Wow, that place is amazing! I have been there before, in fact, as a scarfie I attended a ball there, but I hadn't really appreciated it as much as we did today.
Tragic story behind the man who had the place built, William Larnach. His wife died at 38, his second wife (her sister) also died at 38. He married a much younger third wife, who, it was rumoured, was romantically connected to his son. He had a number of financial failings and he took his own life in the Parliament buildings in Wellington. Later, his son also claimed his own life, so it was a very tragic series of events.
The place has been being restored by the Barker family and is quite something. While we were there, it was a stunning, blue sky day. However, over about 20 minutes, the cloud rolled in, the cold set in and the day was utterly transformed! It was quite amazing how quickly it changed.
The garden was lovely, with magnificent views of the harbour and back towards Dunedin. I think the tadpoles in the garden pond might have been PB's favourite thing. They had their back legs grown and were almost ready to turn into frogs!
After Larnach Castle, we attended the 3pm Cadbury World tour. Wow, it was such fun! The guide - Colleen,was a real gem, and even in the face of potential redundancies (given talk recently of a possible closure of the factory), she was an absolute professional. We climbed the inside of a silo and got to see 1 tonne of chocolate be poured down the inside, along with other cool things to see and do.
Left with little bags of goodies, too! Would be sad to see this icon go.
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