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Liminal — 03 — July 04, 2024

Sandflies and sea lions on the Catlins Coast

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Hello there fellow travellers,

It's me, Petrina, writing to you with an ode to sea lions. Not your thing? Please feel free to unsubscribe if you would rather not hear from me.

The Catlins, the southeastern coast of the South Island, is a miserable part of New Zealand. Persistently roaring winds, relentless rain, and if you're lucky enough to have sun in summer, a bounty of sand flies that mean long sleeves and long pants are your only clothing options regardless of the temperature.

See these photos from the Lost Gypsy Gallery, a self described Fantastical Museum of Automata, which joyfully pokes fun at the weather in the Catlins. An absolutely essential Catlins stop.

Of course, none of this was enough to stop me from camping my way around the Catlins.

It's too beautiful by far to stay away, so I beelined south from Dunedin and drove my black hatchback down a lonely narrow gravel road to the sea, praying the whole time I wouldn't encounter another vehicle (when I arrived in the campground, a fellow camper immediately told me that one of the campervans there came across a stock truck. There was much manouvering and sweating and praying. The drama amplified in the retelling).

​Purakaunui Bay is a campsite almost at the lowest heel of the South Island, a vast stretch of sand on the south east Catlins coast. The beach is so large it takes around 10 minutes of walking to reach the water. On one side, a line of cliffs falls away into the distance. The waves are restless, whipped to chop by the wind, but the water is bright and clear.

In the lumpy dunes at the back, sea lions hide.

I nearly didn't spot them; for such large, ungainly (on land at least) mammals, they are surprisingly stealthy.

But I came across one almost by accident, and was so focused on taking photos of it, I nearly walked backwards onto another one.

This is not recommended, as sea lions have no fear of humans. Encroach too far and they will heave themselves up onto flippers and begin a lumbering, surprisingly quick rolling gait toward you.

Instead, you should look for their tracks – not footprints as such, but dents in the sand left by flipper elbows as they drag themselves along, one step then two before flippers fly out sideways and they drop chin first onto the sand.

Look for bodies the same silver gold as sun bleached driftwood, hundreds of kilograms of hulk puddled in shallow nests of sand, one flipper occasionally flicking more grit onto their backs to insulate from the sun.

Look for the wet brown eyes set in flat faces (more bear-like than the pointy dog-like noses of fur seals). They will look at you, with little interest and then with a lot of interest if you get too close.

Their ambivalence to humans was to their detriment once, when humans hunted them to the brink.

For 200 years sea lions abandoned New Zealand shores, driven away by relentless hunting, pushed to refuge in the Sub Antarctic Islands

Which, incidentally, have also provided shelter for southern right whales, also hunted to near extinction. There, they survived.

Happily, the refugees made great playmates; here's an excerpt from a New Zealand Geographic article:

Now, slowly, sea lions and southern right whales are returning to New Zealand shores, tentatively seeking out the places they used to frequent, driven maybe by instinct or maybe by stories passed down from their ancestors.

Sea lions don't breed in any great numbers on New Zealand shores anymore (and the handful that do are almost all descended from one dauntless female nicknamed "Mum", who hauled herself up on a beach near Dunedin in 1993 and gave birth to a pup on the mainland, the first sea lion to do so in around 150 years).

New Zealand sea lions are the rarest sea lions in the world; they are endangered and the numbers are still dwindling.

All the more special, then, to nearly stumble on two in the dunes. And to spend two hours watching them lumping playfully along the sand, gliding belly first into the waves only to hump out again, and tussling grouchily with each other.

Sharing the beach with these svelte sea dwellers made my sandfly-bloodied ankles worth it.

Sunrise, coffee by the beach, hanging out with endangered sea mammals, no cell reception. Sometimes, all the best things require braving a little discomfort.

Touche Catlins, touche.

Until next week,

Petrina