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Living in New Zealand: What is There to Do in Oamaru?

November 28, 2018

We arrived in Oamaru on a Wednesday evening and it was pretty quiet, with few locals in the street. They were outnumbered by a coachload of Asian tourists who were drifting around. The most obvious attraction in Oamaru is the little blue penguin colony at the end of Friendly Bay (see my earlier post).

Here are some of the other things to do in Oamaru:

1. Spot trains.

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2. Walk around the independent shops in the Victorian precinct. There was a building boom between 1875 and 1883 when Oamaru was a busy port, making a lot of money from wool & grain exports and using the local limestone to put up some pretty impressive buildings.

oamaru-old-building.jpg oamaru-old-church.jpg oamaru-old-coffee.jpg oamaru-old-post-office.jpg oamaru-old-street.jpg oamaru-opera-house.jpg oamaru-wool.jpg

3. Dress up like a Victorian (there was a festival the weekend after we were there in November).

Oamaru-victorian-festval.jpg

4. Get into the steampunk

Oamaru-steampunk-cafe.jpg Oamaru-steampunk.jpg

5. Drink beer. You can go to the oldest pub in town, The Criterion, which has Emerson beers on tap. Or you can go to Fat Sally’s, which seems to be a Speights Alehouse in disguise, but had cheap beer and a quiz on a Wednesday. Or you can go to our favourite, which was the Scotts Brewery. This was in an old railway shed. The owners had wanted to put the brewery in one of the old Victorian buildings, but they couldn't get insurance for an old stone building.

oamaru-fat-sallys.jpg Oamaru-Scotts.jpg

6. Drink some whiskey. There is an award-winning whiskey company in the old town.

7. Walk along the esplanade and see lots of shags (cormorants) and seals.

8. Walk near the beaches at night and see penguins or you can go and see them at the covered area. They have given the penguins nesting boxes here and they even have their own gardener.

oamaru-penguin-1-come-in-at-beach.jpg oamaru-penguin-2-stand.jpg oamaru-penguin-3-gardener.jpg

9. Go secondhand shopping, although the op shops are so much more expensive than in Christchurch. There is, however, a really good secondhand store that has well-organised old tools and bric-a-brac, etc, with very fair prices (unlike the very expensive but beautifully organised Hampden store just down the road from Oamaru).

Oamaru-Hampden-Store.jpg oamaru-secondhand-opshop.jpg oamaru-secondhand-red-rooster.jpg oamaru-secondhand-store.jpg Oamaru-vinnies.jpg

10. Check out the small, but lovely Forrester Gallery, which has some Colin Wheeler paintings as well as other artwork from Oamaru and around.

oamaru-forrester-gallery-colin-wheeler.jpg oamaru-forrester-gallery-fiona-van-dyen.jpg oamaru-forrester-gallery.jpg

11. Go to the farmers market on a Sunday morning.

12. Head out to the Waitaki Valley where there are wineries and the famous Whitestone Cheese Company.

13. Enjoy being in a quiet, friendly town.

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In New Zealand Diary, Living in NZ Tags New Zealand, NZ, cartoon, surfing, surf, Oamaru, Otago, body-boarding, steampunk, penguins, fur seals, cormorants, shags, la cucina, second hand shopping, cheese, whitestone cheese, limestone
← Living in New Zealand: Why Do Kiwis Make So Many Things Out of Corrugated Iron?Living in New Zealand: Little Blue (Don't Call Them Fairy) Penguins →

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Inspired by the book, Deep Work by Cal Newport (I’m inking while listening to the audiobook. Oops. I think that may be against the idea of the book…), I’m taking a social media break for the month of February. Read more at alexhallatt.com.
It's lucky I'm trying not to eat sugar right now, because on days like this I really miss the Empire. 
#EmpireHotel #icecream #heatwave #NewZealandDiary #NewZealand #NZ #Aotearoa #SouthIsland #Canterbury #Christchurch #Lyttelton #BanksPeninsula #illustratorsofinstagram #illustratorsoninstagram #cartoon
It's looking very dry around the Port Hills. 
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Pinchos assemble! #pintxo #pincho  #pinchoparty #BasqueDiary  #Basque
Making Gildas for tomorrow's #pincho party.  #BasqueDiary  #Basque #pintxo
I've had contents insurance for years and (fortunately) never had to make a claim until now. #AMI #Insurance #ReasonsToBeCheerful #illustratorsofinstagram #illustratorsoninstagram #cartoon
Oh, Herbertville, I had high hopes for you.
#herbertville 
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#bleak
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Happy Birthday to the boyf. #LandRoverSeries3
  • Alex Hallatt
    I've had contents insurance for years and (fortunately) never had to make a claim until now. But it was a big one.… https://t.co/oGTrDy5HCh
    about 2 weeks ago
  • Alex Hallatt
    Feilding, New Zealand is a perfectly nice town. Half of it seems to close down around Christmas and the rest of it… https://t.co/gX8n3xldfc
    about 2 weeks ago
  • Alex Hallatt
    Inspired by the book, Deep Work by Cal Newport (I’m inking while listening to the audiobook. Oops. I think that may… https://t.co/v3qWmhVVuK
    about 2 weeks ago

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