What to See in Dunedin, New Zealand: Free Audio Guide

Dunedin is a city of Scottish heritage, historic architecture, unusual museums and dramatic coastal landmarks. The best things to do in Dunedin range from exploring a castle on the Otago Peninsula to discovering industrial history, university collections and one of the world’s steepest streets. Neywo has a free audio guide for Dunedin with 67 narrated places.

What to see in Dunedin

Larnach Castle

Larnach Castle stands on a ridge of the Otago Peninsula within Dunedin. Built by entrepreneur and politician William Larnach, it was constructed on a remarkable scale for New Zealand and offers a distinctive glimpse of the country’s mansion architecture. Since 1967, the Barker family has privately owned the house and opened it to the public as a tourist attraction known as New Zealand’s only castle.

St. Joseph’s Cathedral

In City Rise, St. Joseph’s Cathedral is the cathedral of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Dunedin and the seat of its bishop. The Diocese of Dunedin was established on 26 November 1869, and the cathedral remains an important part of the city’s Roman Catholic story.

Baldwin Street

Baldwin Street is a residential street in Dunedin’s North East Valley, 3.5 kilometres northeast of the central business district. Known as the World’s Steepest Street, it is one of Dunedin’s most distinctive sights. Its dramatic rise makes the street worth seeing even though it is part of an ordinary residential neighbourhood.

Cargill’s Castle

The ruins of Cargill’s Castle stand on a promontory above the Pacific coast. Known as The Cliffs when it was built, the Italianate mansion was commissioned in 1877 by Edward Cargill, the eighth child of Dunedin founder William Cargill. It was designed by architect Francis Petre and built in concrete by Harry Lyders.

The building’s history includes a remarkable family connection: while designing the house, Petre fell in love with Edward Cargill’s daughter, Margaret. Their relationship faced opposition because Petre was Catholic and the Cargill family were Presbyterians, but they eventually married in the villa’s principal salon on 1 March 1881.

A fire gutted the castle in 1892. Edward Cargill restored it and added a ballroom, although he could not replace all the original wooden furnishings. After his death in 1903, the building passed through several owners. In the 1930s, it became a restaurant and cabaret.

Tower Block

Tower Block is a historic school building and part of Dunedin’s architectural history. It offers another perspective on the city’s built heritage beyond its better-known civic and religious buildings.

Dunedin Gasworks Museum

The Dunedin Gasworks Museum occupies the former gasworks in South Dunedin and is one of only a few preserved gasworks museums in the world. The gasworks operated from 1863 until 1987. It was the first gasworks in New Zealand and the last to stop production.

The site includes the former engine house, boiler room, boiler house, chimney stack, fitting shop and blacksmith’s shop. Five stationary steam engines form a distinctive part of the collection, with at least some preserved in full working order. Displays of domestic and industrial gas appliances show how gas was used in everyday life and industry.

The museum remains an operating museum, so machinery and the working environment are central to the visit. Much of the original gasworks was demolished during the 1980s, while the remaining buildings were saved by a trust led by Elizabeth Hinds.

Museum of Natural Mystery

The Museum of Natural Mystery is a private museum in the Royal Terrace residence of mural artist and sculptor Bruce Mahalski. Its collection includes bones, bone art, ethnographic artefacts and other curios. The museum opened to the public in March 2018 and offers one of Dunedin’s most unusual cultural experiences.

Dunedin Public Art Gallery

Located in The Octagon, the Dunedin Public Art Gallery holds the city’s main public art collection. It is a central place to encounter Dunedin’s art and an important stop in the city centre.

Fort Taiaroa

Fort Taiaroa is one of the landmarks at Taiaroa Head, a distinctive coastal headland in New Zealand. Its position connects Dunedin’s history with the open coastline of the Otago Peninsula.

Geology Museum

The Geology Museum at the University of Otago presents the Earth’s story through the university’s geological collections. It adds a scientific dimension to Dunedin’s university quarter and complements the city’s wider group of museums.

Olveston Historic Home

Olveston Historic Home preserves an unusually complete picture of upper-class colonial Edwardian life in Dunedin. Designed by Ernest George in the Jacobean style in the early twentieth century, the house was lived in by the Theomin family and remains decorated and furnished much as it was during their time there.

The Theomins were avid collectors, and the rooms contain art, furniture, weapons and decorative objects. The house, garden and contents were gifted to the city by Dorothy Theomin when she died in 1966. The gardens are considered to be of national significance, and the property forms part of Dunedin’s Royal Terrace, Pitt Street and Heriot Row Residential Heritage Precinct.

Tūhura Otago Museum

Tūhura Otago Museum is one of Dunedin’s major attractions and one of New Zealand’s largest museums. Its collections bring together natural science specimens and humanities artefacts from the Otago region and around the world.

The museum’s interactive science centre includes an immersive tropical rainforest butterfly house. In 2022, the museum officially adopted the name Tūhura, a Māori word meaning to discover, investigate and explore.

Port Chalmers Maritime Museum

The Port Chalmers Maritime Museum explores the history of the harbour town and New Zealand’s maritime past. It is housed in the former Port Chalmers Post Office, a building designed by Colonial Architect William Clayton in the Renaissance Revival style.

The post office served Port Chalmers for more than a century before becoming a museum. Today, it is registered as a Category One heritage building with Heritage New Zealand. Its collections include objects connected with Port Chalmers and material relating to the wider maritime history of New Zealand.

Middlemarch Museum

The Middlemarch Museum connects visitors with the history and character of this New Zealand town through locally preserved material. It provides a view of community history beyond Dunedin’s central streets and major institutions.

New Zealand Sports Hall of Fame

The New Zealand Sports Hall of Fame commemorates the country’s greatest sporting triumphs. It was inaugurated in 1990 as part of New Zealand’s sesquicentennial celebrations and honours achievements that have shaped the nation’s sporting story.

Explore Dunedin with Neywo

Neywo makes a Dunedin self-guided walking tour easy to follow: the app tells the story of each place as you reach it, at your own pace, with no group and no schedule. Its Dunedin audio guide includes three walking tours, one bus route and one bike route, covering 67 narrated places in total. Narration is available in 11 languages.

The three walks are:

• Scotland of the South: The Octagon and Dunedin’s Founders — 2.22 km, 87 minutes and 11 stops.
• Scholars, Collectors and Curiosities: University Dunedin — 3.06 km, 94 minutes and 10 stops.
• Steep Streets and Hillside Churches of North East Valley — 1.59 km, 46 minutes and 4 stops.

There is also:

• A bus route from the Cargill Monument to the Art Gallery — 14 km, 60 minutes and 8 stops.
• A bike route from the station to North East Valley — 3.6 km, 18 minutes and 6 stops.

Download Neywo and explore Dunedin with a free audio guide that follows your route. Walk, take the bus or cycle between the city’s historic buildings, museums and hillside landmarks while the stories begin when you arrive. If you are planning more of a trip around New Zealand, you can also discover other destinations such as Napier, Christchurch and Wellington.