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Published: March 19th 2007
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Dunedin City
So called town of students and chocolate... The City Dunedin is the second largest city in the South Island and is home to the very first NZ University. It is said to be a student town but since our arrival we hav'nt seen many students. I guess they must be on a break or locked away studying hard....
As soon as we arrived here from Wanaka we parked up in the city and explored as much as we could. Unfortunately it was a sunday and most places were closed, however we got a good bearing of the area, visted the tourist info office (thats our routine now, every village, town and city we visit, the first port of call is the tourist office) and got all the info we required.
The Otago Penensula is home to the Royal Albatros, yellowed eyed penguin and sea lions. It houses the largest population of sea lions in the world! The visit to the penensula is a must for us. We also sourced camping grounds, eateries, and other activities todo in and around Dunedin.
Cadburys World We booked ourselves into a tour of Cadburys World... yum yum
I found Cadburys world interesting as it showed
Cadbury
Mh Chocolate .... where the cocoa beans were sourced and how they made the chocolate. The visit also taught how other cultures used cocoa beans and generally the history of chocolate. I will let Katja give you guys a more indepth description of our visit...
Cadburys World... after working at Nestle and having a pretty good taste within a year and our chocolate room full off all lovely sweets of this famous brand - we just had to visit this so called Willi Wonka Chocolate trip offered at Cadburys World. Imagine all New Zealands chocolate is produced here, which is very rare as the production must be highly flexible.
I was told that Cadburys has a 100% market share (can't call it share anymore - monopoly) within New Zealands chocolate confectionery market. Hm, and we got a good taste of it. We were dressed in the sexy hats, which I started to miss from Zeina 😊, and off we went. I was often wondering how they would combine thousands of people being lead through their factory with Hygiene and Quality. Well, listen to that David and Susan - Ali was asked to take off his watch and other things and said
Cadbury Ali
Guess how much chocolate he had already? he will put it in his pocket - she was fine with that!
Anyway, away from work back to the sweet brown mass. We didn't really see much production as the lines didn't run during the hour that we visited but we got lots of chocolate, chocolate coated marshmallows, a copy of a mars bar from Cadbury's and even more chocolate to keep our mood high. The best part was a chocolate fountain that is showing 1ton of chocolate being spilt down a tunnel. Well I got a bit of it on my 'white' Shirt, jam, it was hungy too.
Treaty of Waitangi - Maori vs. British Whislt in the city we were lucky to come across a road show about the Treaty of Waitangi. Now this is a treaty that was signed by the Maoris and the English around 80 years ago. Not that long ago at all!! The treaty was supposed to give equal rights to the Whites as well as the Maori but unfortunately their are many discrepencies within the Treaty such as its translation, in the English version is states to Soverenty over the whole of NZ but whereas the Maori version
Cadbury Katja
And now guess how much chocolate I had? is states to give equal rights. The road show highlighted tensions between the two races. I got talking to a Maori girl working on the roadshow, It was quite interesting to see what she had to say as she was light skinned. She said it was interesting to see how people treated her in comparison to her cousins. I guess its no different to any other type of racisim found anywhere else in the world but it was a real eye opener for us and something that i found quite sad to see. The road show was there to inform everyone of the Treaty (as we were told) 80%!o(MISSING)f NZ's population does not even know it is even there.
Dunedin as a city is very relaxed, people go about there business in a layed back sort of way and both of us felt quite welcomed there. We walked around loads and just soaked up the atmosphere. Infact we spent quite some time on the internet researching, booking and uploading.
Otago Penensula The Penesula isnt very big and in truth there isnt much to see there by your self. If you want to see something you
Ali's new friend
Guess what he is getting for x-mas? have to book with one of the tour operators who will either fly you over the penensula or the slightly cheaper option, 4x4 over it. Most of the penenusla is privately owned land so we couldnt just walk around as we thought we would. However in the Albatross booking centre, I met a really nice old lady who gave me a few tips on where we might be able to spot some sea lions, albatross and penguins, however we couldnt see the penguins until later in the evening as that the time they come back to shore.
We went to the first place she suggested, it was small beach five minutes drive away and since they had spotted sea lions there in the morning it was highly likely they may still be there now. So off we went on our new found mission to spot some sea lions, we drove over the beach, got out and walked very very carefully. The sea lions cover them selves in sand and look like sand dunes, its very easy to mistake them for a sand dune. As they are very teritorial creatures it is advised that you dont get too close or
One man and his dog??????
Hey wait for me... I am still here too else you will most likly have a couple of tons sat on you!!!
unfortunately our soft steps and whispers didnt get any results. There were non there or we didnt seem them.
On the plus side i made a new friend. A dog, I dont even know what he was called but he was so well trained and so trusting. He came up to, ran around and what i thought ran away. No not this dog. He actually went and found a stick, brought it to me and dropped it before me. He then just stared at me. I knew what he wanted and was at first reluctant to play with him. In the end I did and he was really playful. Time was pressing on and we had to go. My new friend didnt quite understand that but we couldnt take him with us, even if i wanted to!
Our next stop was a few miles down the penensula on a beach that was said to be a breeding place for seals and sea lions normally hanged out there. We had to walk for abouts 20 - 30 mins to get down to the beach. It was
Otago Penensula
Where sea lions live... really worth it, we not only got to see seals, sea lions and a couple of dolphins, the beach was amazing... soft sand with a slight breeze, just what the doc ordered!
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