Wellington, NZ Highlights: Things to Do

So, for the last three years, Hubs has taken a business trip to New Zealand. I've always been unable to take time off work, but last year I was free, and we made a holiday of it. We stayed in Wellington for a week and a half (the business portion of the trip), and then we spent two weeks on the South Island for a vacation.

During the week and a half in Wellington, we were still able to have some fun. It's a beautiful city. Compact, but it still feels like a bustling, vibrant city. These are the places well worth a stop if you're visiting.

The Botanical Gardens

Ride the cable car up.

Have lunch on a picnic table at the top. Take in the views.

And meander back down to the city along a winding path surrounded by trees and flowers.

Tree blossoms in bloom.

My favorite were the bell-like yellow flowers.

Some unique pine trees, too. On one tree the clusters of needles formed large gloves.

You can pass the beehive on the way to the city center.

Weta Workshop

If you like movies, specifically Peter Jackson-produced movies, you should definitely go on the small tour Weta offers.

A display in the lobby.

I got to hold the alien gun from DISTRICT 9! And it was heavy.

Fan. Girl. Moment.

There are swords and costumes from all of Peter and Neil's movies. No photos allowed. I could tell more fun tidbits, but I don't want to spoil anything from the tour. I will say that the tour is especially cool because all the guides actually work for Weta. Our guide works for the costume department.

Tour highlight (besides the D9 gun):

Fellow Tourist: "Does Weta ever used human skin to make the masks?"

Tour Guide: "No, we never do that." She'd clearly heard worse questions. God bless her.

Outside:

Te Papa Museum

A great place to escape the rain, as we did.

Our main focus was an exhibit on Gallipoli, which we'd only learned was in Turkey when we visited Turkey. It all went very badly for the NZ forces. The exhibit was long, but very thorough and interesting. The narrative followed many soldiers who survived the initial attack, but didn't make it to the eventual evacuation. 93% of the NZ troops there perished. It was a sobering experience. The NZ men who survived were given a few months to rest before being sent to the Western Front. So. Yeah. Happy thoughts.

Weta constructed giant life-like figures to depict the soldiers being profiled.

You can see the person standing in the background for scale. They were massive.

My favorite part of the exhibit was the raised, topographical displays that illustrated the battlegrounds. Red and blue masses representing the Turkish and Anzac armies showed the momentum shifts throughout the battles. Cheers to visual learning!


Walking along the water

Great people watching. Lovely beaches. (Too cold to lay out in September)

Birds that aren't in the U.S. (at least not that I'm aware of)

Birds diving into the water. Video here.

Beautiful water and sailboats.

Hiking near Mt. Victoria

We took the Southern Walkway up towards the Mt. Victoria Lookout. It was mostly uphill, but quiet and shaded.

Some nice lookouts on the way up.

The forest grew dense.

Beautiful bird sounds all around, including my new favorite, favorite bird: the tui.

He has the most precious bulb of feathers where his neck meets his chest, and he sounds like R2D2. Just watch and listen. Note the tuft of white feathers.


Jewelry

Shout out to Made It for having super cute and reasonably priced jewelry and other artsy items. I bought a necklace with five triangles made out of repurposed skateboards, similar to the 5-triangle one below. I've never seen anything like it.

Photo by Made It