On Thursday Malcolm Liddell regaled his skills as a tour guide and presented a vocalised actual reality tour as him the Driver of a 12 seater van with up to 10 tourists from the cruise ships. Malcolm was dressed appropriately with the uniform ,speaker phone and hat .Here are the highlights of the stops with some added info and history .

“Malcolm “’ good morning I’m your guide today and you are on the Larrnach Castle Garden tour. Check your seat belts and we are departing Port Chalmers , Dunedin was established in 1848 with the arrival of the Phillip Laing and grew later due to gold discoveries in 1861 in Central Otago . Dunedin has a strong Scottish connection with our Gaelic name Dunedin . We are now in Sawyers Bay and I would mention that when the early settlers arrived the only mammal in NZ were native bats . The farmers in their wisdom introduced Rabbits for food and other undesirables such as stoats ,possums ,gorse and broom and this is why you see predator traps on the side of the road . You can now see ahead of us Dunedin which is a hilly city . NEV -  the houses here are typical of the early wooden villas with weather board and double hung windows . Knox College was a Presbyterian minister training institution and now a hall of Residence . Baldwin Street is famous as the steepest street in the world and I’m happy to walk it with you. Up Opoho you can see Flax bushes which was the first established industry in the city. From here we can see the Otago University and upper harbour port . We will visit the Upper gardens with Rhododendrons and Azaleas and this is a comfort stop .

Malcom pointed out at the Northern Cemetery the Larnach mausoleum and gave some history of the richest man in the city ,his family and demise as a parliamentarian where he committed suicide .We will be visiting his castle later where we will have lunch .We are now in Lovelock Avenue named after the Olympian James lovelock who won the 1500m in the Berlin Olympics .This is the Otago university with 20000 students and 4000 staff ,Historic fire station built in red brick in 1930 .The railway station built in 1906 is the most photographed building in Dunedin and the most photographed Railway Station in the world .Of note is the mosaic floor which has 750000 mosaic tiles .We will stop here for 20 mins for a bit of a wonder ,upstairs art gallery and as a comfort stop .On the move again we see the court house and via the Octagon the Robbie Burns statue who was a famous poet. Trinity college and across Portsmouth drive past the Molars and down the peninsula to Larnachs Castle built in 1871/1874 for Lunch .Note the rock wall built by Maori prisoners of war in the late 1880s .Return trip is down Centre Road past Smaiils beach with its sea lions, Tomahawk beach and St Clair with a hot salt water pool. Returning to port we pass Ings avenue which reportedly has the most expensive house in Dunedin and and the other end the most affordable houses .Past kings and queens high ,see the covered stadium with natural grass.

Thanks for being with me today and if you would like to give a Revue that would be appreciated . If you didn’t enjoy today my name is Russel –but if you did then I’m Malcolm