them and it was whilst cautiously making my way along one of these tracks I heard some snuffling coming from within one of the bushes.  On my return I found out the reason for the noises as one seal pup emerged from under the bush and started lurching towards me.  He was followed by two other much more cautious pups.  At that stage I figured that all they wanted to do was get across the 'path' to the rocks and then maybe, onto the pools.  I happily obliged.

I spent a lovely 30 or so minutes photographing pups and mums together feeling quite privileged to be able to be so up close and personal with them.  This one in particular was a bit of a character - couldn't help but think of Yoda when I saw him! (and you can see in the picture, it was a bit mizzly  by this stage)

It was during this time that I met a lovely young man from India who was keenly interested in learning a lot more about photography.  We enjoyed a good long chat about travel, photography, New Zealand and India.  He's spent six weeks so far travelling the North Island and is soon to head south.  He has thoroughly enjoyed his North Island adventure and is pretty much in love with New Zealand already..........I think he'll be absolutely besotted by the time he's finished around the South Island!  Anyway, he was keen to share some of his images and to see some of mine so I passed my blip address on to him.  If you're looking in on this Sajal, hope you like it :) 

Note to Rainie: interestingly, he was from the north of India, under the Himalayas.......!!  Said it was a beautiful area......hmmmmm