How does wildlife viewing compare at Nugget Point and Doubtful Sound?

The reason I ask -
At first we picked Doubtful Sound over Milford Sound for Doubtful's abundance in wildlife and its remoteness. However, later on we added Catlins to our itinerary, which will then give us some wildlife viewing at Nugget Point. As a result we are now thinking of replacing Doubtful with Milford Sound since Milford is more accessible (we'll be staying at Te Anau) and we'll get our wildlife viewing at Nugget.

Hmmmmm...
Am I comparing apples and oranges though???

Can someone please give us their thoughts on that?

Thanks a lot
Kat

ttt

We were in NZ last December and we did the overnight cruise on Doubtful sound, the only wildlife we saw was dolphins (and sandflies!!!)- it also rained all the time but apparently that's how it is supposed to be! We were told we were too late to see fjorland penguins (we were there on 26th Dec.)
We went to the Catlins but I think we were a bit unlucky as the weather wasn't very nice at all, we saw some hector penguins and that's about it.
However we loved Oamaru and the Otago peninsula where we saw blue and yellow eyed penguins, seals and sea lions. The weather was beautiful, it's always better when the sun is shining!

KatKat

Apples and pears. I would suggest Doubtful over Milford and also do Nugget. Doubtful you should expect to get a penguin or so and dolphins (on the return trip) and seals where the boat reaches the sea (i.e., be on teh upper deck when yuo get to the apex at the Tasman and in front of the boat about half way back.) At teh point do take your binnoculars. And I agree with Meg on Otago.

Thanks, Meg and WA.

So is it true that I would get as close to the dolphins and penguins (if any) in Doubtful as in Nugget? (since I'll need to use binoculars anyway?)

Thanks
Kat

KatKat

Nugget - you walk up around a light house and look down a couple of hundred feet to the sea and rocks. It was a good place to watch the seals and sea lions and a penguin or two. I do not see any dolphine when I was there.

Doubtful, the dolphine come up and swim around the boat. We saw a few more penguin.

There different experiences. I woudl just do both.

Thanks for the helpful clarifications, WA!

Katkat
On Doubtful sound, the dolphins swam around our boat - no need for binoculars. We also saw dolphins in the Bay of Plenty and in Kaikoura, we got really close to penguins in Oamaru and Otago. We needed the binoculars for the hector dolphins in the catlins though.
Let me know if you want to see any of my 'wildlife photos' and I'll email you some!

That'll be awesome, Meg! It's great to be able to compare the distances. Please send them to [email protected]

Thanks a lot!
Kat