Day 19. Wet day in Dunedin

Day 19. A wet day in Dunedin.

Today the weather was wet and cold. At first I was unsure what I was going to do other than the Dunedin walk, which would take me around the city. Once I found the information centre, I found that the Lenarch castle tour could be done in the afternoon. This was a historic building tour that was owned by Lenarch, a politician / business person to the Dunedin area and was actually Australian. The info centre thought I was actually from the cruise ship and at first I was confused until it dawned on me about what was going on.

I was booked to go on the Dunedin walk for 10am and thought that many people would be interested and that everyone would love a coffee at the end of the tour. I was actually the only one o the tour and I did get plenty out of the tour as well. More than what I had when I was last in the city. I knew the city had been inhabited by the Scottish people and what I didn’t know was that when the people had arrived in the area within 3 months of leaving England and before they had left they were under the assumption land had been sorted for them. When they landed and they learnt that the area was not what they had though it was. One of the hills called, Bell hill was very prominent in the area, but the people were actually able to chip it away and lower the land. They changed the environment completly. The land was actually reclaimed and  think most of that came from Bell hill since i was solid rock. The city’s first church is a Presbyterian church followed by several others and several of the old churches are now converted to other type of businesses. The old Synagogue is actually an apartment. The good thing is the city does know is heritage and is trying to keep many of the old buildings and monments. The whole city grew with the gold rush and this helped build the city we have today. The city does have its firsts in the world. The first girls school, the first female uni students and even the first female lawyer. One of the law firms even had the first letter bomb in a building called securities although it was nothing to do with security. Apparently the sender of the bomb was never known. The Otago settlers museum is actually getting a huge makeover and is said to be ¼ of a mile, which means it will now take near a full day to visit. I want to come back just to see this place.

The Grand hotel, now the casino was a building that had at one point had a verandah around it, but not anymore as time changes the buildings looks. This was where we had our stop for coffee and I was shown old pictures of the town before it was now including the cutting of the Bell hill and filling in of the water to reclaim the land. Near the First church is some examples of how tough the rock was that the people during the late 1800s. The last stop was actually a short tour through The First church. The building was interesting and I found you could rent a few for a year and that would have your family name there too. If you did not turn up then there would be questions that would need answering. The roof did leak at one stage and they did fix the leak using levers and teak wood I think. It had information about the reformation. I couldn’t stay long as I had my next tour to catch and basically 15 mins before I had to catch it.

The tour to Lenarch Castle was interesting as the bloke liked giving people a hard time especially Aussies. There were three of us on the tour and the other two were from Perth. It was by the time raining and I had thought the tour went to just the castle and that was it. Turns out we went to Lenarch’s grave too which was an elaborate construction. Seems in the 180s people broke into the mausoleum and tool Lanarch’s skull and was using it as an ash tray. On the way we did stop at the worlds steepest street and we went past the Otago peninsula on our way to the castle. What happened was that our driver happened to be our tour guide through the building. The alternative name for Lenarch castle was The Camp and had two other owners since he and his third wife had died. Lamarch was the first person to commit suicide in the parliament buildings and only person so far. The building was intricately designed with carvings that took months to complete. The second owners converted the place to electricity and modified many things. The third owners who now run the tours have tried getting everything back the way it was during Lanarchs time. Some of the objects had been sold like the chandeliers and all the people had to do was to ask around and put some adds out to actually find the pieces again as they were actually unique.

 The garden was also themed on Alice in Wonderland as one of the daughters name was Alice. It was raining and not nice, but at least I had my brolly. I did find that the hostel shouldn’t be allowed to be doing the tours they are as it is illegal, although they are not advertising them on the vehicle. I got this from my tour guide. I think I am no happy that I took the official tour and not ripping off the group. The figurines in the garden are the wishing well, Alice and the flamingo and the king and queen of hearts floating around. Before leaving the building, I did have a quick look at their geneaology to see if I was related in anyway. I wasn’t although he was Aussie, so you never know. By the time I got back it was late afternoon. When I had dinner there was a sparrow that was very tame and actually sat next to me eying off what I was eating. It wouldn’t move when I waved my had telling it to shoo. It even took a chip out of my fingers. I think those things were worse than flied especially when it would share your meal with you. I was thinking about going to the cemetery, but thought to leave that until tomorrow. I think I will do the cemetery, botanical gardens and university walk as they are all in the direction on the way back from where I want to go.