Looking at Otago Peninsula as we sailed along it into Port Chalmers.
Port Chalmers is a quaint little port town on the southeastern side of New Zealand and our home for three days of exploring.  Dunedin is just 8 miles further up Otago Harbour and HollandAmerica has provided courtesy shuttles running every 30 minutes for those three days. We got off the boat right away and planned to take the shuttle but the line had a few hundred people in it so we decided to walk around Port Chalmers and it was a good decision.

 It’s a friendly little town with shops and a grocery store on the main street along with plenty of areas with free wifi. We naturally had to check out the grocery store to see what kind of prices we will face when we rent the motorhome in Auckland. They appeared to be the same as in Australia but the exchange rate is more favorable here.  In Australia we would deduct 10-11% from the price to arrive at US dollars and here we deduct 20%.

Port Chalmers has many walks with vantage points that have spectacular views. There was a nice looking church to our right and once we got there we saw a sign to walk up a hill to a rhododendron garden.  We had a view of the port along the way.

This week there is a rhododendron festival planned in Dunedin but we heard it might be delayed since spring got off to a late start.  The botanical garden in Dunedin has over 3000 varieties!  There were quite a few varieties in this little garden and above on the right was a great lookout along with plaques and pictures telling some of the history of Port Chalmers.

This bush had the biggest blooms but the only picture I took had Steve in it.  His eyes looked weird (actually hysterically weird) and he didn’t want the picture used. I have cropped his eyes out so you can see the huge blooms.

Further up the hill was an old cemetery and by chance I read a grave stone belonging to a 23 year old crew member of the ill fated final expedition ship of the explorer, Robert Falcon Scott to Antarctica. Nearby is also a memorial to Scott. I’m not absolutely sure but I think the ship was called the Discovery.

I couldn’t get a good closeup picture of the church because there is scaffolding all up the front so the back will have to do.  Only construction workers are allowed on the church grounds at this time.

The weather was 60F/16C degrees yesterday and 54F/13C today with sprinkles of rain here and there.  The air is clean and crisp and I am loving the beautiful clouds.  Tomorrow we go into Dunedin.