Moeraki and Dunedin

We woke up to the sound of crashing waves and the sun just about to come up beyond the horizon. It was still cloudy, so it wasn't a dramatic sunrise, but we could see a change in the amount of light. We enjoyed our ocean view for a bit before getting going. We had some breakfast before leaving the campsite.

Once we did head out, we back tracked towards Moeraki Village and down to Katiki Lighthouse. The lighthouse was short and seemed very inland to be a working lighthouse, but it must still be effective if it's still in operation. We continued down the path until it opened up to the coastline. Initially there was fencing which blocked the view of the seals lazing in the grass, but we continued down the path past the fences and the path opened up into a grassy area with plenty of seals all having a morning snooze. Some saw us and ran towards the water, others didn't care and just looked at us before going back to sleep.

We walked amongst the seals to the edge of the cliff before turning back. We didn't want to disturb them by getting too close or in their way. Back at the car, we drove a little bit further back on ourselves to the Moeraki Boulders. We walked about 400m down the beach until we were amongst the round boulders, most buried in the sand from being on the beach and washed over with sand and sea daily. We also saw some boulders that must have been pushed into the cliffs and burst open. The shards of rock have crystallized along the edges where salt water has gotten in and interacted with the rock. There were a few boulders that hadn't burst open, but the cracks were a honey crystal color, like veins.

With most of the boulders being sunk in the sand, they're easier to climb and walk on top of. There were a few in a line that I hopped across, and just as I got to the lowest sunken one, a big wave came and washed over my feet! Luckily the Goretex on my sneakers still works and my feet surprisingly stayed dry! It made for some cool pictures too. We continued walking along the beach looking at the different boulders and took turns trying to climb the only boulder intact and fully out of the sand. (Although, when I say take turns, I mean Allan ran and jumped on clambering himself and he gave me a big boost and I still struggled and flopped onto it. Took me two tries, but I got up!)

After playing at the boulders, we walked back along the beach to the van and finished the drive to Dunedin. It's about an hour from the boulders. Our first stop in the Scottish settled city was Baldwin Street, the steepest residential street in the world. Being a residential street, a lot of the houses have cute little gardens because they know people will visit the street. A lot of people forgot it was still a street and laid down in the road to take pictures and got honked at and nearly run over 🙄. We walked up the sidewalks to the top of Baldwin Street where there is a bench and water fountain as well as a nice mural behind the bench. There's also a plaque to commemorate regaining the "world's steepest residential street" title from the Welsh in 2019.

After taking some pictures at the top, we walked back down. Allan suggested we drive it. I was fighting a migraine so I didn't want to drive, so he did instead so I could still see what it was like. We drove up, and rolled back down and carried on into the city center. We found a good parking spot in the center of town near the train station which was on our Lovely Planet walking route.

We started the loop around the city at Dunedin Railway Station. This is a beautiful building with black and white brick and looks like a big, fancy gingerbread house. Inside the main foyer was tile mosaic flooring as well as some stained glass windows with a second floor balcony that allowed you to see down to the ground. They have an art center and a Sports Hall of Fame in the building too. Across the street was a similar brick building, but this building was the Law Courts. We couldn't go inside here, but Allan probably would've if he could've.

We continued the walk from the station straight up the street until we hit The Octagon. The Octagon is the center of the city with shops, pubs and cafes along the edges. In the middle is a statue of Rabbie Burns (they called him 'Robbie') as well as some park benches and awnings. Two of the streets that branch from The Octagon are Princes Street and George Street. I was noticing that Dunedin, named for the garlic version for Edinburgh, is a big copy and paste of Edinburgh, but also like if Chat GPT made the copy. It's similar, but not quite right at the same time.

Before leaving The Octagon, we stopped in at St Paul’s Anglican Cathedral. It's an impressive building of gray stone and the inside is plain, but also a bit modern with how they chose to decorate the sanctuary area. There was also a huge organ in the front of the church and some nice stained glass windows. Moving away from The Octagon slightly up the street was another church, this time a Catholic one, St Joseph’s Catholic Cathedral. This building was definitely more impressive than St. Paul's. It had ornate stone carvings at the entrance and when we went inside there was a huge, pastel rose window behind the altar as well as pastel stained glass windows higher up in the church. At eye level were classic stained glass windows.

A short walk around the corner and down the hill was a large brick building, the home of Speights Brewing, the oldest brewery in Dunedin and one of the oldest in New Zealand. It was pretty quiet around the brewery despite the fact that they enrun tours daily. We went into the alehouse, their pub connected to the brewery, and ordered a tasting board of the 8 beers they had on draft. It was a fair mix of different things like the gold medal ale, IPAs, a porter, even ginger beer and cider. We enjoyed all of the beer we drank here, but especially the hazy pale ale and porter. The low carb beer was by far the least favorite.

After Speights we walked along Rattray Street past The National Bank of New Zealand and Garrison Hall which had a unicorn on the front at the entrance. When walking through the small Queens Garden we stopped at the Cenotaph honoring lives lost in WWI. The final stop was an unplanned one after seeing it on a hill on our way back to the car and had us walking back into town. The First Church of Otago was a nice stone building with a tall spire. The inside was closed for renovations so we admired the church from the outside.

During our walk back to the car, Allan made final arrangements to see an old friend, Dave, from his first trip to New Zealand. We made a pit stop for groceries on our way to Dave's house. We only planned on a small stop for a beer and a shower to have a catch up, but when Dave and Emma offered us a comfy bed and dinner, we couldn't resist. We ended up staying and chatting well into the night before heading to our comfy bed and shower just after midnight. It meant we had to get up early tomorrow to drive the extra distance we didn't manage today, but the small breather of the chill evening was nice.Leer más