The One with the Chocolate Boulders

Back on the road, and heading south again, this time destination Dunedin, the Edinburgh of the Southern Hemisphere.

Our first stop of the day, however, is at Moeraki - home of the famous spherical boulders on the beach.

I have to admit that there are a lot less of them than I imagined, but they are impressive nonetheless, especially as they are nigh on spherical, have little vein marks on them, and when you see a broken one you realise that they have a honeycomb centre.

The Maori Legend has is that these boulders were gourds from some Maori ancestor's Woka. The Woka (canoes) got into trouble and crashed. The Gourds and food supplies such as Kumara were washed ashore where they were turned to stone. The Woka became the headland, and the captain and the crew became the surrounding hills.

We had a bit of fun with comedy poses, and wandered along the beach enjoying the sun (and wind). We drove from here to Shag Point, and watched the Seals who also seemed to be enjoying the sun, and basked on the rocks, or played dodge the seaweed in the sea.

Back on the road and we arrive in Dunedin. This place has hills that compare to San Francisco so driving a manual was fun!

When travelling, I always like to try and sample all the local foods, and that has come to include local sweets (and beers!). The one thing that Helen and I have noticed in NZ is that there is so much more choice of Cadburys chocolate over here than at home. And whilst Dairy Milk doesn't taste the same, some of the other flavours would be a real contribution to the chocolate industry in the UK. For example... the chocolate fudge brownie Dairy Milk in the Desserts range. Other flavours we can leave happily in NZ however, such as the Pinky Bar - pink marshmallow, covered in caramel, and then in chocolate - and yes, it is as sickly as it sounds, and I think I have the sweetest tooth in history!

So, purely in the interests of cultural diversty we took a trip to the Cadburys Factory!

As we entered, along with our sexy hairnet, we were given a bag, and a Chocolate Fish bar (marshmallow and chocolate - the kiwi's are HUGE on marshmallow it seems!), and as we worked around the factory, watching Willy Wonka style machines make chocolate buttons, learning about the 40 million easter eggs that are made in NZ each year (and consumed in a week by 4 million New Zealanders), and lots of other choccie based knowledge, our party bag was swelled with more fun sized treats.

On top of this, we were also given the opportunity to "win" more bars by joining in the Question and Answers sessions. The person who guessed the right answer winning another chocolate bar. We didn't know that to begin with, and the group was pretty quiet, but once we realised chocolate was at stake, we all became a rowdy bunch, guessing out loud in the hope of another bar (H was one of the leaders on this - but then she is a chocoholic!)

The piece de resistance was watching a ton of liquid Dairy Milk fall from the ceiling, in one of the cooling towers. It really made my mouth water, which I guess it was designed to do as the next stop was the shop....

After being dragged kicking and screaming out of the shop, we dropped Helen and Ben at their hostel, and H and I took Bertha to St Leonards. We were going to stay with Ron (Julian) - a friend of my brothers Dan's from way back, his wife Nicky, and two children Daniel and Abigail.

I haven't seen Ron since I was 18 (and had THAT haircut!), but the family instantly made Helen and I feel completely at home, and we were soon learning all about which were the best "monsters in my pocket" from Daniel.

Once the children were in bed, we had time to catch up and then nicky took us ona quick night time tour of Dunedin, including Baldwin Street - the steepest street in the world - and boy does it kill your legs, and I only walked up a little bit!

We also went to Signal Hill which gave glorious views of the city. The sun was setting behind the hills and the cloud was rolling in, and turning orange where it hit the sun, and below the lights of Dunedin twinkled, and the harbour water glowed in the evening light.

The next day, we picked up Helen and Ben and drove around the headland to visit the Royal Albatross Centre. We had a talk on these magnificent birds. They have a wing span of upto 3.5m and fly around the world only landing on terra firma once every 2 years to breed, the rest of the time they spend in the air or on the water. They mate for life, but only meet up to breed, spending most of the rest of their year in single sex groups or on their own, and if they lose a partner they mourn before finding a new mate.

It was nesting season, so we got to see 3 Albatross (I really feel that the plural should be Albatri!) on their nests - sadly we didn't get to see any of them in flight.

We then drove round to Allans Bay and got up close and personal with some seals on the beach. We also saw some very lively sealions frolicking on the sand. The wildlife in NZ is wonderful.

The others dropped us in St Leonards, Abbie was a pre school, and Daniel had a friend, Lennox, over, so we took the two boys down to the beach with Odd the Dog, and Ted, a neighbour of Rons. The boys went to "paddle" in the sea and were soon completely drenched!

We fought for the frisby with Odd, and kicked a rugby ball about the beach, and generally had an awesome afternoon. With the boys now wet, and covered in sand, I decided to give them Mermen Tails, much to their delight!

Helen and I must have made quite an impression on 6 year old Daniel, who told his Dad that we were fun and that he would like to marry one of us but by our age we were probably married already!!

That night we had a chilled out evening, drinking and eating, admiring the view from the house over the inlet, and then decided to play Risk! A competitve evening followed with alliances being made and broken constantly, and by the early hours of the morning, the Treaty of St Leonards, an alliance betweent the three remaining conquerors, was signed, and peace reigned once more.

A huge thanks to "the Reals" who made our trip to Dunedin so memorable, and who made us so welcome. It was awesome to see you all again!