Tuesday 10th June - Dunedin

Today we met up with Dave in a small vegetarian cafe in town and spent an hour or so catching up - we explained everything that we had done since we last saw him. He was eager to get us out of the town and take us to see some nice spots in the countryside around his home town of Dunedin. Since we were booked on a nature tour along the Otago Peninsula the next day, he decided to take us for a drive in his 4x4 up the coast to North Dunedin, through the town of Port Chalmers to the village of Punakaike., where he is in the process of building a brand new house overlooking a tiny secluded bay. The scenery here is less dramatic than most of Otago, Westland and Fjordland but is equally beautiful. The rolling hills and secluded beaches are reminiscent of Cornwall only slightly colder! The beauty of this area is that despite being only 20mins from Dunedin city, it feels tranquil and a million miles from anywhere. The little fishing bays and coves are dotted all along the coast and are untouched by tourism and its discontents. Dave spent another couple of hours taking us to pretty little beaches with not a soul to be seen, it was a great day too (if a little windy), so all in all it was great to meet up with Dave and great to see some beautiful spots around Dunedin that we would never normally have been able to see.

We arrived back at the hostel in time to make some tea, and then headed across town to the Speights Brewery - a famous NZ beer, we thought we just could miss the opportunity to have a look round! For about 15NZ dollars each we were taken on a tour of the brewery, given information on the history of the company and told why it is one of Nz's favourite beers. They call it ale over here, but really its more like what we would call bitter back home- drinkable, nonetheless! We were suprised to learn that the brewery was really quite small and that they still use mainly all original barrels and storage units from the 19th century! The best part of course was the beer tasting at the end of the tour where we were basically given free reign to try the 7 different brands of beer they produce at Speights!