Tourist’s passport stolen by parrot

TE ANA, New Zealand – Police in New Zealand said a Scottish tourist’s passport was stolen by a kea, a large wild parrot, during a bus tour in the Fiordland region.

A spokesman for police in Te Anau, the nearest town to the scene of the incident, said the kea snatched a brightly colored bag containing the man’s passport when the bus driver opened the vehicle’s luggage compartment, Britain’s Daily Telegraph reported Friday.

The spokesman said the passport is unlikely to be recovered given the 4,600-square mile side of the alpine national park in Fiordland.

The tourist, who asked to remain anonymous, said the British High Commission in Wellington, New Zealand, told him it could be up to six weeks before he gets a replacement for the lost document. He said he is planning to return to Scotland in August.

“Being Scottish, I’ve got a sense of humor, so I did take it with humor, but obviously there is a side of me that is still raging,” he said. “My passport is somewhere out there in Fiordland. The kea is probably using it for fraudulent claims or something.”