Around the World in 8000 days: Otago Peninsula

Welcome to our travel blog. We are Tabitha and Nic. In 2011 we 'retired' in our early 40s and set off to travel the world. We spent our first year in South America and have been lucky enough to make two trips to Antarctica.

Our blog is a record of our travels, thoughts and experiences. It is not a guide book, but we do include some tips and information, so we hope that you may find it useful if you are planning to visit somewhere we have been. Or you may just find it interesting as a bit of armchair travel.

Sunday, August 14, 2016

Otago Peninsula

Because this was my first time driving independently, there were many 'firsts' - first hire car, first automatic, first time driving up and down windy hills, and so forth. Nic wasn't generally too anxious a passenger, but he did get a bit nervous where the road was very close to an edge around some of the bends.

But our next location, The Otago Peninsula, was to prove more nerve wracking to my somewhat less than trusting passenger. My driving really is OK, honest!

Otago Peninsula

It started immediately we arrived, and we had to wind our way around the edge of the coastline. When I say the edge, I really do mean that, as in many places there was no gap at all between the road and the short drop into the mostly shallow waters. I'm sure he was convinced that we would take a dive into the water at any second.

Even though we drove back and forth along this road a few times, he never really got comfortable with it. This was partly because, as I got more used to the bends in the road, I drove a bit faster - though still within the speed limit of course.

When we got to our lodge - more on that in the next post - there was a thick gravel track up to it, and we both thought that I was going to get stuck in that. But I didn't.

Otago Peninsula

There are only really two proper roads along the peninsula, the low road along the water's edge, and the high road, which we'll talk about later. The rest is pretty much tracks of varying degrees of suitability for our little Nissan Tiida. But we decided to take a drive around, and see where we could get to.

Most of the tracks weren't too bad. We took them quite slowly, not wanting a flying stone to end up chipping the windscreen. We didn't worry about getting it covered in mud - that is par for the course with a South Island hire car. Thankfully, there aren't many vehicles out here, so aside from the sharper bends,you can quite easily drive down whichever side of the road has the better surface.

Otago Peninsula

We drove around Papanui Inlet for a while, and then crossed over to Hooper's Inlet, before heading along towards one of the bays. We picked one of the easier access ones, that we felt I would be able to get to with my back now finally in the slow process of recovery.

This is one of those times where you follow a very basic map, going along pretty much the only decent track there is, but you're not entirely sure you're going the right way, and not even certain you have when you get to the end.

Otago Peninsula

We found ourselves parking up by what seemed to be a working farm, and followed makeshift signs that we assumed were for we the public, over a stile into a field. That was fun by the way, getting over a stile when I was still having problems with normal steps.

Otago Peninsula

Anyway, we were soon over the field and into the sand dunes, so we were confident we were going the right way. Of course every time the wind blew the long tussock grass around, we peered in nervously to check that one of the resident seals wasn't in there and heading towards us.

The beach was deserted but for one guy, and there were none of the seals that we had hoped we might spot. We did find a nice big piece of driftwood though, and it was a very pleasant drive around.

Otago Peninsula

Our other trip around the island was when we went to visit Lanarch Castle, the only castle that New Zealand has. This is, unsurprisingly, on top of the hill, so it meant taking the high road.

Otago Peninsula

We had been warned about this, and told that it was a very twisty road, often with big drops right alongside you. They weren't wrong. The road is often closed in the depths of winter, because it isn't safe to drive. I think Nic spent much of the drive holding on and breathing in, and looked worried whenever I said anything about the lovely scenery, in case I wasn't paying enough attention to the road.

Landslide, Otago Peninsula

It is just as well I was paying attention because, as we also now discovered, the road is prone to landslides. We were pootling along happily, watching out for the occasional sheep walking down the road, when we found the road ahead was closed.

We could clearly see why - there was a spot up ahead where one half of the road was halfway down the side of the hill.

Lanarch Castle, Otago Peninsula

This of course meant quite a long detour to find another route to the castle, which was even narrower and windier than the last one, but we got there in the end.

The castle was built in 1871 by William Larnach, for his wife Eliza, and no expense was spared in its building and decoration. I'm glad that our luggage isn't as big and bulky as their travelling trunk though.