With tours, walks and cosy adventures, Dunedin offers an enticing mid-year getaway. Here are five ways to explore the city beyond the chill, by Neil Porten.
Ōtepoti Dunedin is worth a visit any time of the year. But the middle months - we don’t have to use the W-word - have their own attraction. With the longest night behind us and the return of the Matariki constellation signalling warmer days to come, now is the perfect time to experience southern hospitality, Dunedin-style. Here is a gold-star list of five things to do in Otago’s gateway city in the puffer and beanie season.
Karitāne Māori Tours - Huriawa Pā Walking Tour
A 40-minute drive north from Dunedin’s Octagon is the coastal settlement of Karitane and the Huriawa Peninsula, where the Waikouaiti River meets the sea. Most of the headland is a reserve, site of the historic Huriawa Pā of Kāi Tahu (Ngāi Tahu) chief Te Wera.
We are met at the entrance to the publicly accessible reserve by Tau and Irie Pomare from Karitāne Māori Tours, for a two-hour guided walk. Beneath the carved waharoa (gateway), Tau explains that the arched structure represents Kahukura, the atua (deity) associated with rainbows.
“This place is like a castle to us,” Tau says. The peninsula used to be an island, its steep cliffs, freshwater spring and palisade fortifications providing formidable defences.
As we walk the narrow track, the views of Taiaroa Head, Mt Watkin / Hikaroroa and Butterfly Bay are spectacular. Surf roars on the wide sweep of Waikouaiti Beach. Kahukura casts a rainbow over Otago Peninsula for our pleasure.
Tau and Irie tell tales of tribal rivalries, sieges, a stolen sacred mauri stone, and teenage star-crossed lovers. It’s a history as layered as the exposed rock strata of the peninsula’s blowhole and natural rockbridge.
Otago Farmers Market
Start your weekend in Dunedin with an amble around a foodie institution. Every Saturday morning the northern carpark beside the historic Dunedin Railway Station is the spot for breakfast and a chance to stock up on staples and treats for the week.
We were lucky enough to be entertained by roller-skating violinist Kahurak̲i - The Prince of Purple, whose rendition of Don’t Stop Me Now while doing the splits (yes, on roller skates) was a showstopper.
I needed a coffee after that.
The Classic Cafe coffee cart offered takeaway cups in four sizes: cute, adorable, just right, and pushing it. I opted instead for a mugful, borrowing from the cup library, an excellent initiative for waste minimisation.
I could’ve bought pies, cured meats, baked goods, tofu, honey, cheese, gin, meat, fresh fruit and vegetables for the pantry.
For breakfast, the queue at the crepe truck was long but patient, and the bagels looked good. And a shout-out to Dolce Vita Dunedin: their sweet treats - slices of cheesecake, tart and cake, the perfect pesche con ricotta - looked amazing. But our small group opted for the southern classic: cheese rolls from the Whitestone Cheese stall, freshly toasted on a hotplate, oozing aged cheddar.
Warmed up on a cool winter morning, we were ready for the day.
Orokonui Ecosanctuary Guided Tour
In the hills north of Port Chalmers, a 9km-long predator-resistant fence encloses the Orokonui Ecosanctuary. The regenerating bush and cloud forest of this valley is a haven for many species of indigenous birds, reptiles, frogs, fish, insects, plants and fungi.
Lead kaiārahi (guide) Madison and science educator Taylor take us for a tour.
Winter is a time for “hunkering down” for many of Orokonui’s species, Taylor tells us. There’s no sign of skinks sunning themselves on the rocks of their enclosures. But busted tufts of tussock are a sure sign the takahē are actively foraging, and we soon see a mother and chick, looking like a pair of blue-and-green feathered party balloons.
We see plenty of other birds (manu, in te reo Māori), particularly at feeding stations by the track. Boisterous, plump tūī - also called kōkō in this region; a flitting pīwakawaka (fantail); strong-beaked, muscular kākā; korimako (bellbirds) full of song. Taylor is especially excited to see one tīeke (saddleback) offer a berry to another. “Courtship feeding!” he exclaims.
While this time of year was traditionally a time of learning and discussion (wānanga). Taylor sums up the lesson of Orokonui: “The birds returning bring with them their stories, which we can share.”
Ana Teofilo Art Workshop
Ana Teofilo is a Samoan artist, born, raised and educated in Dunedin. Her gallery-studio in a modest row of shops in St Kilda is a time portal back to primary school art lessons for Kiwis of a certain age. A two-hour workshop led by Ana herself is a simple pleasure done at a communal table surrounded by her stunning work.
Ana works with painted panels of MDF wood, carving the surface with lino-cut tools and decorating them with her signature glue dots. These simple techniques create intricate and textured artworks that combine traditional Pasifika designs with modern elements.
The aim for workshop participants is straightforward: select the base colour of your small wood panel; sit down with the provided equipment - cutters, steel ruler, pencil, eraser and paint pens; create your own masterpiece.
Inspiration is all around you on the walls, and on a laminated handout. Ana is a calm presence, available for creative advice, and practical help when it’s time to apply your own dots with one of the mean-as glue guns.
I noticed the atmosphere in the room change: less conversation, more concentration. More than one of our small group shared a memory of their own art-making. The time flashed by.
Our finished artworks, each a four-pointed frangipani-flower shape, were perfect. A cluster of Ana-inspired stars.
instagram.com/anateofilo.gallerystudio
Tūhura Otago Museum
Guided tour of Tangata Moana and Tangata Whenua galleries
More than 150 years, over 1.5 million objects - Tūhura Otago Museum is ideally placed to live up to its name, which means to discover, investigate and explore. And our guide Rosie, after just completing her master’s degree in archaeology, was the perfect person to show our small group the highlights of the recently redeveloped Tangata Moana Gallery.
The islands of the Pacific are a constellation of stars cast across a blue sky on the wall-sized map in the Tangata Moana Gallery. The gallery floor is art itself: a carpet representing the ocean and an island, designed by Dunedin artist Ana Teofilo. The artefacts have space in their bright display cabinets, and touchscreens reveal fascinating details. Turtle-shell masks from the Torres Strait Islands, ivory and pearl shell ornaments from Fiji, a full suit of armour - helmet included - made of spiky pufferfish skin from Kiribati: Rosie gives us an insight into these treasures and more. She reminds us that exploration and migration across the Pacific were deliberate human endeavours, that Te Waipounamu / South Island was the final landmass to be settled by people.
otagomuseum.nz/whats-on-offer/tour-group-bookings
dunedinnz.com
The writer travelled courtesy of DunedinNZ