Simply lovely Wellington

Day 114 - Tuesday 6 May 2008

Me and Rob checking out his new home ...

















Get off the road ...

















Modern Maori carving from te Papa ...













The Beehive ... but then you guessed that!












Arty Wellywood shows off it's skills ... and if you look closely through the bay ... it's nearest snowy mountains!












The Taranaki lookout ... minus Mount Taranaki!












Tongariro National Park seems to have lost Mount Ruapehu ...















If you're not happy where you are and are looking for a different place to live that has something for all tastes and is a very amenable place to live then you need to come and try on Wellington for size!

I've just about expended my 4 days in New Zealand's capital city (although Auckland aren't too chuffed about that) and I'll be leaving tomorrow saddened but buoyed by the excitement of seeing the natural delights to come on the South Island

And until I visit again (which is a must) I'll have very fond memories of this incredible place - I've renewed an old friendship, soaked up some real life Lord of the Rings, learned about how New Zealand is governed to be such a cool place and acted all cosmopolitan in scores of top class, free to the people, museums - can I come and live with you Rob?!!!

My old friend from Newent Comprehensive School, Rob Buckland, has just re-located out here and (if all works well when his family reach New Zealand very soon) will have swapped Liverpool for a house on a hill overlooking Wellington Harbour one way and the Kaikoura Mountain Range the other way (that have just had their first dusting of snow for the Winter) - now there's a smart guy ...

And if I could find a USB port on this computer you'd see us hanging out - so we're back to the days of South America and I'll add them later - but I do love this internet place for the log in screen telling you to use Mozilla Firefox and requesting that you only use Internet Explorer as a very, very last resort - yes!

We had a top day on Saturday with Rob navigating us around his new city - we headed up to Wellywood's high points - if you didn't know Peter Jackson and The Lord of the Rings movies were produced from here so that's why it's Wellywood - in fact New Zealand is certainly making the most of their Rings connections - I wouldn't say ashamedly 'cos I love them but it's pretty difficult not to move around a hostel without seeing a Rings adventure being advertised - and I'm off topic quickly - Rob and I headed up the cable car from Lambton Quay to Kelburn where you get a good look at the Harbour and the CBD (Central Business District) - but the real deal is a trip up the higher 360 degree lookout of Mount Victoria - where the wind blows straight up the Cook Strait (the Island separator!) and does it's best to knock you over - the views are stunning and it's memorable seeing and feeling the planes coming in to land over sooo much sea

Mount Victoria has an added bonus that if you walk (like we did) you go straight through a wooded area that was used to film the hobbits leaving the Shire where they were almost trapped by one of the Nazgul - and I've got a picture of me in the now legendary location of this 'get off the road' action! - well - around there anyway - thanks for hunting around Rob! - I've worked out that it's incredibly difficult to track down the locations despite my 'Lord of the Rings Location Guidebook' unless you have GPS - and I've made a promise on the South Island just to soak up New Zealand for it's own natural beauty - and not what it's been made to be by the genius of Peter Jackson - this will be easier said than done - I'm already considering a very expensive trip to Edoras - I mean Mount Potts - see!

We rounded off the day by seeing Iron Man in the Embassy Theatre - the Embassy sits at the end of Wellington's entertainment district like an altar at the end of a church - it hosted the Lord of the Rings premieres including the world premier of The Return of the King - a movie that it got a complete overhaul for and is now delivering a world class movie experience - the best anywhere for me alongside the Arklight in Los Angeles - a top movie to watch there as well - the seats were shaken and rumbled by the sound system - and the action that came thick and fast - it's well worth a watch - if you forget the Afghanistan setting - and how hot does Gwyneth Paltrow look in it?! - I agree usually - but check her out ...

Wellington also has a world class museum called Te Papa that cost millions recently and is right on the waterfront - I lost a whole day there and think it cured me of comparing them all to New York's Met - a superb Maori collection again and an incredible Maori 'community' area that had some beautifully intricate wood carvings from renewable wood sources - New Zealanders are the best environmentalists I've ever seen - Swifty and Nev'd love them! - I also brushed up on the different ways that rain and glaciers shape the land - rain falls and cuts steep narrow gorges when it flows down the mountain - but when that same rain freezes it expands and carves a huge chunk out of the mountain creating a flat, debris filled valley - I even drew a picture of it in my notebook - inspired by my brother Rich's scribblings clearly - only a bit better than his?!!!

