June 12, 2017 – Dunedin and the Otago Peninsula

We’re up at five!!  Ridiculous!  When there is enough light we’ll check out this cute little camp ground and the animals they have on their twenty-seven acres.  Right now, we’re more fixated on there not being hot-water taps and how many steps it is to the bathroom and the shower room.  We’re going to skip showers since we’ll be in a real hotel tonight with ensuite and hot water! 

The kitchen here opens at seven, so there’s time to play with our pictures and I can check my mail.  Marilyn’s password worked last night on her phone;  but now it won’t work again on either her phone or computer.

We wander over to the kitchen and some nice  person has turned on the heater! It takes a bit of fiddling to realize that the toaster is plugged into one of the stoves, and they are switched off! Flip the switch and, voila! toast! It goes well with our hard boiled eggs and coffee/tea!  We’re just heating water for our second cups when Jenene’s husband, Warren, comes in to start the fireplace. He’s charming and filled with information about what to see and do.  He tells us that the people on the south island are much friendlier than those of the north!  And you are safer in the south! He also comments that it is sometimes hard to get away from them!

Such beautiful sunrises!

It turns out that they have only owned the place for two years!  It used to be a scout camp and they have made a lot of improvements in that time! He tells us that over Christmas they had over four hundred campers! He suggests that after breakfast we walk down to the river and to see the animals, and so we do.  We run into Jenene and she brings some apples to feed to the highland cattle and her goat.  The horse across the way feels left out;  but he gets his treats in the evening.  Most of the animals are rescues.

While we’re chatting a pest control truck arrives.  They are possuming!  The little beasts are over-running the island so they are hunted down.

Back on SH 1 and we’re headed south to Dunedin.  First, though, we stop at the Moeraki Boulders, figuring that if they are cool enough to be on the map, they’re worth seeing!  You go down a flight of wooden steps to the Koekohe Beach and are greeted by large boulders scattered along the beach.  They have been eroded out of the local mudstone by both wave action and earthquakes.  Everyone on the beach is having a blast thinking of clever ways to pose for pictures. 

 

We go back up and visit the gift shop, in part so we can find Garrett, Jenene and Warren’s son who works there, and say, “Hi”, for them.  The lady at the counter is very friendly and even draws us a map of the places she thinks we need to visit next!  She also explains that the reason we had so much trouble finding accommodations in Dunedin is that one of the rugby test match between the English and Irish Lions and the New Zealand All Blacks will be played in Dunedin tomorrow!  Lucky us!  Happily the next one will be played on the north island!

Rugby Haka!!

 We’re hoping to go to Nature’s Wonders Naturally on the Otago Peninsula before settling into the Wains Hotel.  Along the way I call them and ask if they are doing their sheep shearing and sheep dog demonstrations.  Unhappily they don’t do them in the winter, so instead we plan on going to Larnach Castle.  It’s the only caste in all of New Zealand!  It’s a bit of a drive down SH and once in Dunedin we quickly find ourselves following the signs to both the Albatross Center and the castle.  We figure we can’t do both today, and the castle sounds pretty cool.

As we get closer to Dunedin I call Nature’s Wonders a second time.  They hadn’t answered the first time.  It turns out that they aren’t doing the sheep shearing and sheep dog demos this time of year without a lot of advanced warning.  Ah well, on to the castle.

Dunedin is a large town!  With only a little difficulty and quick thinking we find the turn off to the Otago Peninsula and follow the signs to Castlewood Road.  That requires a lot of driving along Portobello Road, which hugs the coast line.  One tiny slip of the wheel and you’d go straight into the drink!

The castle is more like a manor house than a castle, no moat or crenulated towers, but it is lovely.  It has been abandoned twice and when the current owners bought it the gardens were all over grown;  but they say it has been a labor of love to restore it.  One section is covered with scaffolding as the restoration continues.  There is a lovely café, called the Ballroom Café and we split the chicken and mushroom pie which is square and has a flaky crust that completely encloses the filling.  It comes with mesculin, which we learned about at the Little River Café, and big, thick fries.  The girl at the counter, who was dressed in the Ferguson tartan, suggested that we might want to each order our own meal if we’re hungry.  We are!  It’s been about eight hours since those two hard-boiled eggs!  Accordingly, we also split an “open steak sandwich” with blue cheese.  The bread is very dark and quite tasty and the sandwich comes with more of those perfect fries and three cherry tomatoes.  The server brings us two little plates to make sharing easier.

