First I have to thank Tim, who provided the impetus for the journey - thanks mate. I grabbed Tim from his place pretty early before heading off to catch our flight to Dunedin. I'm not a fan of Qantas, but their Jetstar service was awesome, the check-in girl not even batting an eyelid as our shotguns went onto the conveyor. The flight was smooth and uneventful, and soon enough we'd claimed our baggage and guns and were into our hired car for the drive south west. As we passed lake Waihola, the sign posts for he Sinclair Wetland appeared... and I made the comment of the week "Hey Tim, I thought the Sinclair Wetlands were in the South Island...". Um yeah, ok so a 2 hour flight is not exactly jet lag inducing, so we'll leave that one right there. We turned off the main highway and drove around the back road to the wetlands, and it was almost like Mecca to 2 visiting waterfowlers.
We got back on the road, destination Gore. Having arrived, we went up to see the NZDA's pet stag in its enclosure, a fine young 12 pointer. Quite neat to have deer in the middle of town I reckon. Then down to Shooter's World to pick up ammo and other necessities. The afternoon passed and we were soon on our way to meet up with Tim's mate Josh, for our first hunt on the Mataura River. Josh had kindly arranged a hunt on a backwater near to a well set up maimai. As we approached the backwater, ripples gave away the mallards in residence. they rapidly departed (no chance for a shot) and we set up some decoys on the backwater in preparation of the evening flight.
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| Tim & Josh |
Masses of seagulls passed up and downstream, along with the occasional irregular flight of ducks in the distance. As we called at a passing bird I heard the woosh of cupped wings as a bird came in to the heavy willows of the backwater and remained hidden. It departed soon after but soon we had a bird circling and I dropped it with my first shot. Success! We were on the board.
The evening passed way too quickly, and we picked up the dekes and made our way back to Josh's car for our return trip. It really felt quite surreal shooting ducks in July, but after all, thatr's why we had come down, to take advantage of Southland's extended season. After a relaxing meal and a beer, we went back to our unit to prepare for day 2 - to be spent with reknowned waterfowler Paul Stenning.
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