Mr Man, our Nuts'n'Bolts man was travelling through a high mountain pass where these NZ parrots, called Kea, live! His wee blonde travelling partner was knocked off the bike by one of these cheeky birds and he was asking whether these two might help him retrieve her!
In actual fact I had to retrieve her quickly as she would have been carried away swiftly! While we were there, a man had his lens cap flown away, and another a whole plastic bag of food was swiped! One grabbed our butter pat and we never saw it again!
I've not met Mr.Man before... how funny! Those parrots sound almost vicious... hope Mr. Man and his partner are ok! Funny photo, hope you are having a good time!
@jackie8 If you Tag, "Nuts'n'Bolts", there are two sets of stories which run together! These 365 friends of mine encouraged my imagination to go beyond the realms of sensibility!
I have never seen these before Maggie - I have heard about them and my children have books with them in (having many NZ relos) but not in real life - my they are big. Good job keeping Mr Man safe!!
haha! Good save! Oh and I have a question for you. While traveling near Franz Josef at night I saw some black animals that were around the roadside. I tried to find them online but didn't know for sure. Would you happen to know if they would be black lemur, black possum or something else?
@buffy Buffy, these are national pests - possums! There are soo many - good at breeding and no predators - they destroy acres of new tree shoots every night! Please don't feel sorry for them! In Australia they are protected but they have lots of predators over there!
@maggiemae thank you! I spent hours online trying to figure it out. I didn't get a clear enough look at them to help when I was searching for them online. The black color and fluffy tails threw me off a bit. The possums in the states where I'm from and the one's here in Australia look different from each other and from what I saw in NZ. I like that I'm seeing new and different things!
@buffy Most people don't know this! They look cute with their fluffy tails but they look piggy with their snouts and vicious with their claws! Nice to have your response!
Maggiemae, all this time I thought I was folowing you because I always saw your name everywhere on a daily basis. I'm sorry, baby. Fixed that oversight. No snub intended. :-)
I love the shot and remember those mischievous keas. We stayed in a place where the owner kept a bike on display as a warning. Keas had chewed the seat off as well as the rubber grips on the handlebars.
Oh, I do remember the possums. I stayed with rellies on the north island and was awakened in the middle of the night by Selwyn shooting at a possum (he missed). I must say they are much better looking than the ones we have in the US. Too bad they've done so much damage, especially to the flightless bird population.
Glad Mr man wasn't taken ...years ago when we were in NZ these birds were trying to take anything that would come loose off the cars that were parked!!
I do hope Mr Man Is more careful of his travelling partner in the future and that she is fully recovered from her trauma and able to continue her trip.
