Ancestral Figure – Carved from soft trachyte – Easter Island

I’d been rummaging through the shelves at a local bookshop. Not knowing what I was looking for or finding it, I departed out onto the footpath. I was due to meet my wife at 2:45 pm and with 30 minutes to spare, I decided to fill the time with a wander around a nearby museum. Once inside, for no particular reason I made my way to Pacific Island Gallery. I strolled around for a while, looked in display cases, read labels, mispronounced words written in other languages and generally tried to look knowledgeable and thoughtful. It was then that I came across a series of stone statues typically associated with Easter Island and other Polynesian cultures. Unfortunately, due to the display lacking an information sign, I didn’t know what they were. All it said was ‘Ancestral Figure – Carved from soft trachyte – Easter Island.’ They could be ancient fertility figures or figures representing masculinity for all I knew! Then again, it might be Tom or Steve from accounts. But, I really don’t know!

Flooding In Ross Creek

Back in October Dunedin had its wettest day in over a century. Three times the usual rainfall expected in October fell in the city in just 48 hours. 38 roads were closed including State Highways to the north and south of the city, communities were cut off and suburbs were flooded. A state of emergency was put in place and all over the region there were landslides and rivers bursting their banks.

Early morning in the Exchange

I found myself on an early Dunedin morning, ambling into The Exchange where I spent a few minutes watching the city come awake. The air had a fresh untouched feel to it as the soft orange hues that appeared with the break of day were hit with sunlight. That’s what I love about mornings, they have a fresh, new, anything is possible feel to them. Unless of course you’re wildly hungover. Fortunately I wasn’t, so I savored watching the city stretch and yawn. I sipped my coffee and admired the urban patchwork stitched together by time and light.

Lawyers Head towards Blackhead and Brighton.

This is one of my favourite views of Dunedin and I have no idea why! I’ve photographed it early in the morning, late in the evening and during the day. Many times I stop by and just simply stand there looking. Why do I like this view so much, maybe the answer is blowing in the wind!

The Savoy Restaurant

The Savoy Restaurant was once considered the finest dining room in the Southern Hemisphere. With its ornate Tudor Hall featuring English oak panelling, a magnificent Oamaru stone fireplace and stained glass windows, in the 1920s and 1930s it attracted consistently large numbers of diners.

Port Chalmers Maritime Museum

Since I was in the area, I visited the Port Chalmers Maritime Museum which had recently been updated at a cost of $20 million. Upon entry, I liked it immediately, not least because it was free. Also, I didn’t have to navigate through a stupid gift shop or cafe just to get inside which was an added bonus. With the building’s new design taken on what is termed a minimalist approach, more than 25,000 photos and almost 12,500 items were shuffled around in the refurbishment.

Evening in Dunedin

Late Sunday evening over St Kilda and St Clair in Dunedin as spring prepares to roll into summer.

George Street in Dunedin

This is Dunedin’s George Street back when it had painted dots all over it due to Covid. The idea was to encourage a safer CBD by lowering the speed limit to 10km/h and painting 450 dots all over the street to promote social distancing. At the time it did raise the question of the council if it was wise to encourage people to walk in the middle of the road while cars would be driving along it. It also made people wonder if the $40,000 it cost was money well spent.

The Boundary Track, Ross Creek

The outstanding Ross Creek Reserve is quite simply marvellous. I can’t express how much I enjoy walking the various tracks that make up the entire reserve. There are multiple entry points to the tracks that take you up hills, down into valleys, past one of the oldest water supply reservoirs in the country and past dams. It links up with other nearby tracks that venture high into the Dunedin hills, past water falls and all the while you’re surrounded by an abundance of birdlife. It really is a wonderful place.

Water Garden, Dunedin Botantic Garden

I found my way back to the Dunedin Botanic Gardens, mainly because that was where my car was parked. Also, to see the Water Garden. With the Botanic Gardens split into two main sections, the Water Garden is located in the Lower part of the gardens, while I had spent my time on the various paths in the Upper section. From there, I had then made my way back to the carpark by way of zig-zagging through a number of side streets before suddenly remembering I was wanting to see what reflections I could find in the various nearby ponds.

Lower Stuart Street in Dunedin

For those of you that live in Dunedin, this is a reminder of what Lower Stuart Street looked like before the whole thing was dug up. Just in cases you forgot. The purpose of the massive hole that has been dug in the middle of the street is to replace historical pipes dating back as far as 1887. While this work was taking place, they unsurprisingly found old constructions like makeshift wooden steps that were put in place over a century ago and the foundations of a horse stables that used to occupy part of Moray Place. I think that’s just splendid.

Lindsay Creek in Bethunes Gully

Last month when Dunedin was inundated with three times the usual October rainfall in just two days, unsurprisingly all the local rivers and streams had a massive flow rate. One of those was Lindsay Creek. It starts on Mount Cargill and runs down into Bethunes Gully and through North East Valley before linking up with the Water of Leith at the Dunedin Botanic Gardens. The day after the rains stopped and the streets began to clear, I went for a wander through Bethunes Gully and found Lindsay Creek in full flow with an impressive amount of water in what is usually a fairly sedate body of water.