Wellington : Part One

For the Easter break we headed south to New Zealand’s capital, Wellington. We packed a lot into this long weekend, too much for one post, so this will be the first of a few!

Amanda has relatives there, and while the familial tie is somewhat distant and tenuous there has existed a strong friendship ever since Amanda's mother Sheila, first visited and lived in New Zealand during the 1960s.

Amanda & Sheila last visited in 2000 and now that we had established our base in Auckland it was time to return, as Amanda promised to, 12 years earlier.

Since Sheila was first taken in by The Butters in the 1960s the two families have acted as hosts to any family members that have dared to crossed the equator. Thus we came to stay with Liz & Pete in their wonderful home located in the Upper Hutt valley, while George, Liz's brother, was our designated chauffeur, tour guide and chief raconteur.

We arrived in Wellington late Wednesday evening on a direct flight from Auckland and were met by George who whisked us out of Wellington and into the Hutt Valley. Liz and Pete own a plot of land with a house they designed themselves and this was to be our home for the duration of our stay.

Since we arrived late at night and Rich was half asleep it was not until the morning that he could appreciate both the home and its views – the South side of the house having views over the Hutt valley and the mountains beyond-amazing! The property was also home to two dogs, a cat, horses and even a couple of cows and the nearest neighbours were 5 minutes walk away.

The dogs soon took a shine to Amanda but it remains to be seen if the feeling is mutual enough for Amanda to consider dog ownership! The horses are owned and trained (to a very high dressage standard) by Liz, while the cattle are chief lawn mowers and eventually Sunday dinner. Mmmm, organic grass fed beef. :0)

Liz made herself a friend for life when remarking on Rich's Vibrams -"they look like something Batman would wear". :0)

Thursday being a working day, Liz was at work, George had errands to run and Pete, was laid up on the sofa, where he would remain unfortunately, for the duration of our visit, with an undiagnosed, yet very painful foot problem.

We therefore headed into Wellington city for a nose around and some sightseeing.

Wellington's inhabitants may disagree, but sights wise there is not much to see. We started at the large modern Te Papa museum. Some interesting stuff but nothing we have not seen before and even the earthquake simulator was tame. The display with extinct native birds was pretty cool though, as it played a soundtrack of what the forest may have sounded like if they were still here.

Rain had been forecast all weekend and since the sun had made an appearance we did not linger in the museum but instead headed to nearby café central, Cuba Street. Wellington is known for having a bit more culture and being less brash than Auckland and we must admit that walking along Cuba Street the area had a distinct Manchester / Brighton vibe to it. Although this may have been down to the large proportion of students and oh so trendy types milling about.

After lunch we headed to the Botanical gardens via the 100 year old cable car. The sun was out in full force so we spent most of the afternoon here; admiring the native specimens and the foreign invaders. Once we had had our botanical fix, we had a quick play in a conveniently located children's playground.

With the sun heading for the horizon we took some obligatory star jump pictures then headed back to town for dinner. Found a steakhouse where Rich had an interesting take on Surf and Turf - a steak stuffed with oysters! Interesting and tasty although he probably won't rush to have it again...

Grabbed the train back to Upper Hutt and discovered that Wellington's trains are electric, not diesel powered as in Auckland. Thus quite a bit faster and quieter and soon we were wrapped in bed looking forward to another day of sightseeing.