8th December 2009
The weather closed in again this morning, so we spent it drinking hot drinks and reading in the van at the campsite. Not very exciting, but a pleasant enough morning.
This afternoon we caught the bus into town. I always find it very interesting to take buses in cities, since they never take the direct route into the centre, but go around the houses, so you get to see a little bit more of suburbia. For the first time in New Zealand, we saw rows of terraced houses - probably due to the Scottish influence and we also went past the huge University of Otago, New Zealand’s oldest university.
Since we hadn’t taken any photos yesterday, we took them today instead, following the same route as we had with Bob. Unfortunately today’s weather wasn’t as nice but you can’t have everything.
As yesterday we finished up at the Settler’s Museum and spent a few hours here really exploring this time. There was a large area dedicated to the early settlers, which included a room with portraits and photographs of many of those who came, including the two men who headed up the immigration, Thomas Burns and William Cargill who sailed to New Zealand on the ship the Philip Laing.
There were also exhibitions about the engineering history of New Zealand and the Masons. Both of our grandfathers had belonged to this organisation, so we were particularly interested in this area which aimed to remove some of the mystery surrounding the masons.
After this we headed for the Dunedin Public Art Gallery, which was one of the recommended things to do in the Lonely Planet. To say we were less than taken with it would have been an understatement. Although housed in a lovely, open and airy building with wooden floors and wrought iron rails, this collection of modern art failed to inspire either of us. While I’m sure some people like it, it was a bit too far removed from my idea of art for me.