4 | REGIONAL DEVELOPMENT Glen Dene Station: Cross Hill Lodge and Domes Project Domes with postcard views a hit T T Hugh de Lacy Sarah and Richard Burdon’s Cross Hill Lodge and Domes offers glamping and hunting experiences on the 6250ha Glen Dene Station. New Zealand’s open to visitors, and the luxurious Cross Hill Lodge and Domes, offering glamping and hunting experiences on the 6250ha Glen Dene Station in the Otago high country, are getting a surge of business more than a year after they were built. The six domes, on part of the 15ha Cross Hill camping ground on the Hawea Flats that Glen Dene leases from the Lakes District Council, are serviced by a central lodge jointly run by a chef and a host, providing high country hospitality along with superb dining and the chance to hunt or just explore the stunning surrounding mountain scenery and farm. Marketed as Cross Hill Lodge, “It’s a different concept from staying in a hotel,” Glen Dene owner Richard Burdon says. “People just love I t.” The domes and lodge were built while New Zealand and the world were in the grip of the Covid pandemic that had gutted the New Zealand tourism industry until the re-opening of the borders earlier this year. The domes themselves were supplied by an American company, Pacific Domes Inc, launched in 1979 by Asha Deliverance, who fabricated her first geodesic dome on an ancient Singer sewing machine. A family-owned company based in Ashland, Oregon, Pacific Domes went into full production of Deliverance’s designs in the 1980s after finding world-wide demand for them. Asha developed her domes after studying ancient Vedic philosophers and the work of the multi-faceted American architect, systems theorist, author, designer, inventor, philosopher and futurist R. Buckminister Fuller (1895-1983). Pacific Domes supplied Cross Hill with the basic dome structures, and local contractors put them together with built-in bathrooms and full plumbing. “The domes come as a shell, and we commission local architects to design the interiors and bathrooms,” Richard says. Each dome covers an area of 40m2, offset by a 30m2 deck from which to appreciate the surrounding vistas. Floor-to-ceiling windows let the guests sleep under the stars, then awake to the glorious sun-rises. The lodge at the centre of the cluster of domes is where guests are first greeted by a host with a traditional high-country cuppa, and to whom they can outline their plans for their stay. “It’s a different concept from staying in a hotel. People just love it.....Guests at Cross Hill Lodge and Domes become part of our high-country family.” Located on the Haast Pass-Makarora Road near Lake Hawea, the central lodge is where guests take their breakfasts and dinners – and, if they feel so inclined, a massage. Beyond the lodge and domes lies the vast scenic playground of Glen Dene Station where guided hunting tours offer a range of game from chamois and deer to wild pigs. Guests also get to see the station’s grassbased farming operations, revolving round the 2500 Headwater ewes and 1000 hoggets, the 1000 breeding hinds and 350 Black Angus cows, as well as the additional block in South Otago that carries a further 500 ewes, 190 calves and 1100 mixed-age velveting and venison stags. The station also harvests manuka homey, and carbon credits provide a further revenue stream. Though Cross Hill Lodge and Domes are managing a surge in inquiries since the opening up of the borders, not all problems caused by the Covid pandemic are behind it. “There’s still a severe shortage of skilled labour and it’s been very difficult finding staff,” Richard says. But New Zealand, and the Otago high country in particular, seem to have lost nothing of their attraction to especially American hunters and tourists. Tariffs range from $450 to $700 a night, and most inquiries and bookings come on-line through Cross Hill Lodge and Domes’ website, and its email address stay@crosshill.co.nz. “Guests at Cross Hill Lodge and Domes become part of our high-country family,” Richard says. Floor-to-ceiling windows let the guests sleep under the stars.
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