Dunedin & Otago 18th to 22nd November 2010

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It was sad to leave Aoraki Mount Cook as it was such a lovely place and we could have undertaken a few more of the excellent walking tracks but we have to move on. We headed back following the edge of Lake Pukaki and arrived in the small town of Twizel, a town that should not exist today. It was built in 1968 as the base for the Waitaki Power Development and the plan was to bulldoze the town once construction work was completed. However the inhabitants had grown fond of their home during the 18 years of construction, so they successfully campaigned to retain the town. It’s now a vibrant place with plenty of cafés and bars that enhance its appeal and we stopped in one to have a break and of course coffee and cake (yes again Kit!). We had a small tour around a Salmon Farm on a lake nearby and then continued towards the east coast, passing several more lakes, including one named Lake Aviemore. We crossed many rivers and were amazed at the masses of flowering lupins growing in abundant all around the area, a truly spectacular vista, the river beds were edged with carpets of blue and pink. The rivers were quite dry but apparently when the snow melt is in full flow they raise dramatically. We finally arrived at our next destination Oamaru and what a difference to all the other towns we have visited, the houses were mainly made of stone not the usual wood and the whole town was in the throws of a Victorian Heritage Celebration. The celebrations are an opportunity for the locals to celebrate their past under the backdrop of the Historic Precinct and Victorian buildings in their town. It’s strange but Oamaru has the best kept collection of Victorian architecture in the world, buildings that continue to serve a vibrant and positive community which we were to experience during our brief stay there. During the late 19th Century, the harbour was a vital business hub for Oamaru and its farming community. Grain and Wool was housed in ornate warehouses built and carved from locally quarried Oamaru Stone. The discovery of an excellent building material, limestone, contributed to the town’s early appearance of permanence and stability. Because the stone was easily carved and moulded architects and stone masons revelled in the creation of the then fashionable classic form of architecture. Their skills aided by the general prosperity of the time, have given Oamaru some of the finest 19th Century streetscapes in New Zealand today. It had traditionally been a servicing centre for farms and estates and just south of Oamaru, sheep for New Zealand’s first shipment of frozen mutton to the UK were killed and processed. Because the port played an important role in the handling of imports and exports, the harbour area was developed first. Here, creamy white limestone hotels, banks and offices stood alongside equally well-designed and proportional grain and wool stores and warehouses, still very much in evidence today. The closure of the port in the 1970s led to the decline of the city and it then became quite deserted, which has however been fortuitous for the town’s 19th century heritage which still remains largely intact today and poised to greet an era of renewed appreciation. The town is now trying to ensure that its historic buildings are preserved for future generations to appreciate and looking for support for this to happen, many building have been restored but as we wandered around the town just as many were still in need. Throughout the five days of Victorian Heritage celebrations many activities take place and local residents dress in Victorian costumes and go about there everyday life, whether it be a gentleman of distinction, a lady of wealth or a simple colonial settler. Walking around the town was a very unique and at times weird experience, it was like being in the middle of a film set. We met so many friendly people, so enthusiastic about their town and heritage and we thoroughly enjoyed joining in their celebrations. We had a long chat with a local bicycle manufacturer who still produced the penny farthing bicycle as well as restoring old bicycles. He invited us into his shop to see them although we declined his offer to ride a penny farthing – a little uncomfortable! We attended a music concert in the local church and were invited to a Victorian Tea Party in the Oamaru Botanical Gardens. Amongst the many restored buildings was the original post office which was too small when the town prospered so a new very grand replacement was built right next to it which looked like a slightly smaller version of the Guildhall in Winchester, pretty impressive for a Post Office! The original one still remained and had been turned into a café called ‘the last post’. As well as its Victorian heritage, Oamaru is also home to two very distinctive penguin colonies, the Yellow-eyed Penguin which nests amongst the native bush and the tiny Blue Penguin, which return to shore in rafts (groups) to their nests near the town at dusk each evening. We were lucky enough to see both of these during our time in the town. We booked a local tour with a delightful knowledgeable guide called Malcolm Williams. Our first stop was to see the yellow-eyed