Townsville & Magnetic Island

I arrived in Townsville late on 20 April.
The next morning I took a ferry to Magnetic Island to join Steve, who then was staying at the some friends' place (a piece of land with a shed).
In just 2 days on the island, I saw all sorts of inhabitants, sometimes unexpected, as you can notice on the pictures. A heavenly island. swimming when get up, walk in the forest on the mountain walls, idleness under the palm trees, observation of the local fauna, sunset... Perfect!

I introduce you to our little companions :
- Allied Rock Wallaby (Petrogale assimilis) , a wallaby who leaves in the mountain. Every night, he and his friends and family came shyly close to us. Sometimes they let us approach (with some food). So cute!
- Brushtail Possum (Trichosurus vulpecula), a possum not shy at all, as soon as he can see or smell some food... or something else he can get its teeth into: one of them bit my finger, before attacking my toe!
- Eastern Shovel-nosed Ray (Aptychotrema rostrata), which translucent nose offers a good camouflage. This one is only a baby, but his mother is probably 1,20 m long!
- Rainbow Lorikeet (Trichoglossus haematodus), a particulary noisy bird!
- Sulphur-crested White Cockatoo (Cacatua galerita), who as well knows how to attract attention, with his very strident cry
- Bush Stone-curlew (Burhinus grallarius), a nocturnal bird who, high on his legs and with his low head, seems frail et shamed
- Death Adder (Acanthophis antarcticus), one of the world's most dangerous reptile
- Huntsman Spider ; actually, on the picture, it's just the skin (!)
And: another beautiful hairy spider, who looks like a tarentule, who was sunbathing in the midlle of the track (rare; usually, they hide in the forest) ; a lezard with a strangely short tail, a gastropod leaving in the mangrove, et some wunderful butterflies (why do you call them like hat? what the link with butter?!!).

The mangrove shelters some crocodiles, and better is not to venture too far away in the sea, because the sharks are not rare. It's possible to see some turtles too, but the reproduction season was finished.
The island, moun tainous, has a area of 52 km², including a 27-km² National Park.

New Zealand (7) - Northern Island

Last Saturday, I took a ferry in Picton, to go to the Northern Island. Beautiful cruise in Queen Charlotte Sound, and then Cook Strait.
Arriving by night in Wellington.

Te Papa Museum, in Wellington, is so interesting (and free) that I spent at least 4 hours, glancing through the exhibitions distributed on 6 floors. You can learn more about Maori the people, its culture, its history...
The Treaty of Waitangi is New Zealand's founding document. It is an agreement, in Maori and English, that was made, in 1840, between the British Crown and about 540 Maori rangatira (chiefs). It is a broad statement of principles on which the British and Maori made a political compact to found a nation state and build a government in New Zealand.


From Wellington, I went to Taupo, a little town which lies by the eponymous lake. A magnificent place.
Along the road, the lanscape