Rimutaka Mountains

We recently made a trip to Wellington, the capital of New Zealand. Wellington is located on the very southern tip of the north island and is about a 4 hour drive from Hastings. Going south on the east side of the island one must cross the Rimutakas on a very winding, windy road. The drive was beautiful but, the wind was fierce. We stopped at the summit and took this picture but the wind literally took our breath away!

Town sheep

As most everyone knows, the hillsides in New Zealand are covered with sheep. (Sheep outnumber humans 40:1) We found these cute little "town sheep" (and goat) in Greystone where we stopped for lunch. They are made of pieces of painted corrugated tin. Like there aren't enough sheep on the hillsides....

View from the deck.

We stayed in a lovely B&B during our visit to Wellington. Wellington's streets are steep, narrow and winding and the people drive as if they are possessed! Roger negotiated the streets like a pro and, we agreed it was an interesting experiment, but we both prefer the flat, somewhat wider and straight streets of Hastings!!

Arriving at the B&B

When we arrived at the B&B we parked on the street near the garage...and then tried to find the house. This is the view that greeted us from the deck behind the garage.

The dark blue square at the bottom of the tram track is the front door of the B&B (it is a large, double door!!) Oh dear, this is NOT going to be fun.

It was scary enough that I actually climbed and descended the stairs on several occasions so as to avoid the tram ride. Good exercise, I told myself.

Not any better....

This is the view from the front door up ~ not any more encouraging than the view from the top.

But not as scary as this one!

Privately owned trams are very common in Wellington which is a city built on the sides of hills and mountains. We saw this tram track on our drive around Wellington. This is the part of the tram track that goes to the top ~ the bottom part isn't even in the picture!! Not for me, thanks.

The Chocolate Fish

We drove around one of the peninsulas that are in the city of Wellington and stopped to eat lunch at a city icon called The Chocolate Fish. The restaurant is on one side of the road and most of the seating is on the other side of the road just next to the beach. This is the view from our table. Unfortunately, The Chocolate Fish will soon be going out of business; we were glad we were able to enjoy a meal and the view before it does.

Water's Edge Runway

This photo is from the top of Mt. Victoria ~ the highest mountain in Wellington (and the one our B&B was perched upon.) On the left side of the photo, at the water's edge, you can see one end of the Wellington Airport main runway and on the right side of the photo is the other end of the runway. Both ends end at the water's edge! Yikes!! No room for error there.

MOM

Wellington has some very interesting architecture. This was a renovated building along the main street, Oriental Parade, around the bay. It says MOM MOM MOM MOM across the front of the building. Don't know if this was intentional or not. A closer look reveals the parts of the letters that spell MOM are scrolls and flowers. But, a nice effect anyway!