penguins, one of the world’s rarest penguins; it breeds only on the southern coast of New Zealand and outlying islands. The name is given because of the iris of the eye which is yellow in adults (grey in juveniles). Known to the Maori as Hoiho (Noise Shouter) their calls can be heard on isolated Otago beaches as they announce their arrival back from a days feeding. In the late 1980s the outlook for these penguins looked very bleak, the cool coastal forests where they nested had been cleared for pasture and sheep and cattle had trampled their nests. Ferrets and stoats introduced by the early settlers killed and ate their chicks. The population was falling fast and from a low of about 150 breeding pairs in the 1990s, numbers are slowly increasing although it will be many years if ever to reach their original numbers. They can dive in excess of 100 metres and feed mainly on fish. At Bushy Beach on the edge of town a track platform allows the viewing of these penguins as they emerge from the ocean to waddle their way up the cliffs from the beach to their nest. We were lucky to see four on the beach below although at a distance they looked truly wonderful and we wished we could have seen them closer. The mainland population is classified as regionally endangered so we were lucky indeed to see four together. Adults have brilliant white plumage and a salty blue back. Around the back of the head is a bank of bright yellow which passes through the line of the eyes and the eyes themselves are a pale yellow, their feet are flesh coloured and the beak red-brown. Normally two eggs are laid in early September three to five days apart. There is no capacity to lay again in the event of egg loss and with mortality at sea said to be 75 to 80% before breeding age is achieved it is no wonder that they are endangered. After viewing the yellow eyed penguins we moved on to the harbour area where we gathered with quite a few other ‘tourists’ at a place where the blue penguins arrive later in the evening and as dusk arrived so did they. Firstly you could see black smudges out at sea as they came in together in rafts (groups) of about 40 penguins (for safety) all arriving on the shore together, They then wait patiently until one decides its safe to make its way up the beach and they all follow and head for their nests. In total about 180 arrived in a one hour period, quite a different experience from seeing only four yellow-eyed penguins on the beach earlier in the evening. It was quite dark as we left the colony and headed into town where Malcolm stopped on the main street for us to see the nightlife of Oamaru. In the middle of the street just beside the ‘grand’ Post Office was an old steam engine that had been customised eccentrically. It was emitting steam and making so much noise we could not hear each other talk. The locomotive had been modified by ‘Steampunk’ a world full of mad and quirky alternative technology, so strange alongside the beautifully restored buildings. Perhaps someone knew what it was about but we definitely didn’t! The next day we walked into the town and spent sometime chatting to the locals as well as visiting the local cheese factory where we watched the process and sampled some of the local cheeses in the restaurant. That evening we walked back into the harbour area where we spotted some very ancient rusty train engines around the old train tracks (perhaps these are heading for ‘steampunk’). We started chatting to a local fisherman as we waited for the blue eyed penguins to arrive at dusk, and sure enough the ‘rafts’ started to arrive and head for their nests, some actually came to within inches of our feet and we got some superb views, although the battery on the camera had run out so we were unable to get any good photos. The local fisherman said that they sometimes came into the streets and he had often seen them walking around the harbour in the early hours of the morning. They even build their nests under people houses but were quite a pest if they did as the noise and smell was not pleasant, even though they are very ‘cute’ you would not want them under your house! The fisherman was telling us stories about when his father was a boy and what Oamaru was like then. We asked him about the rusty old train engines we had seen early and he said that his father told him about a great storm which had destroyed all the penguins nest and had washed away their nesting habitat. The locals had spent many days shoring up the beaches and had buried the old steam engines for support. Apparently these had recently been dug up for some reason and were the ones we had seen earlier in the evening. It was quite dark as we made our way back to the campsite and we wished we had taken a torch but made it back OK. The next morning we headed south to our next destination stopping at the Moeraki Boulders on the way. A large number of huge spherical stones that look like giant marbles are strewn along a stretch of Koekohe Beach near Moeraki, a small settlement just south of Hampden on New Zealand's Otago coast. These boulders are grey-coloured septarian concretions which have been exposed through shoreline erosion from the black mudstone coastal cliffs that back the beach. They originally formed in the ancient sea floor