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Published: January 23rd 2009
Dunedin on a quiet Sunday afternoon, it was exactly what we needed after a fun-filled visit to Queenstown. We stayed in a gorgeous hostel which was a converted private hospital and was over 100 years old. Our room was huge, about 25x25 feet and we even had our own antique fireplace as a headboard. It also had a ghost which, we were as much warned as informed, appeared occasionally to guests during the twilight hours. Luckily we escaped without making her acquaintance. I’m fairly certain I would have had a minor heart attack if I had seen her.
The city was nice enough although we both agreed we favoured Auckland and Wellington over it. The one thing it really had going for it was the history. It did have a much older feel and some nice old buildings and churches. Dunedin is also home to New Zealand only castle which is perched on a hill about 20 minutes drive from the city centre.
Larnach Castle is 137 years old and was built by an Australian, William Larnach. The Larnach family suffered a number of tragedies, the culmination of which was the suicide of William Larnach in 1898 after the
death of two wives and a daughter. The castle was eventually sold in 1899 after a number of legal battles over its ownership. It had many owners between then and the present day and also many uses, as a lunatic asylum, a hospital for shell-shocked soldiers, a nuns retreat and the ballroom was once even used as a sheep holding pen.
It was in an awful state when it was purchased by the current owners, the Barker Family in 1967. They recognised the promise and potential of the castle and its gardens and have spent the past 40 years restoring them to almost their original condition.
It was a gorgeous sunny day when we visited the castle and one of the most striking things was the fantastic view from the gardens over the city and out along the rest of the Otago Peninsula as it stretched out into the Pacific. The castle itself, although really pretty, doesn’t exactly look or feel particularly old but then again, coming from Dublin nothing in New Zealand is going to have the kind of history or old feel of Dublin Castle for example. Nevertheless it was well worth a visit and a
really nice way to spend an afternoon.
Dunedin felt somewhat like a bonus as it wasn’t on our original itinerary but one place we were very much determined to visit was Mount Cook. Known as Aoraki (meaning Cloud Piercer) in Maori, Mount Cook is the highest mountain in New Zealand standing a whopping 3,754 metres high.
The first recorded European attempt to climb to the summit was of course made a Paddy! Rev. WS Green alongside a Swiss hotelier, Emil Boss and a Swiss mountain guide Ulrich Kaufman climbed Mount Cook on 2 March 1882, but it was later discovered that they were 50 m short of the true summit. Too much Guinness not enough climbing!
Mount Cook continues to grow (7mm higher each year) due to the tectonic uplifting as the Pacific and Australia plates collide.
Our drive from Dunedin to Mount Cook Village was one of the most interesting drives we‘ve taken. First we encountered the Moeraki Boulders along the coast about 1 hour north of Dunedin. There is a whole interesting story about how they were formed, including theories on the reason for their spherical shape and how they are now visible along
the shore line, due to the soft cliffs which they were enclosed in being worn away by the force of the sea at high tide, but really there just look cool haha.
Our drive also took us along by Lake Pukaki which lies to the south of Mount Cook. It is a huge body of the memorable turquoise water which has become synonymous with New Zealand in our minds. Despite the fact the we have now seen many rivers and lakes this colour (although none quite as amazing as Hokitika Gorge) we had to stop and take in the gorgeous views.
On our arrival into Mount Cook Village we were instantly awestruck. The clouds seemed to have abandoned the sky just so we could appreciate the magnificent views around us. I feel the pictures really say more than I can in this instance.
The village itself was just that, a village. We read that the population in summer is 200 and in winter 150 and the only supermarket was our little shop in the hostel. Although they did sell almost everything and it had a very impressive range of dinner options. We, of course, had enough to
feed the village in the car already so the only thing we actually needed from the shop was a yummy Magnum for dessert.
Despite the magnificent views and the lovely walks, we decided to hit the road the next morning and start making our way a bit further north towards Hanmer Springs. To break up the journey we decided to stop off in a town called Methven, which had quite literally nothing to do in it and we were delighted to have an excuse to cook a nice dinner and lounge around all evening reading our books and drinking champagne. We can’t resist the champagne over here. It’s gorgeous and only about 3 Euro a bottle. Yes I know, champagne doesn’t exactly fit in with our “backpackers” image but then again neither does steak or giant bars of Dairy Milk or Magnums!
Hanmer Springs is a gorgeous little town with a lot more to it than just the mineral pools it is famous for.
The weather was fabulous if even a little too warm. The fact that it is so far inland and situated in a valley means that there is scarcely a draft never mind a breeze
or a bit of wind. The town did have the best and biggest ice-cream cones we found so far. Two scoops of ice-cream is piled about 6 inches high on the cone and it is like some kind of sick challenge to try and eat the bloody thing before it melts all over your arms. Then again we are almost professionals now and were more than prepared for the challenge. We watched out for each other all the way shouting “DRIP” at the slightest sign of a dribble in the other ones blind spot.
Next stop was Kaikoura, our final destination before we made our way to Christchurch. It is a lovely seaside town, in the Marlborough region of the South Island. We decided to spend four days there and use it to relax and catch up on some of our forward planning, which we had completely abandoned in the past few weeks taking each day as it came. We will be looking for somewhere to live in Sydney very soon so we looked at various websites and got really excited about the prospect of it all. And we of course needed to book some accommodation in Melbourne. We’ll
be there during the Australian Open - so we figured it might be a good idea to book a good bit in advance.
Apart from the boring practical things, we did have time for some lovely walks along the beach and a few visits to the seal colony just up the road from us. We also went out for a really nice meal to sample some of the local seafood which Kaikoura is well known for. Gareth decided on traditional battered cod and chips and I got a HUGE bowl of green lip mussels in a chilli and white wine sauce which I devoured as though I hadn’t been fed in a week! We each had a drink to accompany our meal and just to rub it in, it cost us about 23 euro. Bargain!!!
The hostel was a lovely old hotel which was decorated with old lamps and dark wooden furniture in the common room and had a funky kitchen which included a canoe as a light fitting. There were two cats as the hostel mascots and they were the cheekiest cats I have even seen.
One day were making steak, mash and gravy for the
dinner and I left to set the table, when I got back one of the cats was perched suspiciously on the counter a couple of feet from the baking tray with steak in it, looking as though 10 seconds later we would have been choking the little brat to get our steak back! Although a nice big piece of steak only costs about 4 euro here, so we may have just popped out and got more (Gareth reckons he would have choked the cat anyway and then gone out to get more)
Kaikoura is one of those towns that has plenty on offer in the way of walks and activities but is great if you just want to stroll along looking in the shops and popping into the bars and cafes along the way. We also went our for a thai lunch one day . It was a lunch special so we could resist. Two lunches for bout 8 euro and the green curry (yes I know I am predictable) was almost too spicy for me, so just the way I like it! We even managed to catch some of the Bolton v Man U game which needless to
say we were both delighted about!
Oh and we had fish and chips and watched Harry Potter and played scrabble (We won one game each - we play the decider next week). So yep that was Kaikoura 😊 And we’re not even nearly broke -we love the favourable exchange rate!
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Elvira
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Not jelous this time ;p
Hi guys!!! As always I LOVE the pics!!! But not too jelous this time. I have been doing a bit of travelling mysefl. For the 1st time in ages, Slawek had the weekend off!!!!! So we went to Cliffs of Moher, Burren, Galway, Connemara.... BEAUTIFUL IRELAND!!! Slawek is so in love that we wants to move to the countryside hahahaha! Big kisses guys! keep on posting the amazing pics and telling us all the places you are "discovering" Besos