New Zealand's Windy City

 Kia Ora,

We've been sightseeing NZ's capital city, Wellington, which is located on the southern tip of the North Island.  It's known as The Windy City due to the blustery winds that blow regularly.  Wellywood, as the locals call it, has wind gusts up to 38 mph for 178 days of the year!  It's a pretty, old city with narrow streets, houses neatly stacked up the hills and a vibrant harbor.   

Wellington's skyline 

Cars line the streets as these houses have only stairs leading to them.

The main capital building is called the Beehive by the press.  Notice there are NO security barriers.

 

The NZ library of Congress

 

Rhododendrons grow enormous here!

Nothing says spring like tulips!!

After two days of some very drippy weather, we were glad to be heading east to Greytown.  Nestled in the midst of fruit/veggie fields and vineyards, we stayed in a delightful cottage with a wonderful host.  The wines of the Martinborough region are lesser known than those in Hawkes Bay but no less delicious.  Many of the wine cellars are considered boutique as they can produce only a small number of bottles each year.  We've seen signs in some cellars that indicate the entire year's production has already been sold.  It's been fun to learn about the vineyard's stories.

While in this sleepy village, we were reminded of the character of New Zealander's.  On a hike, Cheryl left her binoculars on a bench where we had been taking a break.  We returned as soon as we noticed, but the glasses were gone.  It wasn't a busy trail, so we were hoping that perhaps someone would have picked them up and left them at the trail head, but to no avail. Later that day, we mentioned the incident to our host who was surprised that anyone would actually take the binoculars to keep them.  She decided to post our loss on the local on-line lost/found site.  Lo and behold, two days later, she found out that the binoculars had been turned into the local police station!  We were  (in the words of the Aussie's) gobsmacked!~

One day we hiked up a river bed to find the Putangirua Pinnacles.  These amazing formations were part of a Lord of the Rings movie "The Return of the King".  If you're a fan, these rock towers were in the "Path of the Dead" scene.  

 

 

 

If you've been following our adventures, you know that New Zealand has a vast array of landscapes and natural wonders.  Given the entire country is only the geographical size of Oklahoma, it's pretty mind boggling how much variety there is here.  Whether you enjoy J.R. Tolkein's middle earth or fancy the stars, NZ has it covered.  We ventured out one evening to visit Stonehenge Aoetearoa which is a replica of Stonehenge in England to learn about the southern night sky.  We were surprised to learn that there are stonehenges all over the world and they are built around important events that happen in the sky such as the summer/winter solstices.  With the help of some powerful telescopes, we saw Mercury, Mars, Saturn & Venus.  Cloudy skies kept us from finding many of the constellations, but we learned how stars in the southern hemisphere move counter clockwise.  On clear nights, absent air and light pollution, NZ offers some outstanding star gazing opportunities.

A pretty sunset ending a glorious day.

Off to the east coast for some warmer temperatures and sunny days.  We're ready to throw off our coats and run barefoot in the sand.

Stay Curious

Cheryl & Dan