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Published: March 2nd 2010
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So we wake up to rain which I guess is thankfully not a surprise and hey we are only driving to Dunedin today on highway 1 so there is not going to be that much to see. We do have the hopeful promise that the weather will improve. We are collected at our motel by Linda from Affordable Motor Rentals to go and collect what is going to be home away from home for the next 11 days. I am pretty excited when I see it because I have done pretty much every other type of accommodation so this would be the last to cross off the list. Linda explained how everything worked to us and it all seemed pretty easy to manage and there was plenty of space to put all our stuff and we had the added comfort of our own toilet and shower even if you did have to clean it out yourself every other day. Linda had heaps of information about the South Island for us in our van as well so we felt very prepared! So it was only with a little trepidation that we headed on our way.
I guess our first official stop
was the supermarket. We were really going to be good on the holiday and do our own cooking and try and save a bit of money for all those hundred and one activities that we had planned to do. The second official stop was to see the cool Moeraki boulders found strewn along a stretch of Koekohe Beach along the Otago Coast. Maori legend tells that the boulders are remains of calabashes, kumaras and eel baskets that washed ashore after the legendary canoe, the Araiteuru was wrecked at nearby Shag Point (Matakaea) though I believe that officially they are grey-coloured septarian concretions which have been exposed through shoreline erosion from black mudstone coastal cliffs that back the beach. They originally formed in ancient sea floor sediments during the early Paleocene some 60 million years ago. Go figure, for me they were simply very cool spherical rock formations which I tried to climb on so that hubby could take a picture of me. Thankfully the rain held up a little bit as well so we got to enjoy for a short while. It was also a great excuse to have a coffee and a biscuit which we could make for ourselves while enjoying the sound of the sea.
We got to Dunedin to experience our first holiday park which was decked out with all facilities which meant we really did not have to use all our own. It was cold though and it was very tempting to spend the rest of the evening hidden in the van drinking cold beer, reading our books and munching on chips! But we eventually started to feel a bit guilty so we headed for a walk along St Kilda Beach only a 5 minute walk from the holiday park. It was sunset and beautiful which helped a lot as I was wearing jumper, coat and scarf to keep myself warm. It was a fantastic walk and a great time to take lots of pictures as the light ebbed away.
Never mind that we went to bed with our jumpers on and fingers crossed that the weather would be a bit nicer tomorrow...
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