During lunch we read about the gardens and the native-plant trail.  Of course it’s winter, so not much is in bloom;  but you can imagine how gorgeous it must been in the summer and there are huge succulents and other non-flowering plants that are magnificent.  There is an Alice in Wonderland theme, with the Red Queen’s chair and small statues of the characters scattered about.

Seen in castle bathroom!  Wonder what caused this to be necessary!!

 After admiring the garden we take the self-guided tour of the house. It is much as you’d expect, with three floors and a basement which is the history room now. There are  tiled floors throughout and some of the furniture is original, which is amazing considering it’s history!  There are several bathroom, one of which has a tub that you could probably lie down in!  The views toward the water are spectacular and the wood work and ceilings are  enough to take your breath away.  No flash photography is allowed, much like in an art gallery, and the rooms are pretty dark.  Sunset is a bit after five, so I guess that isn’t too surprising..

Perhaps the most unusual room is Constance’s Boudoir.  There are double curtains through which you pass to gain access and within are ladies’ clothing, a mannequin wearing a glorious wedding gown and paintings that are actually more like collages, in that the ladies’ lace is actually real lace.  There are two that are quite three dimensional with the faces painted in 2-D while the torso is 3-D and the clothing is real!  Perhaps the most astonishing feature is the full-sized mannequin who floats above us, with her feet on the wall and her body parallel, and quite close, to the ceiling!  It is said that the castle is haunted;  this is the room I would nominate at most likely to house a ghost!  Mr. Larnach had three wives before killing himself on the floor of parliament!  There is a paining here of three women and I’m guessing they are the wives.  Two were sisters and maybe the other was a friend of theirs?

 

 There is a very narrow, stone spiral staircase to the tower room, with twenty-nine steps to negotiate.  There are views all around;  but the best one is of the water.  Of course that’s where the scaffolding has been erected.

We’re castled out and head back over the bridge and into town.  The Wains Hotel is on Princes Street and there doesn’t seem to be a parking lot, so we find street parking on the street behind it.  The machine which dispenses your parking permit takes credit cards, your mobile number, or cash.  There’s a touch screen; but nothing happens when you touch the cash icon.  The others work just fine!  Marilyn tries just putting in a dollar coin and that makes it happy!  It spits out our ticket and we put it on the dash before heading to reception to get our keys and the lay of the land.

 If we want to use their parking facility it is fifteen dollars a day;  but if we’re going to be using our car during the day, the receptionist suggests that we use the street parking.  It is a dollar an hour between 9:00 a.m. and 6:00 p.m.  Some machines will only let you stay for one hour;  but others are good for four hours, so we’ll probably need to find one of those when we come back tomorrow.

We go back to the car to bring in what we’ll need for tonight and tomorrow morning and schlep back around the corner to find room 604.  You take the elevator to six, then walk down a half-flight of stairs to the sixth floor.  Don’t ask!  But our room is the first one off the stairs, so that’s good.  And it’s a real hotel room!  There are two double beds with fluffy duvets and space between the beds(!), a large ensuite with a hot shower(!!!) , a fridge, a TV, an electric kettle and plenty of outlets!  Heaven! 

When Marilyn goes back to feed the meter, she rides back up with a Lion!!  I guess they really are everywhere!

We are so very beat.  Dinner is out of the question because we ate so much,  so late for lunch.  But – we still have that cute little bottle of cider/wine and the delectable cheeses from Whitestone.  Is there a better snack?  Marilyn has the creamy Havarti, which they describe as “rich, creamy flavours;  soft, sticky texture; delicate, acidic finish”.  I’ve got the Vintage Windor Blue, “ aged 8-12 months; rich, bold blue flavours, spicy, luxurious finish; soft, silky texture”.  We each have a little of the other’s and open the bottle of bubbly spirits.

After hot showers we are ready for the evening.  Marilyn and I are both typing;  but, uncharacteristically,  I am ready to crash and burn quite early.  Like about 7:30! I’ve only written about half of this blog!  I’m finishing it in the morning, after waking up at five!