New Zealand - North Island - Wellington - Day 7
December 23, 2005

We awoke and had breakfast at the motel, and since it was Fiona's birthday, it was decided by Dale that she was to go and visit her 96 year old Great Auntie Lal at a nursing home on the way to Wellington. After arriving and waiting for her to come out, we sat around talking about people I've never heard of or met for about 30 minutes or so, and upon announcing that we were leaving, we had to pry Auntie Lal's hand from Fiona's and have Dale distract her while we made a hasty escape in another car. "She won't let you leave, just go" she whispered to us while she kept Auntie Lal busy.


Wellington
Raining one day, Raining the next.
We left clear skies at the nursing home to be greeted with a torrent of rain as we reached the Wellington CBD, which was a mere 20 minutes away. We bought some cookies to snack on and took the cable car to the top of the Botanic Gardens overlooking the city and harbour. We wandered through the small cable car museum, hoping the rain would clear enough to get some decent photos, before finally giving up and taking the cable car back down. We headed out to Oriental Bay for lunch to celebrate Fiona's birthday and ended up at a dodgy restaurant overlooking a fountain several hundred metres out in the water.


Cable Car Museum
Really, I'm not drunk.
With little hope of any nice views I decided we'd drive out to the suburb of Karori and try and find the house where Fiona spent the first 3 years of her life, given that she was born in Wellington. A phone call to Fiona's mum back home in Oz provided us with some basic directions to follow, we found the address, but after following the driveway we found two houses at the end. With some guesswork Fiona decided she knew which house was number 14, and we took a couple of photos...hoping it was the right house.


Rain
Get used to it.
It turns out it was the right house, but regardless we drove back into the city and wandered in the rain checking out the various landmarks like "The Beehive", New Zealand's Parliment House, Old St Pauls Catherdal (the oldest woodwork church...or something) and the Parlimentary Library. Many years ago both of Fiona's parents worked at the library and it is the site where they met and fell in love.


New Zealand's Parlimentary Library
Wellington's Hot Spot for Love
The rain was clearing slightly so after our sightseeing we drove back up to the top of the Botanical Gardens to get some less obscured views of the city. It was getting late so we quickly stopped back at the Te Papa museum to get a gift for Dale to thank her for our free accomodation before buying some fried rice and champagne and retiring to our room for the night to enjoy a relaxing dinner in our big room and take advantage of the spa.

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New Zealand - North Island - Tongariro National Park to Wellington - Day 6
December 22, 2005

We set the alarm for 5:30am hoping the weather would be clear for us to see the volcanoes, but after peeking out the window to a view of white fog we went back to sleep. A few hours later and the weather hadn't gotten any better so disappointed we decided to move on, but not before bestowing onto Tongariro National Park the "Most Spectacular View We Didn't See" award.


Tongariro National Park Volcanoes
It didn't look like this for us.

Before we left the area we took a short detour up the side of Mount Ruapehu just outside the ski town of Ohakune. Mangawhero Falls was the destination, a location where a scene from Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers was filmed. The waterfall itself wasn't shown in the movie, but the stream above that feeds it was - in the scene Frodo and Sam walk along the stream while Gollum splashes about in the water trying to catch a fish. It was freezing cold when we were up there, and apparently when they filmed the scene it had snowed the day before and firemen with hoses had to wash away the snow before they could shoot. So I can't imagine how cold it was for actor Andy Serkis in the water at that temperature.


Gollum's Stream
How it looked in the movie.


Mangawhero Falls
How it looks in real life.

Back in the warm car, it was off to Wellington, with the only real stop on the 300km trip south at Levin for lunch. At 3:30pm we arrived at Fiona's father's cousin Dale's place at Paremata, a suburb north of the Wellington CBD. Dale runs the Marina Motor Lodge and she was kind enough to give us a free room while we were in Wellington. Not just any room though, the largest room we had on the entire trip, complete with a spa bath! For that I give it "The Best Room We Didn't Pay For" Award.


Marina Motor Lodge
Enough Room To Swing A Cat.

With a few hours to kill before dinner we threw some clothes in the wash and headed into the city. After getting lost and making our way through the winding streets and crazy local traffic (who don't slow down on one lane streets when they see you coming, they just scrape your mirrors and climb up the gutters on the way past) we were greeted with 360 degree views of Wellington from the top of Mount Victoria.


Wellington
Viewed from Mt Victoria.

After dodging death again on the way back into town we stopped at Te Papa, Wellington's huge museum. We wandered through the various exhibits on New Zealand's volcanic activity, fauna and maori culture before heading back to the motel for dinner and many drinks with Dale, her husband and her brother. We finally stumbled back to our room around 11pm.

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