Woke in Dunedin today at the Top 10 holiday park Aaron, it was raining. We had a quick breakfast and hit the road heading for Larnach Castle in Dunedin.

The castle was built between 1871 & 1877 by William Larnach who was an Australian born banker and entrepreneur, who obviously had some serious wealth. The castle was built as his holiday home which he termed The Camp. For it's era it certainly was a flash home. Not as large as many European residences but it is New Zealand's only castle and has some seriously stunning views. It had stopped raining and cleared up a fair bit so we got some good photo's

The castle fell into disrepair after Williams death (by his own hand) in the early 1900's and renovation did not start until the Baker family purchased it in the late 1960's and they have made a fine job of it.

I am a bit resentful because photography was not allowed inside the house, they sight conservation and security as the reasons but frankly they don't have much to protect, far more interesting and sensitive sites allow photography. I suspect that they just want to sell you their literature, which after you have paid an entry fee of $20 a head seems a bit mean. Pictures from the outside could not be prevented though.

However the visit to the castle was well worth it and I would recommend a visit.

We had decided to shift camp but to stay in Dunedin so we made for the Dunedin Holiday Park in St Kilda (Kiwi chain). Jackie had a bad day on the maps, this is a sensitive subject and I hesitate to expand but something was wrong with her internal compass.........(I've said too much already)

Anyway we found the site and struck camp, then immediately caught the 12:40 bus into the city centre.

Dunedin is the worlds 5th largest city, an interesting claim that one as the actual city is not much larger than say Bunbury (WA) or maybe Bristol in the UK but the catchment is huge. The city is a pleasant one with a lot of history. We visited the Art gallery and saw many fine works on open display and not behind mega security. You could if was your want (and were bloody quick about it) have actual touched a Monet, Lowry or Constable. There were also many more modern works, so many of which I am so sure I could do better but lack the reputation......

Then we took a double Decker (unusual in the southern hemisphere) bus tour of the city. This was informative and took us past many sites including the steepest street in the world called Baldwin St; this was apparently widely contested when announced but has been proven by the Guinness book of records. It has a concrete surface but is apparently not possible to drive up in a normal car (but many still try), it's about 1:1.25, how the homes along the road cope I don't know.

Then back to the city centre and on to the Otago Settlers Museum where there are some great exhibits of Mauri artifacts and European settler items also the railway exhibits and the transport section went down well, they had a leverly 1950's home made caravan. .

Then we caught the bus back to St Kilda and had the obligatory bottle of wine and a sausage dinner. Easily the coolest day we have so far had a max of 21 but it felt like 15