Huh, why Port Chalmers? Well we were heading for Dunedin on a cruise but quickly discovered that almost everything was closed there on Christmas day, so we decided to explore the little port town of Port Chalmers. I think this will be a quick post as there wasn't a lot happening in the small town, but it was still worth checking out if only to see how others celebrate Christmas.
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Our first sighting of Otago.
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| Sailing into the narrow entrance of Otago Harbour. |
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Before setting foot on land however the ship had to negotiate the entrance to Otago Harbour, the wind was howling and the entrance narrow but we managed to sail up the winding channel safely. With not much open we decided to have an early lunch before heading ashore, its a little surreal to be sitting on the open deck of a cruise ship with the container cranes making up the view, but that's was our lunch spot.
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| Lunch on the deck of the ship with the container cranes behind us. |
Heading ashore we followed the main street up the hill until we ran out of shops for Sam to gaze in the windows. Crossing over we walked down the other side until we were back at the harbour, well that was the window shopping expedition over in twenty minutes (I'm exaggerating a little, a couple of shop keepers did interrupt their Christmas day to open up for the cruise passengers). The little town of Port Chalmers, while quiet on Christmas day, looked like it would be an interesting place to visit when things were open, there were a few nice looking galleries and cafes.
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The main street of Port Chalmers, Christmas day.
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| Looking down on the town from the lookout. |
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What to do next? (I like this asking my own questions, I feel like a politician in question time getting asked a dorothy dixer). Well we decided to tear ourselves away from the hustle and bustle of the main street and climb to a lookout overlooking the harbour, once at the top we could look down at the ship tied up below us. After gazing at the view for awhile we took a walk through a small garden and sculpture park before heading back down to town.
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| Sam, checking out the small garden and sculpture park near the lookout. |
Sam then headed back to the ship while I went for a longer walk up a mountain on the north side of the port, I've forgotten the name of the track but the walk took me around two hours so it was fairly substantial. If this post is a little on the vague side well that's probably because at that point of time a blog wasn't even on the radar, so I probably wasn't taking in as much detail as I do now, anyway it saves you from some boring waffle.
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A little wild life near the second lookout.
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| The view from the lookout on the north side of the harbour. |
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Retracing my route back to the ship I joined Sam on deck for a drink while we sailed out the beautiful Otago Harbour, it looked like we were the tourist attraction judging by the number of cars parked on the roads beside the harbour with there occupants outside standing and waving. Before long we cleared the harbour and turned north along the coast, tomorrow we would be in Christchurch.
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Getting prepared for another hard night at sea!
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| People were stopping and checking the ship out all along the harbour. |
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The Dirt.
We did this cruise with Princess Cruises, as usual all was good with them. Port Chalmers appears to be nice little spot, there were quite a lot of nice galleries and cafes and there are a couple of easy walks around town if you want to stretch your legs.
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| It's a hard life this cruising caper. |
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| The light house at the entrance to Otago Harbour. |
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