Dunedin weekend!

---

So, last Friday Sarah, Emma and I loaded up our bags and caught the InterCity bus to Dunedin. We stopped at Timaru and Oamaru along the way. Was pretty cute little trek I thought, some of the towns we passed through had less than a handful of actual traffic lights. Got to see a lot of the countryside, a lot of sheep and cows. At one point we actually passed a field of grazing deer, which I found to be pretty funny because you see wild deer in BC, though you'd never see a wild sheep or cow. I might have to try some New Zealand venison sometime just because of that.

We got to Dunedin around 8 pm and found our hostel which was decent actually, warm and cozy with no upper bunks, bonus. Friday night we went to a SuperHero/Villain costume party as Emma had friends in town. I got hopelessly lost when trying to make my way back to the hostel, the kiwis don't design their roads in grid, it's more a jumble of streets everywhere. So after walking up and down the hilly streets of Dunedin for awhile, I definitely got a good night's sleep!

Saturday was spent wandering around town a bit, hung out at the hostel and went to see some bands play in town that night. Pretty relaxed Saturday all in all. Sunday I went on a tour of the Speights beer factory. The tour guide was a jolly man named Keith, I think he may have already tasted some samples that day, but it only made it more interesting. He took us through the factory and afterwards we relaxed and tried some samples of the 6 beers they had on tap while watching the series of 'Southern man' ads for Speights, which are pretty funny. After that I went to the Cadbury chocolate factory for a tour. I'd recommend coming to Dunedin during the week so that the factory is actually working, on the weekends it's a shortened tour. Nevertheless, it was pretty cool to see a tonne of liquid chocolate dumped inside the Cadbury silo. I bought some gifts for back home, now I have to send them before I eat them! I met up with Sarah and Emma a bit later and we decided to take in a movie. Mamma Mia was hilarious, nice Sunday afternoon movie, though I don't like the idea of assigned seating in a movie theatre; the seats don't fill up so everyone's in the back rows of the theatre!

Monday morning we woke up early and hauled ourselves to the bus depot. The bus was quite crowded after a few stops, but we were all half-asleep anyhow. The rain didn't set in until we were going for the bus, so I was glad it had held off all weekend! Got home about 2 pm, realized how much I like having my little room in Christchurch to come back too!

---