Wellington -The windy capital

 The Wellington Cable Car

 I'm running a bit behind with blog posts as we've been without internet access for a few days. So apologies to anyone who's been checking the site.

We left the South Island on the Interislander ferry last Friday afternoon. It was a beautiful cloudless day  sailing out of the Marlborough Sounds ,which are pretty spectacular, and across the Cook Strait to Wellington. We spent most of the crossing on the outside deck and were lucky to see lots of dolphins! They are really hard to capture on camera, but I did manage to get one good shot .....

Marlborough Sounds

The ferry takes you right into the city of Wellington and we spent the next three days wondering around, eating some good food and trying to get a bit of a feel for the place (well, as much as you can do on a short visit). The first thing that strikes you is the geography of the city. It seems most of  the houses are scattered over a series of very steep hills that encircle a fairly compact downtown business and shopping area. That means almost everyone gets a spectacular sea view. But the price to pay are some of the steepest climbs imaginable. Private finiculars seem to be a must in  places that are much too steep for cars and driveways and barely manageable by humans.

Our impression of Wellington is that it's a pretty happening kind of place where the retro trend in clothes, furniture and even cars abounds. And there are lots of hip people spending time in the gazillions of cafes and restaurants around.

We spend a few hours in the national museum Te Papa which is really imaginatively laid out and fairly interactive. But I have to say one of the high-lights for me was Wellington public library. It is in the heart of the central civic area and is really interesting building architectually with great details such as bespoke designed chairs and lovely metal fern heads as part of the outside landscaping. But it is the quality of the library itself that was stricking. It had a brilliant children section, the best selection of magazines anywhere  a whole area with multiple copies of current best sellers and even a bustling cafe on the first floor. And it was full of people! Young and old , all shapes and sizes. If you want a model for a great library look no further.

Although it was described in the guide books as the windiest city in the Southern hemisphere, we were lucky with the weather on our visit. Of slightly  more concern was the other fact we came across- that there are  multiple fault lines running through and under the city, making it a bit of a seismic hotspot, but luckily for us no cracks when we were there....

So all in all we would rate Wellington pretty highly on the must see list of places in NZ. Pretty cool, hip and happening (as if we'd know...).

Moari Totem at the top of Mount Victoria overlooking Wellington

And one final aside. The first eveing there we were walking around and who did we happen to walk past but several of the stars of the new Peter Jackson film The Hobbit. Andrew hadn't a clue why I was nudging him and saying look it's whats his name and thingymabob. But the next day on the telly here they announced shooting was about to begin and put names to the faces.....