Day Thirty Three Roslyn

Today I finished a number of streets that I had already walked most of and have already counted so there weren't many streets to count today.  I walked 6 streets

441. City Road
442. Ross Street

443. Stuart Street Extension
444. Strathmore Crescent
445. Erin Street
446. Sligo Terrace

Today I walked past the Observatory in Ross Street, which was established in 1922 by the Dunedin Astronomical Society and is named after local astronomers Arthur Beverly and John Campbell Begg,  The observatory is open to the public on Sunday nights.

The observatory is in Robin Hood Park which is on the edge of the Town Belt and my walk down City Road took me down the hill and through the Town Belt.

I walked part of Arthur Street and past two schools.  The first is Arthur Street School which is the oldest primary school in Otago.  The school was started on the Phillip Laing which is one of the first sailing ships to arrive in Dunedin in 1847.  Once in Dunedin, the school was opened at a waterfront site in 1848 before being moved up the hill. Arthur Street School moved to it's present site in 1877.  

Next door to Arthur Street School is Otago Boys High School.  Originally known as Dunedin High School and opened 1863, Otago Boys High School moved to it's present site in 1885 making it one of New Zealand's oldest boys secondary schools.

From Arthur Street, I turned the corner and walked up the Stuart Street Extension to the Roslyn Over Bridge which was constructed in 1954.  The views from the over bridge make the climb up the Stuart Street Extension worth the effort.  

From the over bridge I walked back through the Roslyn shopping area and down Erin Street which is a narrow one way street that comes out on Sligo Terrace.  The view from the Sligo Terrace playground  looking towards Mt Cargill was also worth taking the time to stop for.  

Today on my walk I saw this memorial in the Arthur Street Playground, beside Arthur Street School.  I found it particularly interesting is that, what is now a playground was the first cemetery in Dunedin.  The first burial on this site was in 1846 and as the city grew quickly, the site became unsuitable for a cemetery and in 1865 the cemetery was closed with the remains being relocated.  This memorial was erected in 1880 and has the names of around 60 known burials at the site, many of them are children who died at sea on their way to New Zealand. 

The other interesting thing I noticed about the Arthur Street Playground is the size of the trees. They are huge! Records show that the trees were planted around 1870.  This picture shows the size of one of the trees compared to the memorial in the bottom left corner.

Distance walked:  5.0 km      Walking time  57 mins    

Total distance: 283.2 km       Total walking  53 hr 04 mins