Mon 5th Apr 10, 6.30pm
We've made it safely back home after a couple of final nights in Dunedin, New Zealand's "Scottish" city. After Queenstown's failure to live up the hype, we found Dunedin to be much nicer than we expected.
The city has more to offer than we could get round in two days, but the imposing stone buildings made it reminiscent of Edinburgh, but without the hordes of American tourists and Nazi traffic wardens. (I got fined seven minutes after the ticket expired, and vowed never to spend any more money in the city - we Bodecotts do like a grudge, don't we Dad?).
Dunedin boasts the only castle in New Zealand and the World's Steepest Street (which didn't look that much to me, though I didn't risk it with the hire car, a modest 1.8l automatic Corolla. There is also a lovely train station, plus several museums, a brewery tour (don't worry Auntie B, we're staying loyal to Jennings!) and a Cadbury factory.
Definitely worth a couple of days for anyone planning to travel the South Island.
Update on Dunedin - I'm told that it's not actually the World's Steepest Street any more, but it's not giving up the dream any time soon. Maybe they'll add "in Dunedin" in really small letters. Oh and apparently someone tried to go down it in a wheelie bin and died. Now that's Kiwi as.
Posted by: Simon Bodecott | 09/04/2010 at 07:27 AM