Meeting the Little Blue Penguins of Pilot Beach, Otago, part 2

You are greeted by your guides who tell you a little bit about the area and the penguins before the fun part begins and you make your way by torchlight down the long zigzagging walkway. Several years ago when I first visited this beach there was no boardwalk and you could literally pull up and park your car almost on top of were the penguins nest. Needless to say this didn’t fair well and the penguin numbers dwindled depressingly. Now locals have fought back and access to this incredible experience is only available through guided tours. The penguins now protected with replanting having also been carried out and said boxes put in place to provide them with safe and secure homes have started to fight back and the great news is that numbers are increasing like never before. My guides told me they are regularly counting over 100 arrivals each night.

The wooden boardwalk is excellent, it’s huge for plenty of people to enjoy unrivalled views and close ups of the penguins without causing them any disturbance. The penguins throughout the hour long time I spent there were beside me and sometimes even underneath me, they like to hang out under the platform. Lighting is provided to help you easily spot them. This same lighting is turned off as soon as the tour finishes to leave the penguins in the darkness of their natural habitat. We watched for nearly an hour as more and more penguins landed face down on the beach – some in smaller rafts and some just in pairs or on their own. They all clumsily ran from the beach to the little penguin walkways they have made in the down trodden grass as soon as they could. It was amusing to watch their antics. Some stood for a while trying to guess where they were and listening out for the endless calls of other penguins waiting for them further up the beach. Some went the wrong way and had to turn around and scurry back to where they had come from, and one box beside the platform had a penguin known to the guides as ‘grumpy’ as he had a habit of yelping at any other penguin who got to close, at one point he put his head out and scurried over to push another innocent penguin over – grumpy by name and by nature it would seem.

A little penguin a small distance from me checking out the underside of the viewing platform

The penguins are a noisy bunch. Cries and squawks could be constantly heard as we stood watching them make their way home.

The penguin march, just outside Grumpy’s home, which is top left

I’ve been fortunate to experience a number of penguin homecomings over the last few years and all of them are a massive privilege that I thoroughly enjoy, however this one somehow is quite unique. It feels as though you are almost alongside the penguins as they are so close to you but at the same time you are entering their world to watch their little life’s play out for a short amount of time, and it would seem cause them very little disturbance which is a huge honour.