New Zealand

One of the highlights of our New Zealand holiday was a whalewatching trip at Kaikoura. The boat was completely booked, the weather for change stunning, cold, but no wind and sun. We had been warned that it could get rough, but we were the lucky ones. We sighted three whales and each dive was great. The tail rises above the sea and the whale quickly dives back to the depths. At that very moment all the cameras clicked and clicked until only a last wrinkle was left in the waves.

On one of our trips we went penguin watching. The main goal of this trip was the little blue penguin that can be found near Akaroa.
We've seen these penguins as well, but it was rather dark and too far away so the photos turned out bad. The night was saved by three Fiordland crested penguins that were wandering on the rocks and cliffs.

lake pukaki, originally uploaded by xiffy.

The first photos have been uploaded to flickr. Today I was busy wading my email while waiting for the panoramas to render. This one i rendered for over four times and eventually stayed with the result Hugin gave me.