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Friday, 28 November, Dunedin, NZ We docked in Port Chalmers, the commercial port for Dunedin about 730 and by 815 we were on our tour of the city and the Otago Peninsula. We stopped for a few minutes at the old train station, which still is in use, very nicely restored. Across the street is the main Cadbury’s factory, with its tall purple tank filled with thousands of gallons of chocolate. Dunedin was developed by Scottish immigrants, and Dunedin is the Gaelic word for Edinburgh. Thus it naturally has a multitude of Presbyterian churches, including a gigantic Cathedral that is larger than most Anglican or Roman edifices, including the Anglican one in Christchurch. The city is the home of the University of Otago, as well as a number of other higher education institutions, with a total of some 30,000 students in the city of 120,000. We then drove out the Otago Peninsula, taking the high road over the tops of the hills and ridges to the university aquarium. This isn’t a typical aquarium with all sorts of fish, but is a research facility that just shows the local creatures. It has a touching tank where you can reach in and touch the creatures that live in the shallows, such as sea stars, anemones, shellfish, and so forth. Next we went on to the dock for a ride on the Monarch, a boat that took us out into the harbor and around the end of the peninsula. We saw some royal albatross from a distance sitting on their nests, but also dolphins, fur seals, and a large nesting colony of spotted shags. The Japanese tour members were busy playing “I have a bigger lens than you do”, and complaining that after spending a lot of money on the boat trip that the women were falling asleep. One of the Japanese men did have a new digital Canon with a 600 mm lens and a large tripod to match, at least $5,000 of equipment just asking to fall in the water. But it didn’t. Upon returning from the boat ride, we rode on to Wildlife Encounter, located at the very end of the peninsula. It is another working sheep farm that also provides support for endangered wildlife by protecting it and giving tours that don’t harm the creatures. We had a pleasant lunch hour there, with sandwiches and salads, followed by an hour on eight-wheel-drive Argo vehicles. They have no suspension, and will go over and through almost anything. Gail and I sat in front with the driver, and four other people sat in back. They’re basically open, much like a 4wd vehicle at home. They only have 700cc engines, but are geared to have incredible torque that hauled us up and down steep inclines. They had one blind where we were able to get very close to fur seals, mostly males lying around protecting their turf, waiting for the females to be ready to breed in the near future. Another blind allowed a view of rare yellow-eyed penguins, though from a hundred yards or more, which made it fairly difficult to see the foot high birds on the beach, even with binoculars. We returned to town on the bus for a two hour tour of town. It was long, with the driver showing us his primary school, the house he lived in when young, and the house he grew up in, as well as the rest of the sights of downtown and elsewhere. Another nice dinner and a bit of reading before sleep after a long day. Back to itinerary (trip home page)
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