Phalacrocorax varius

You wouldn't believe it, but I was watching this little group of Pied Shags down at Armers Beach in Kaikoura this morning, when out of nowhere one of them opened its mouth wide and shouted, "Fa la la la la...la la...la...LA!!!"

Despite my best efforts to get some good sleep after my vomitous tour of the Kaikoura coast yesterday, Christmas Eve festivities here at Albatross Backpackers Inn continued long into the wee hours of the morning, and then started up again around 6 am, when someone went around screaming indecipherable messages of (presumably) good cheer. I took the opportunity to rise early and walk past a deserted downtown to the beach to check in on the Banded Dotterel chicks, who are still tiny as ever. In the late morning I walked out towards the end of the peninsula, but only made it to Armers Beach, where I spent most of the hour in conference with three Pied Shags, who were very obliging in providing funny faces and evocative body shapes for me to photograph. In the afternoon the hostel at which I've been staying the past 10 days put on a free (not to mention epic) Christmas barbecue for all of us wayward travellers so far from home, a gesture of the utmost kindness, and an opportunity for each of us to be a family to one another. Later on still I returned to the fur seal colony with some new friends (hailing from Sweden, Germany, Israel, and Australia) for a gaze at the adorable pups and a stroll up to a lovely tucked away waterfall. All in all, I couldn't have asked for a better way to spend Christmas.

Merry Christmas to everybody out there, from me and the shag....