From Oban to Oban

A year ago today, Alec and I were in Oban, Scotland having celebrated my 29th birthday. So it was quite bizarre and cool, almost exactly a year on, to be in Oban, NZ. The other side of the world.

Most people call Stewart Island's wee town by the name of it's bay - Halfmoon Bay. So much so that it was really difficult to find a sign saying 'Oban' for a photo opportunity, but find it we did.

Stewart Island seems like a lovely place, and I am glad we went, but we didn't get the best experience of the place. Part of this was down to the bad weather (though we couldn't have escaped that anywhere else in NZ the last few days). Not that the weather stopped us getting out and about (literally) stretching our legs on Oban's hills.

The other part of our Stewart Island experience centred around a really crap hostel with damp rooms and more notes on the walls than I have ever seen - including the instruction 'Young people - no alcohol or smoking'. Not sure if a nearly-30-year-old counts as 'young'.

However, the pub was nice and there is a cool wee cinema. I was even offered a job in the pub, which I considered for a while but thought the better of. After all - if it all went pear-shaped it would cost me a $50 ferry / plane journey to get out of there.