Wellington

Saturday saw yet another sunny morning although there was cloud and some showers when I arrived back on Friday evening. Wellington is known as a windy city and I can easily believe that you can get some big winds particularly in the winter. People are already starting to talk about “the southerlies” starting up. For us from the northern hemisphere this would indicate warmer weather but not here in the south. These will be the winds that blow up from Antarctica and Wellington is roughly 40 degrees south about the same latitude as New York. Wellington gets some shelter from South Island but is temperate at best.

 

Art Deco building downtown

 

Guide biscuits equals Girl Scout cookies in the American language! I like the balloon hat

 NZ Mailbox Circa 1960

 

 

View from the top of the Cable Car ride

 

View from my hotel room

 

The town is very hilly and compact. Mount Victoria is a natural eastern boundary for the city but there are other small suburban towns to the east near the airport.

 

Haight Ashbury? Wrong city I think!

I am going to do a separate post about the airport for any aviation lovers (like me) out there.

Wellington is the southerly most point on North Island and the train terminal and a port. The inter Island ferries run from here to Picton on South Island 4 times a day. 

 

New Zealand has it's share of ugly 60s architecture also

It is now Sunday morning and I am about to leave for the ferry.

I spent a pleasant day Saturday wandering about town and rode on the cable car up to the Botanical Gardens (I understand that Christchurch has better ones) and got some great views of the city. It is an easy city to get around by either walking or taking the bus. I did a little of both and stopped for a beer in a local tavern, and listened to a couple of guys discussing world topics and their views. It really could have been anywhere in the world! 

 

I attached my bottle opener to my CPR kit to be sure I did not lose it. CPR kit is for others, not me!

I stopped in town to get something to eat and noticed that a bacon and egg sandwich was NZ$4 (very cheap) but to order that as a plate was NZ$10.50g

. The overall parts content (Cat language) was the same, 2 eggs, a piece of bacon and 2 pieces of bread.