New Zealand - Wellington

The family enjoying a walk in the hills
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Waving a fond farewell to Top 10 Taupo we headed for the vineyards of Masterton and Martinbrough and looked forward to a couple more days of R&R at the Cornwall Park Motel with a good glass of plonk! Unfortunately, apart from the first afternoon the rain defeated us and the vineyards were closed. This was not the only bad news as Ed and Des’ attempt to go hot air ballooning was foiled by the high winds although our attempts to wave them off as they floated in the sky was not prevented as Ed did not bother checking his voicemail for the numerous cancellation messages as we all arrived at the airfield for 5am.

Alright Bro
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Leaving Masterton we pushed onto Wellington where we would part company from the Des, Jean and Ed but not before celebrating Jeans birthday. As we were faced with another wet and blustery couple of days we headed for the refuge of Te Papa, the impressive National Museum of NZ. There are over 5 floors to peruse at your leisure celebrating and in parts admonishing the historical, political, sociological and natural history of NZ. The Museum is a little confusing in its lay out but has plenty of interactive games to keep the kids and young adults occupied and also has an impressive section on the Treaty of Waitangi and subsequent present day land rights issues for the Maoris.

Bye Bye Buckinghams

You shouldn’t really compare the situation of the Aborigines in Australia with the Maori in New Zealand as the two invasions were very different. For example the Maori, although having different tribal groups, spoke the same language (as opposed to over 200 aboriginal languages) at the time of the British invasion and were unified in fighting them. Differences aside, you can’t help but feel that New Zealand is just a million miles ahead of Australia in terms of true equity between its indigenous and colonial peoples. Although animosity still exists, and battles continue over land rights etc, there is a much greater deal of pride in Maori culture here than you ever get in Australia, where you feel many people like to pretend the Aborigines don’t exist.

For Jeans birthday we headed to Kai in The City, a Maori influenced restaurant with live music from Lucky. It was a superb night with the singer gamely trying to belt out ‘Build me up Buttercup’ by the Foundations as Jean reminisced over Becs’ hen do. Lucky’s version was hindered by his lack of teeth but great entertainment all the same. Feeling a little sore in the head we headed off back to Sydney and Des, Jean and Ed took their motion sickness tablets (can’t think why Ed decided to take some!!!) and crossed the Nth/Sth divide to Picton.