sediments during the early Paleocene some 60 million years ago. It was rainy really hard as we arrived at the beach but we still wandered down to the shore and took some photographs of these very strange stones which reminded us of giant turtle shells. It continued rainy nearly all the way to Dunedin which is the South Island’s second city and home of New Zealand’s first university. The city has a statue of Robert Burns guarding its centre, echoing its foundation by Scottish settlers - Dunedin is celtic for Edinburgh. It was once the richest and most populous place in all of New Zealand and in the 1860s with the discovery of gold it had a ‘rush’ that rivalled California’s. The next morning we headed for the Dunedin Railway Station where we were going to travel to the spectacular Taieri River George. The railway station is one of the finest stone buildings in the country and looks more like a palace than a railway station. It earned designer George Troup a knighthood and the nickname ‘Gingerbread George’. Inside there are ornate Edwardian fixtures, Royal Doulton mosaic tile floors and intricate stained glass windows as well as a very cosy lounge with plush sofas and armchairs - nothing like railway stations back home. We had lovely coffee in the lounge which was not self service! As we waited on the platform to board the vintage 1920’s wooden carriage we thought this is lovely as there was only a couple of others and we would have lots of space. However just before the train left a group of very young scouts arrived, we had forgotten it was Sunday and the local scout troop was having a days outing! The guard assured us that they would be in separate carriages and they were (we do seem to attract school parties wherever we go!). The train journey was very comfortable and one of the guards sat in the front of the carriage giving us all a live commentary as we travelled along the river gorge. As it climbed the steep gorge you were able to stand outside between the carriages for good views, although you had to remember not to lean out as the tracks sometimes nearly touched the sides of the gorge, luckily the scouts were not let out on their own. It stopped at several old stations as it wound its way through the rocky gorge which was like a giant version of Cheddar Gorge in Somerset. Along the way we crossed about a dozen viaducts, one of them 50m above the creek bed and travelled through many tunnels the longest of which funnily enough was called Salisbury Tunnel. At the end of the line we stopped at a place called Middlemarch for lunch before the return journey. This quiet country town has a population of only 250 and is situated on the Strath Taieri Plain which is the eastern portal for the Otago Central Rail Trail. This trail is a 150km track restored from the former Middlemarch to Clyde rail route and which attracts many walkers and bikers each year. We remained in Dunedin for our next trip which was a wildlife cruise to the Otago Peninsular to see the diversity of wildlife which abounds on Taiaroa Head. We initially travelled by coach out on to the peninsula gradually climbing up extremely steep narrow roads with superb views over the city of Dunedin way below (glad we did not drive the motorhome) and then to our first stop Penguin Place Reserve. This reserve is a private conservation effort to save the yellow eyed penguin from extinction and is funded entirely from profits from tour fees. We had a short introduction talk by an experienced guide before we visited the working conservation programme to see and photograph undisturbed activity at close range through a unique system of hides and tunnels. With the support of tourism they are able to replant breeding habitat, build nesting sites, trap predators and care for sick and neglected birds. We were lucky enough to see two nesting penguins and their chicks and whilst we were viewing these our guide had a call to say that a penguin had arrived on the beach and was making its way up the cliff. He told us to follow him along the cliffs to another hide as the penguin climbed up to its nest and it came within feet of us, but was completely unaware of our presence. Paul managed to get some really good photos but I was so excited that I forgot to turn the video on so had no footage. At least we had managed to get some closer photographs than we did at Bushy Beach. We then travelled down to the wharf to complete the second part of our tour by boat and we set off around Taiaroa Head to see the Northern Royal Albatross which breeds every second year in this location. This huge bird lays an egg twice the size of an orange, which then takes 79 days to incubate. With a wingspan of three metres they can fly at 120 kph (only just faster than Paul’s driving in the motorhome along these narrow bendy roads!!). We were lucky enough to see a number of these magnificent birds flying (gliding) around the head with their wings skimming the surface of the waves and we also saw various other birds including, spoonbills, gannets, terns and the odd little blue penguin feeding out at sea (as we didn’t get a close up earlier have included this one in our blog). Tomorrow we move on again and are heading south to the Catlins Coast.

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