Moeraki Boulders
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Recommendations for Your South Island New Zealand Itinerary: Moeraki Boulders
The Moeraki Boulders are a must-see stop on the coastal route between Dunedin and Christchurch or a drive from Dunedin to Queenstown. If you’re staying close by, it’s worth visiting the Moeraki Boulders and the town of Moeraki as a destination all its own, and there’s plenty to do along this stretch of the South Island’s East Coast.
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There are three main routes from Dunedin to Queenstown, each with its own geography and landscape. The center and Northern routes converge on Alexandra and continue along the reservoir above Clyde through Cromwell before approaching Queenstown from the East. The third, southernmost route follows a lower elevation through Balclutha and Gore before approaching Queenstown from the South. We typically take the central route through Roxburgh for beautiful Central Otago scenery, unless we want to stop by Moeraki and some of the coastal towns further North along the coast. The broad, panoramic vistas along the northernmost route are truly hard to beat, and the landscape changes dramatically from coastal farmland to dry, sparsely populated Central Otago mountains before finally giving way to the rugged mountain region near Queenstown and Wanaka.
Taking the Northern route, one of the most popular stops between Dunedin and Oamaru is the Moeraki Boulders beach, just a few kilometers away from the sleepy fishing village of Moeraki. The boulders draw crowds of visitors, so the early you arrive, the better. If you have a little more time, drive into the town of Moeraki and visit Fleurs Place, an eclectic, award-winning restaurant on the point overlooking the bay across to the boulders on the coastal shore.
The Moeraki Boulders: Not Your Typical Beach Balls
The Moeraki Boulders are a composite of mud, silt, and clay, held together by calcite, all of which formed under the surrounding cliffs before erosion etched the softer sandy material around the boulders, depositing them on the shore. Many of the boulders have cracked open, some lying half open and exposed like broken eggs on the beach. Others still hold their round shape, while some are just scattered fragments of rock lying on the beach.
We arrived at Moeraki village mid-morning and bought coffee and pastries at Fleurs Place on the bluff overlooking the bay. The indoor seating is comfortable, and the wooden building feels like a cross between a remodeled church and a re-decorated beach cabin. The outdoor seating sits above the sandy shore on a grassy bluff, and the views of the ocean are spectacular. From Fleurs, it’s just a few minutes further up the coast to the restaurant/shop complex that leads to a wide gravel walking path down to the beach and the boulders. If you want to enjoy the boulders without hoards of people swarming the rocks, get there early; the site has become quite the tourist attraction since our last visit ten years ago.
The Moeraki Boulders Scenic Reserve
The girls ran around the boulders, splashing in saltwater pools and picking up smaller stones and shells that had washed in with the tide. We balanced and jumped from boulder to boulder along the longest chain of them, five or six neatly lined up in a row, just close enough for us to hop from one to the next.
Moeraki Boulder Hatchlings: Then and Now
Back in 2003, Michelle and I packed our bags and moved to New Zealand to study at the University of Otago (it wasn’t really that easy after Michelle’s purse was stolen at LAX and we had to get from L.A. to Seattle to get a replacement passport and then make our way back by car and train to LAX to fly out a week later, just in time for classes to start). Once we settled in to our new life in Dunedin, we found a tiny red Fiat that barely passed inspection and served as our rusty tour guide for our first year in New Zealand. It was the rusty red Fiat that brought us here sixteen years ago, and now we’re back in a rust-colored rental, our two little hatchlings in tow. We found the same cracked boulder that Ben climbed inside in 2003, though it seems to have turned and shifted over time, probably from the constant ebb and flow of the tide slowly churning the sandy sludge beneath the massive stones.
I love the Moeraki boulders! It’s been a few years since I was there last… but this is definitely a special place to visit.
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