Russell, Bay of Islands Cream Tour

The "Cream Trip" is the most extensive day cruise available in The Bay of Islands and follows the selected routes of the original Fullers trip, which began in 1927 to deliver mail and essential supplies, and to collect cream from various settlements dotted throughout the region.
We embarked at the wharf here in Russell and the trip lasted from 9:40 to 4:30pm.

Our catamaran was only half capacity so more room to move about for picture taking.











One of the two privately owned islands. They hired caretakers who also have their own residence on the property.

The Black Rocks. This is one of three locations in the world that these formations are seen. The Galapagos Islands are another. Odd creations created by volcanic activity millions of years ago.

One of the many private properties that we saw.
The caretaker here had just picked up a couple of ponies and had told our captain that if the crew brought carrots for them he would show them to the passengers on board. So all of that happened as planned.

Otehei Bay where we stopped for lunch and some hiking.

Awesome photo opportunity on the way back from the look out hike.

Finally a Tui bird also seen on the way back from the hike. Note the tuft of white at the neck.

And the dolphins were everywhere on this glorious day jumping all around the boat.

Here the dolphins were chasing schools of herring. A lot of water activity.

Hole in The Rock at the tip of Cape Brett Peninsula. The open sea was very rough but at the rock it was decided that it was safe enough to sail through the hole. It was our lucky day!!

Going through the cave. The captain had quite a sense of humour. He said, "one of these times I'll go through here with my eyes open!!"

On the other side

Cape Brett Lighthouse only seen from the deck of our boat.

more dolphins

And then all those who were interested in boom netting were allowed to try this. The net was lowered from the right side and once everyone was in, the captain churned the catamaran in circles. The sun on the churned water made for awesome pictures.

This was not on the boat tour but we finally spotted the Wood Pigeon. They are a beautiful bird and quite large, about the size of a Canadian raven.

We leave in 5 days for the USA. What a lot of awesome pictures and video for our memoirs.