I also discovered a crazy but cool idea for a golf like game played over uneven terrain and not needing the expenses of a green - I thought it looked really cool - check it out boys - you can swerve your drives and everything - not a problem for the wee bald fella, Matt, I know but for some of us!

www.golfcross.com

After doing some travelling chores and visiting my first Embassy/Consulate of the journey yesterday (it's visa time soon and Indian for the record!) I did the only honourable thing - and visited the New Zealand Parliament Buildings to find out just how they get this awesome country to work - I say that because it's a breath of fresh air to visit a country where, in their most important buildings, everyone's warm, friendly, welcoming and no-gun wielding - I even got to sit in their House of Representatives because the House was in recess - but then it was the same at the Capitol in Washington and the closest I got there was having my water taken off me and being shown the rooms used a couple of centuries ago!

Now - they're a constitutional monarchy here - which as far as I can work out means that good old Lizzie 2 is represented by a Governor General who is currently Anand Satyanand - but it's the people of New Zealand who hold the power and govern their country - they've got a Minority Coalition Government at the moment which means that the party in power (Labour under Prime Minister Helen Clark) need the support of other parties to function - and it's proportional representation here for the House of Representatives (not first past the post so your vote for a less popular party really means something and the greens have plenty of representation for example) - similarly there's no upper House of toffs who can chuck out bills they don't like - I think it all sounds pretty ideal - and it's a bit of a British/German hybrid - our influence is clear to see - the House looks just like our House of Commons and everyone sits in the same positions - i.e. Prime Minister front right of the Speaker etc.

I should also mention the spectacular architecture of one of the Parliament Buildings from the British architect who designed Coventry Cathedral (Sir Basil Spence) - it's called the Beehive, is occupied by Cabinet Ministers and splits opinions almost quicker than the Treaty of Waitangi from 1840 - a document I also saw yesterday in a very Mission Impossible high security vault - the interpretation of the English/Maori translations culminated in ongoing payment settlements between the Government and Maori iwi (tribes) - I don't want to open a hornet's nest (just like Alan Partridge) and this isn't Newsnight so here's the link

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treaty_of_waitangi

And I could go on about the maritime-y Wellington Museum of City and Sea, the Reboot art display at the City Gallery Wellington, my viewing of The Fellowship of the Ring at the New Zealand Film Archives or my trip around the Wellington bays to Miramar on a warm and sunny afternoon

Miramar is not the place where the US Navy test their fighter pilots and planes - it's the Wellywood suburb where 3 Foot 6, Weta and Wingnut Films are based (sadly I saw none of them because I had no directions and I'll leave knowledge of what those are to those of you in the know) - it's very simple and very un-Hollywood - in a cool - let's be the world's best right now and have a beer or climb a mountain to celebrate kind of way!

And for the observant amongst you I just need to add details of my time in the middle of the North Island - simple - it wazzed down! - I still made the most if it mind you and am now really glad I spent out on Goretex - but sadly I didn't see Mount Ruapehu (an active volcano that sits in the heart of Tongariro National Park - a UNESCO World Heritage Site) - where I should have been seeing 3 volcanoes actually all I saw was rain clouds - and heavy, heavy rain!

So instead of doing the Tongariro Crossing across the top of them I contented myself with the small, isolated out of season snow towns of National Park and Ohakune - and a classic New Zealand rain forest walk through the Erua Forest to the Taranaki lookout (or rain out!) and the Mangawhero Forest Walk respectively - again - pictures will be posted so please check back!

I did love getting into New Zealand's isolated spots - the tranquility is breath taking - and I've learned that the sky here is just like a canvas that the greatest powers paint on - all the shades of blue, white and grey in the spectrum - and sooooo many rainbows!

When I was in Ohakune I visited the Powderhorn Chateau and made like a Lord of the Rings fan - the cast stayed here while filming on Mount Ruapehu - I swam in their hot pool and sipped coffee in an alpine bar that saw a couple of legendary Rings parties - it's complete with pictures of hobbit actors!

But that's it and my time on the North Island ends on a ferry crossing tomorrow morning at 0900 - I just wish I hadn't visited the exhibition about the Wahine disaster of 1968 - think Herald of Free Enterprise - anyway - it's sunny and calm here now - so it promises to be spectacular - the scenery I mean - not the Cook Strait - see you in the south!