Toby and Allan in New Zealand and Australia 2019

Wednesday February 27 was our coldest day of the trip so far and there was rain on and off.  High about 14C. After breakfast, we headed to Olveston Historic Home which is two minutes away on Royal Terrace, the street we are staying on.   Olveston was built for Dunedin businessman, collector and philanthropist David Theomin (1852-1933) and was the family home from 1906-1966.  The family was Jewish.  David Theomin was originally from Bristol England and immigrated to Melbourne in 1874, where he met his future wife, Marie Michaelis (1855-1926).  They married in 1879 and moved to Dunedin in 1880.  For more than twenty years, Marie and David lived in a house which was on part of the present Olveston site and it was there that they raised their two children.  The older house also seems to have been known as Olveston, a town near Bristol.  The new house was built between 1904-06.  David Theomin had a general importing firm, was active in the Cham...

Tuesday February 26 started cloudy, but the sun came out and the high got to 21C by late afternoon. We walked into town and had an Allpress coffee at a café called The Good Oil.  We also got a takeout B.L.A.T. sandwich to have later in the afternoon. Our 10 minute walk into town, down this street (Pitt St.) Knox Church-- Dunedin has some beautiful churches.  This church dates back to 1876, in the Gothic Revival style.  It has a soaring 50m steeple. We decided to spend the late morning at the Dunedin Public Art Gallery, which is on one corner of the Octagon, the main "square" in Dunedin.  It is kitty corner from the I-Site Visitor Centre, where we needed to be at 1:15 p.m. to meet our Monarch Wildlife tour and cruise. Foyer of the Art Gallery We only had time to peruse the main floor of the gallery which featured works from the collection in an exhibit entitled:   World View: Mapping the Dunedin Public Art Gallery Collection .  The pai...