February 23, 2018 – Dunedin, New Zealand

We had a beautiful sail-in this morning. Dunedin lies 12 miles from the sea on the southeastern coast of the South Island of New Zealand, at the end of a deep and narrow fjord known as Otago Harbor. Cruise ships are unable to travel all the way inland to Dunedin, so we docked at a busy container port in the city of Port Chalmers, about midway to Dunedin. Docked next to us was an even larger cruise ship – Sea Princess. Also of interest in the port are all the piles of hardwood trees being shipped to China and Japan.

For our visit to Dunedin we booked a 6½ hour excursion with “Good Company Tours,” through our travel agent before leaving home in January. None of the Crystal shore excursions went to the two sites we wanted to visit—Larnach Castle and the Cadbury chocolate factory.

Upon disembarking the ship, we followed footprints painted on the road surface to a makeshift passenger terminal where we found Bill, the Good Company driver for our tour. There were about 25 people on the bus – most of whom were passengers from the Sea Princess. Unfortu­nately, many of them were coughing, hacking and sneezing. But, we pressed on, trying to avoid the worst coughers. Bill had been giving tours in Dunedin for 53 years; we think his bus may have been that old also. Anyway, he knew his way around town and had a lot of interesting and humorous stories for us.

Dunedin has a strong Scottish history, and they claim to have the largest concentration of Victorian and Edwardian architecture in New Zealand. But Dunedin isn’t all about history, as it is also home to the University of Otago, with about 23,000 students, according to Bill. During our drive through Dunedin, we stopped and walked a short distance on their very attractive campus.

We also stopped to look at what is claimed to be the steepest street in the world (Baldwin Street). Bill suggested that we not try to walk up the hill, as we might not live to talk about it. 

In Dunedin, we also stopped at the Octagon (an 8-sided plaza) which is the center of town, with a huge green lawn used for public events, concerts and parades. Also ringing the Octagon is a statue of Robert Burns, Dunedin’s Town Hall, the public library, an art gallery, St Paul's Anglican Cathedral, and various cafes and bars. 

Some quick history: Unlike the English settlement of the rest of New Zealand, Dunedin was founded by the Scottish Free Church (in 1848). Scottish settlers gave this community the name Dunedin, which we were told is the Scottish Gaelic name for Edinburgh. Dunedin's strong links to its Scottish heritage continue to this day; our driver, Bill, had a very strong Scottish brogue accent. In 1861, gold was discovered near Dunedin. Within four months, some 2,000 prospectors arrived by ship and crammed into this small community. Dunedin soon became New Zealand’s most prosperous city. Of course, the gold boom didn’t last forever, and growth slowed. Today, Dunedin has a population of 127,000 people (not counting students).

It was at least a 30-minute drive from Dunedin (mostly uphill) to Larnach Castle, New Zealand’s only “castle.” In our opinion, it isn’t really a castle, since it was built by a banker and politician, William Larnach, in 1871 as a very large mansion on a steep hill overlooking the Otago Peninsula. The castle has 43 rooms and an adjoining ballroom. Larnach spared no expense on this home, with materials and artists from around the world. The guided tour of the home lasted about one hour, and then we had time for lunch in the café which is located in the old ballroom.

The castle is now owned by a private family which has spent decades on its restoration. Entry fees help with maintenance and restoration costs. It is now one of the area’s premier visitor attractions. The castle’s tour guide, Robin, did an excellent job explaining the history of the castle and its many features.

Upon our return to Dunedin, Bill dropped off some people at a local brewery for a tour, along with others who just wanted to walk around town and catch the shuttle bus back to Port Chalmers on their own. We elected to tour the Cadbury’s Chocolate Factory for the Cadbury’s World Experience. The 1-hour tour explained the chocolate making process, liquid chocolate tasting, a chocolate waterfall in a tall silo (which Jim climbed halfway up in, to watch the process, while Ginny watched from below. They gave us samples of Cadbury products along the way. We may save them to give to our grandson Evan and granddaughter Erin (maybe). Or maybe we’ll be tempted to sample some of them along the way in the next two months.

Our last stop was to quickly visit the Dunedin Railway Station, built in what can only be called a Baroque style. Construction began in 1903, and the station was officially opened in 1906. During the city's most prosperous years this railway station was the country's busiest, handling as many as 100 trains each day. Now there are only a handful of local tourist trains in Dunedin every week. But it stands as a monument to Dunedin's Golden Days and is said to be New Zealand's most photographed building.

One interesting thing we heard from the Sea Princess passengers – they had tried to get into the same fjords we had visited earlier in the week (Milford, Doubtful, and Dusky), but they were unsuccessful. Their ship is a lot larger than ours (2,000 passengers compared to our 800). Maybe that was a factor. Anyway, they weren’t happy about it.

It was a long day, but we saw a lot. Now we’re looking forward to visiting Christchurch tomorrow.

Jim & Ginny