The Otago Peninsula

Dunedin is a pretty cool place - you could spend a week here and not run out of things to do. Its full of really cool old buildings from the 1880s onwards - great big stone affairs with clocks and bells and pillars and staircases.

The Otago Peninsula

Yesterday afternoon I headed out to the Otago Peninsula, home to abundant coastal sea life and New Zealand's only castle.

Larnach Castle

Larnach Castle was built between 1871-1887 by William Larnach, apparently for his wife (who wasn't all that impressed), but more likely because I wanted a fancy house. The less-than-happy-Larnach family had a rather tumultuous history. William Larnach went through three wives (the last of which was 25 years his junior and had an affair with his eldest son) and 6 children. After his first wife died, he signed all of his property into the name of his second wife (the first wife's sister, whom the children disliked) because he was afraid he'd go bankrupt. Which he did. But then she died, and all the money passed to his kids, so he tricked them into signing it back to him; he then proceeded to put it all in the name of his third wife. Then he killed himself. Then half the kids sued to get the money from the first wife, and won. Then the oldest son killed himself, two of the girls died in their early twenties, and the whole unhappy story continues in a similar manner.

Butterfly in the gardens at Larnach Castle

The castle had been long abandoned and was falling apart when the current owners bought it in 1967 and fixed it up as their family home; with the kids all grown up, they no longer live there and use the house as a museum.

Sleeping sea lion

From there I proceeded to visit some of the beaches along the peninsula. The peninsula was formed by volcanic activity, and its steep, hilly geography is mostly the result of lava flows carved by the wind and buried in sand. I saw some sea lions, and visited "Sandfly Beach" - not named after the annoying little bugs, but rather after the fact that it is SO WINDY that the sand quite literally flies. They had penguins. :) VERY windy though - can't-walk-in-a-straight-line-because-you-get-blown-off-course windy. :p The waves were huge, and you could see rainbows in the spray above them.

Down at the stadium of the university here in Dunedin, there is currently a 5 (yes, FIVE) day long cricket match going on between the NZ team and the English. Several of the people at the hostel came all the way from England just for that (and the one following it in Wellington - again, five days. One match. Five days. Yikes). Apparently the English are losing - badly.

Box reads:
"The greatest jig-saw problem of the age.
THE PUZZLE OF EUROPE
The Nazis have battered their crooked sign
into the face of Europe, shattering nearly
all of it - except Britain.
The task that lies before us is
that, whatever the cost, we must -
PUT EUROPE TOGETHER AGAIN!"

Model of a floating staircase in
the museum. Incidentally, the only
floating staircase in the Southern Hemisphere
(or it was at the time of building, or something),
is inside Larnach Castle.

Yesterday morning I paid a visit to the Otago Settlers' Museum - where there was an interesting puzzle (see photo) and lots of late Victorian recipes. I'll have to give some a shot at work this summer. :)

1890s day dress... appropriate for
the Fort, which is why I took a picture :p