Days 62 & 63: Wellington

Wellington from harbour front
see all photos »

Only kidding mum, no danger here.

The drive down to Napier proves to be an endurance test, with winding roads that may have been fun in my Porsche, but decidedly less so in a bloated and overweight van. Added to this were high winds and a mountainous switchback stretch of road that had been closed after a lorry blew over the day before – all in a vehicle that I could have erected a sail on without creating any greater wind drag! I swear that as a road and conditions combo it was worse than we encountered in Peru.

Bungy - arrrgggghhh

Weird bridge
see all photos »

Anyway, Wellington itself played host to us for just one day and two evenings, in which time the highlights were:

Te Papa – NZ’s premier and national museum “celebrating all things New Zealand”. This covered earthquakes and volcanoes; prehistoric New Zealand; “Bush City” an outdoor garden of native plants; Maori culture including a transplanted Marae (tribal meeting house); and animals including marine skeletons (whales and dolphins). It also included a couple of very entertaining simulator rides (one taking you bungee jumping, skydiving and crashing a motorbike – not sure of the NZ historical or cultural relevance but very good fun) and an exhibit on Scots in New Zealand, apparently we built all the finishing touches after God landscaped.

Ferns
see all photos »

Walked much of the city admiring some architecture (the old government buildings) and wondering what on earth other architects had been thinking (the new parliament ‘Beehive’). Particularly liked the ‘floating world of ferns’ (more correctly just known as Ferns), an almost invisibly suspended ball above one of the squares.

Puzzled over the ‘one day work of art’, a project where 3 people ran around the city centre ringing 11 or 17 fixed bells (Jane & I disagree here!) in sequence, effectively leapfrogging each other. Saw this a couple of times at different points as it went on for a couple of hours. Still not really sure what the point was.

Bell ringer
see all photos »

Took the cable car up one of the hills surrounding the city and meandered back down through the Botanic Gardens (lots of spring flowers in October – weird)

Visited a couple of restaurants and bars around Cuba St and Courtney Place which seems to be the area of the city for such entertainment.