Highland Peaks

The Otago Museum, founded in 1868, is the largest cultural and heritage institution in Otago. It houses over 1.8 million world-class collections that are both nationally and internationally significant.

Discover what makes Otago different at the Otago Settlers Museum, one of New Zealand's finest social history museums.

The Otago Museum is Dunedin's most visited attraction, currently accommodating around 300,000 visitors per year and winning the 2003/2004 NZ Cultural and Heritage Tourism Attraction Award.

Among the galleries...

explains the origins of our demanding Southern New Zealand landscape and environment, how people discovered and explored it, how they utilised its natural resources.

Enjoy a close encounter with the superb fossil collections from the University of Otago recording our history over 500 million years.

Discover New Zealand's largest fossil, the Shag Point plesiosaur - a striking sea-serpent like creature.

Meet the largest collection of moa skeletons in New Zealand and find out why these incredible birds became extinct.

holds an impressive displays of Maori cultural artefacts.

The design of this gallery centres around the protocol of a marae, (meeting house)

Both local and northern provenance material are displayed here.

Is dedicated to telling the stories of Otago's past and its people.

It is the ideal place to investigate the region's journey from the earliest days of human settlement to the present.