Day 1 – Welcome to Wellington

After escaping a couple of final dramas on Friday evening, I was given the all clear to officially be on holiday. So I make a home cooked beef roast and had a couple of cleansing wines while getting packed. It was an early start this morning and interestingly enough as I opened the door to leave the house I found a daughter. A quick exchange of hellos and goodbyes, and then a taxi for us to the airport.

I was expecting it to be really busy at the airport, but all went relatively smoothly until we were about to board and Deb suddenly realised that she’d lost her boarding pass. She went to rush back to the lounge to look for it when a fellow passenger who had picked up the pass recognised the panic on her face and returned the errant document, so all was well again.

Three hours later we landed and made our way to the accommodation for the next few nights which is very neat and tidy and close to Lambton Quay, the main shopping area. There is a sneaky short cut from the apartments that is so well used that they actually print a brochure to map it out, so hopefully no-one gets lost.

My first impression is that Wellington seems to have the best and worst elements of urban architecture, with some beautiful heritage buildings contrasted with the ugliness of the 70s and 80s.

A newer building…

And then an older one….

After a bit of an orientation wander about, we stopped for coffee, because it didn’t seem like “beer o’clock” yet. Then we wandered to the Cuba Street Mall which is well-known for it funky shops and some fine food. On Saturdays there is also an international food market that has a large array of options from paella to all sorts of asian delights. The locals have been quite inventive with some of the establishment names. The Op Shop was ‘Paper Bag Princess’, a ladies wear shop – ‘Madame Fancy Pants’, not to mention Fidel’s coffee shop.

We found a place for dinner and so enjoyed our first ‘sit down’ meal of the trip. Decisions were difficult, but I settled on a Lamb Rump followed by an excellent Creme Brulee, while Deb had some scallops and her favourite Kapiti Ice-cream.  We walked back to the apartment past the town hall, another classic building.

So a short day today, having lost the three hour time difference. The weather looks pretty good tomorrow, expecting a high of 18 degrees and no rain forecast.

Until tomorrow!