Merry Christmassing in Te Anau

We happened to be in the pretty little lakeside town of Te Anau for Christmas Day – it was convenient after our two overnight cruises – without much of an agenda. So we had a very nice, relaxing Christmas enjoying the beautiful surroundings and continuously commenting on the weirdness of summer Christmas.

We started our day with a visit to the Te Anau bird sanctuary (more on this later) followed by a walk along the lake. The weather was perfect for being outdoors, and we found several other groups of tourists and locals doing the same.

In the afternoon, we took a boat ride across Lake Te Anau to the glow worm caves. We had a short walk through the cave on a constructed pathway over a roaring creek and then got on a small unpowered boat to glide through a tunnel covered with glow worms (similar to our previous glow worm cave tour in Waitomo). We decided that the tour could be our equivalent of going for a drive to see Christmas lights.

Finally we returned back to town for a nice Christmas dinner and an evening stroll through the town park and along the lake. We discovered that summer Christmas is about enjoying the weather and spending time with family, which is right up our alley, but we still missed the cold weather and festive spirit of winter Christmas!