Oor wee visit tae Dunedin

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We left Mount Cook with a spring in our step. Our time there had been great and we were really looking forward to getting to Dunedin. Dunedin is old Gaelic for Edinburgh and the impression we had from the guide books was that Dunedin is a little piece of Scotland in the South. It was about 3 and a half hours to Dunedin and our first stop was at the Moerikai Boulders. These are big, round boulders sitting in the middle of beach. It is quite an unusual sight seeing these almost perfectly round rocks sitting on the beach, they seem so out of place. If you are feeling left out of all of this you can have a similar sort of experience, just get some pebbles or marbles, put them in some watery sand and then look at them really, really close up.

When we arrived in Dunedin we were pleasantly surprised. The city/town itself isn’t the biggest or prettiest looking but is set in some nice countryside. We took a drive around the peninsula to a spot where you can see seals, penguins and albatross. The weather was fine and we saw some nice sights along the way. The next morning we went up Mount Cargill (in the car) which is just outside the city. I gave us a great view over the bays and out to the sea. We were going there so that we could walk to the Organ Pipes. This is a collection of rocks that look like - you guessed it - organ pipes. The walk up was quite tiring and in the end the actually pipes themselves were a bit disappointing but it got the heart going and the views of the bays was worth it.

Our next stop for the days was going to be Tunnel Beach but we were sidetracked by the official Worlds Steepest Street, as certified by the Guinness Book of World Records. There were a number of people walking up the street but I thought that was boring so I took the car up it, turned around at the top and then came back down. Sandra had asked me to take a picture of the sign for the street which I dutifully had done, however, neither of us actually took a picture of the street.

We then continued on to Tunnel Beach. When we first arrived we weren’t quite sure what to expect. The parking lot was at the top of the cliffs above the pounding sea and we didn’t know if there was an actual beach or not. We headed down a steep path and eventually saw a massive rock where the sea had worn a tunnel right through it. After taking some pictures a nice old man told us that there was a tunnel which would take you down to the beach. This tunnel had been built 100 years ago by a local farmer so that his daughters could get onto the sand and go for a swim. This is how the beach got its name. We proceeded down the tunnel and popped out at a sandy cove surrounded by towering cliffs. It was all pretty dramatic with the waves crashing in over the rocks.

We returned back to the campsite for lunch before walking into Dunedin city centre and exploring it for the rest of the afternoon. We saw the old cathedral and the railway station (apparently the most photographed building in New Zealand). Given its size and layout it is a nice city to walk around. One fifth of the population here is students and it was quite obvious as we walked around. The University is quite spread-out with all the different faculties in separate buildings all around the place.

Did Dunedin remind me of Scotland? In a way I suppose, the countryside is very familiar and the people are friendly but other than the obviously Scottish street names and the Scottish shop that is where I think the similarities ended. The city didn’t have the same feels as Edinburgh or Glasgow and it also didn’t have the same depth of history and grand historic buildings. Saying that, it is very nice in its own right and perhaps it isn’t fair to draw comparisons. We enjoyed our couple of days here and will look back on them fondly.

We next head south and west into the fiordlands. As always we will try to keep you posted.

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Photos

Morekai Boulders
Big Pebbles in the sand

Tunnel Beach
Towering Cliffs surrounding the beach

Comments

[Bill and Nancy]

The Moerikai Boulders are calcium carbonate spheres or geodes and are very unusual because of their size.

[mom]

Beautiful photos. Sorry didnt get your sms