Leaving the campsite at 10am we headed down along highway one towards Oamaru, where we planned to stop for the night. Passing through the town of Timaru we stopped to have a look around Aigantighe (pronounced egg and tie) art gallery. The gallery is housed within a large Edwardian house, built in 1908 as a retirement home for Scottish born Alexander and Helen Grant. The gallery is well worth a visit, if only to have a look around the house and the interesting sculpture garden. The garden displays works by New Zealand, Zimbabwean and Japanese sculptors, with the Zimbabwean work being our favourite.
On arrival in Oamaru we booked into the very central Top Ten holiday park and then headed into town to get some shopping. Oamaru is a very attractive town with wide streets and a large amount of Victorian era buildings. Our first stop was at the visitor centre, to collect some information about things to do in the surrounding area. Unfortunately while we were in the centre we saw a traffic notice saying that the road heading south to Dunedin (our next destination) was closed due to snow and ice. Enquiring further about the road conditions we were dismayed to learn that many of the southern roads had been closed, our south island tour may have hit a stumbling block! Knowing that there was nothing we could do about the weather we decided on a few things to do while we were in town.
One of the main things we wanted to do was visit the Blue penguin (the smallest breed of penguin) and Yellow Eyed penguin colonies. As according to the visitor centre there had been no sightings of the blue penguins and to see them required us to pay a rather hefty entrance fee, we headed instead to the yellow eyed colony. After waiting in the rain and wind for a while, it became apparent that we were going to be unlucky with the yellow eyes as well. For me at least, the day ended on a high note when we visited ‘The Barrel House’ a whisky maturation store. New Zealand’s whisky is not bad, as I found out during the tour and whisky tasting.
Oamaru is a nice town to spend a few days in, if only to look at the beautiful buildings and have a browse around the very different harbour front shops. Of the shops, ‘Slightly Foxed’ (a second hand bookshop), the wonderfully strange ‘Grainstore Art Gallery’ and the stone masons are well worth a look.
On arrival in Oamaru we booked into the very central Top Ten holiday park and then headed into town to get some shopping. Oamaru is a very attractive town with wide streets and a large amount of Victorian era buildings. Our first stop was at the visitor centre, to collect some information about things to do in the surrounding area. Unfortunately while we were in the centre we saw a traffic notice saying that the road heading south to Dunedin (our next destination) was closed due to snow and ice. Enquiring further about the road conditions we were dismayed to learn that many of the southern roads had been closed, our south island tour may have hit a stumbling block! Knowing that there was nothing we could do about the weather we decided on a few things to do while we were in town.
One of the main things we wanted to do was visit the Blue penguin (the smallest breed of penguin) and Yellow Eyed penguin colonies. As according to the visitor centre there had been no sightings of the blue penguins and to see them required us to pay a rather hefty entrance fee, we headed instead to the yellow eyed colony. After waiting in the rain and wind for a while, it became apparent that we were going to be unlucky with the yellow eyes as well. For me at least, the day ended on a high note when we visited ‘The Barrel House’ a whisky maturation store. New Zealand’s whisky is not bad, as I found out during the tour and whisky tasting.
Oamaru is a nice town to spend a few days in, if only to look at the beautiful buildings and have a browse around the very different harbour front shops. Of the shops, ‘Slightly Foxed’ (a second hand bookshop), the wonderfully strange ‘Grainstore Art Gallery’ and the stone masons are well worth a look.
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