On the 27th December we left New Plymouth to go to Wanganui. Our usually reliable Lonely Planet didn't mention much of our interest for the trip to Wanganui, but the scenery was beautiful.To our surprise Wanganui appeared to be quite a pleasant town. Again we stayed at a Top 10 Holiday Park, this time near the river. Top 10 is good because of the quality of amenities. Showers are usually great and free. (This not always the case on other holiday parks!) Wanganui has a very wide range of interesting shops. We stayed for 2 nights before we headed towards Wellington where we would spend New Years Eve. On the way we found a tiny village named Paekakariki, situated on the coast just before you got to Wellington. This was a real tiny village... Budel-Dorplein (place where I grew up) is small but this could easily beat it in the category of the tiniest hamlets. But it had a very good holiday park! Almost straight on the beach. And staying in Wellington means that we wold have problems with parking since it was coming close to New Years Eve. We had a good walk in the dunes (about 10 KM) and had a relaxed time. We bought a interesting book called The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo (from Steinar Larsson) and Emma talked me into reading it. And it is a very interesting one! (TIP!) We started discussing different plots and theories about it. We decided we had to watch it in a cinema.
On New Years Eve we arrived in Wellington, Cambridge Hotel. That turned out to be a nice treat. On suite bathroom, huge bed, tv, good breakfast, close to city centre. The only minor thing was the wind. When we arrived in Wellington it was windy... Hence the name windy Wellington! We walked around centre (Cuba Street!) and visited the Te Papa Museum. And I guess that this has been the most relaxed New Years Eve ever! We had a very good Indian dinner out and decide to grab ourselves a bottle of champers and go back to bed and watch some tv. When it got close to midnight we couldn't be asked to go out and join the masses in the bars. We stayed in bed and watched some movies...
The next day we walked up Lambton Quay towards the cable car and discovered Wellington is absolutely dead on New Years Day. All the shops were obviously closed but we expected some coffee bars or tea rooms to be open. After about 1 hour of looking around we found a bar that served lunch.
Still, it felt very weird to walk around in such a quiet city...
We took the cable car up to the botanic gardens and made our way back to the hotel via Queens Wharf and the Civil Centre. On the 3rd Januari we took the ferry over to Picton. It took about 3 hours and the trip was kind of rough. We both caught up some sleep and weren't very keen on visting the deck to have a look. First there wasn't much to see and second it was very rocky on the deck because of the weather. After we got to Picton we made our way to Nelson and Motueka where we agreed to meet our new Wwoof hosts.
Our Wwoof hosts had an apple farm with some cattle high up in Brooklyn Valley, about 30 mins drive from Motueka centre. They have cows and horses and a lovely dog named Misty (it's all in the name!). She is very cute and followed us around every morning when we started our daily projects. In total we stayed at Rob'and Barbara fro two weeks. It has been a lovely time in which we got to know these wonderful people and their farm. They both are from Europe (England and Belgium) and lived and travelled in Europe for a bit. They are very switched on and have interesting ideas. We also met their daughter Lucy and her boyfriend Benny, also very interesting people. On a Thursday (thirsty Thursday!) Rob took us to Park Cafe in Marahau, which is owned by the father of Benny. Thirsty Thursday at Park Cafe means live music. Not just live music but music performed by people that are present at the Cafe and would like to play. Kind of random jam session. Every night turns out differently of course! But it was a great experience and there was a range of very good musicians. Rob plays several instruments and had brought his set of hamonicas. He went up stage for a session and gave a really good performance. My only question was how all these musicians communicate with each other? Very special evening...
In Motueka we also found out what it means to have bought a car while travelling... On a Sunday after we visited the farmer's market the car didn't start. We called a mobile mechanic who turned out to be Graapa, known by Rob and Barbara. He had a look at our starter engine and told us it needed reconditioned. But that wouldn't be happening on that day... (Sunday!) He towed our van to his workshop and took us up the valley. We had been waiting in the rain for 4 hours. And on the Tuesday we got our van back with a nice bill...
So long...
Ray
The next day we walked up Lambton Quay towards the cable car and discovered Wellington is absolutely dead on New Years Day. All the shops were obviously closed but we expected some coffee bars or tea rooms to be open. After about 1 hour of looking around we found a bar that served lunch.
Still, it felt very weird to walk around in such a quiet city...
We took the cable car up to the botanic gardens and made our way back to the hotel via Queens Wharf and the Civil Centre. On the 3rd Januari we took the ferry over to Picton. It took about 3 hours and the trip was kind of rough. We both caught up some sleep and weren't very keen on visting the deck to have a look. First there wasn't much to see and second it was very rocky on the deck because of the weather. After we got to Picton we made our way to Nelson and Motueka where we agreed to meet our new Wwoof hosts.
Our Wwoof hosts had an apple farm with some cattle high up in Brooklyn Valley, about 30 mins drive from Motueka centre. They have cows and horses and a lovely dog named Misty (it's all in the name!). She is very cute and followed us around every morning when we started our daily projects. In total we stayed at Rob'and Barbara fro two weeks. It has been a lovely time in which we got to know these wonderful people and their farm. They both are from Europe (England and Belgium) and lived and travelled in Europe for a bit. They are very switched on and have interesting ideas. We also met their daughter Lucy and her boyfriend Benny, also very interesting people. On a Thursday (thirsty Thursday!) Rob took us to Park Cafe in Marahau, which is owned by the father of Benny. Thirsty Thursday at Park Cafe means live music. Not just live music but music performed by people that are present at the Cafe and would like to play. Kind of random jam session. Every night turns out differently of course! But it was a great experience and there was a range of very good musicians. Rob plays several instruments and had brought his set of hamonicas. He went up stage for a session and gave a really good performance. My only question was how all these musicians communicate with each other? Very special evening...
In Motueka we also found out what it means to have bought a car while travelling... On a Sunday after we visited the farmer's market the car didn't start. We called a mobile mechanic who turned out to be Graapa, known by Rob and Barbara. He had a look at our starter engine and told us it needed reconditioned. But that wouldn't be happening on that day... (Sunday!) He towed our van to his workshop and took us up the valley. We had been waiting in the rain for 4 hours. And on the Tuesday we got our van back with a nice bill...
So long...
Ray
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