Bonus Level: Stewart Island

Ferry at Bluff: Reunion with the Scotsman Kieran. We met near Wanaka. Meet two German girls from my town. Good to hear that dialect. Sea is rough. Waves crash the window. Too rough for my stomach. Stewart island is love at first sight. Fish some spotties for dinner. Cut them with a shell fragment. Camp off trail beyond Port William. Hear a Kiwi at night.

Awake with the birds: Tuis and Kererus, Fantails and some new sounds. Is it the Kokako, which brings 10000$ to the one that can prove its existence? Catch a leather jacket and a wrasse for lunch. Shellfish as bait. Sit at Bungaree hut and stare at the waves. Oystercatchers and seagulls. Traces of deers and sealions. Camp in the forest.

Wake up two times by what seems to be the sound of a small biped - as close as a meter. Can't see a thing. The sky pitch black as the forest floor. Later spot three deers in-between trees, gazing at me. Catch a bluecod and an even bigger wrasse near Christmas hut. Find a wreckage. Remove a thin piece of steel to craft a blade. Climb Mt. Anglem. Can see Bluff. Good memories! Barbecue the fish and share with two french girls.

Hot day. Forest keeps me shaded. Climb a rock in the ocean. From 8 meter high I can see all the fish. Bath and wash in Yankee river. Craft a hook out of a rusty nail. Watch the tides change all afternoon. More and more I look strayed and stranded.

It's raining. Wait until lunch in Yankee river hut. Nice walk along sand dunes. Catch a parore and a wrasse with the rusty nail hook! I'm so proud. Also catch a seagull that got tangled in the line. Let it go.

Today is the day! Lived more than four months in nature and now I finally get to see a Kiwi! It looks ugly, almost like a biped piglet with a beak. Nevertheless this means a lot to me! Encounter four more during the day. Fish two wrasse and a parore. barbecue on campfire with the two french girls.

Epic rockformations along the beach. More forest: roots and mud and red flowers sprinkled onto the floor. Big hellfire hut. Nicely located on a hill.

Rain today. Doesn't stop, but at 11 it's warm enough to face it in T-shirt and umbrella. Cormorans at Mason beach. Meet Luke - how cool's that? -he just finished TA, used to big days, lot's of common friends. Of course he heard the goat story. Other guests here got flyn in with all their food - what a difference.

Keeps on raining. Swampy but easy walk. Then try to get to Freds Camp hut. When you're ancle deep in the swamp you can't jump across the hipdeep parts anymore. The continuous rain makes it hard to judge the soil. Back to Freshwater hut and camp beyond in the forest.

Another day in paradise. Meet Lauren and David, two Canadian TA-veterans. Camp offtrail deep in the forest.

Back in Oban. No money spent on proper accommodation but 20$ invested for Ulva island. See the same wekas, robins, tomtits bellbirds, brown creepers, tuis, kereru, kaka, yellow hammer and fantails - but the saddlebacks are unique. So is the American girl I meet on the boat back. Spend the rest of the day at the beach. This is it - end of the blog. I learned more than I could ever expect. And this blog can be seen as my record of the progress, containing more than words and pictures could ever show. Truth that only reveales itself to a curious heart. Go!