Wellington

Where do I start? This is a really nice city. Pretty, unique and vibrant. There are old victorian homes next to new buidings and modern homes and somehow it works. It is a truly lovely city on a beautiful bay. This city certainly makes the most of it's location!

First we went to a place called "Weta". This is a company that does the special effects for many movies including "lord of the Rings", "Avatar", "District 9" and many others. This company is located in a warehouse in Wellington, and Lindsay wanted to go because they have a museum on Special effects. Not being big on Sci-Fi stuff, I was surprised how much I enjoyed this outting. It was really interesting to see how they did much of what you see in many movies. This is a company that is hands on and we actually met some peole that do the special effects in movies we've seen. To our surprise, this museum was free. Peter Jackson and others started this company years ago and they have become very well known in recent years. I'm sorry to say I had never heard of them before a few weeks ago.

We drove back to Victoria University and Lindsay gave us a trour of the campus. This is a university that is much smaller than the University of Minnesota. Her dorm is nice by U.S. standards, but frankly, it is still a dorm. The campus is small, but nice. It is laid out on one of the hills in Wellington.

After our "tour" we walked the few blocks to the cable car. The city of Wellington is surrounded by hils and they have a great little cable car system that allows riders to easily commute between the waterfront upper hill neighborhoods. We rode on "elevators" that were quite similar in Lisbon. In Wellington the go up and down the hill through a number of tunnels. It is such a nice ride. The cost is a bit pricey, $6 for adults, $2 for students (round trip).

We got off the cable car and walked the two blocks to the waterfront. They have developed their waterfront so that along with the shipping industry they have museums, parks, cafes and shopping in the area. We even saw school girls jumping from the docks and swimming. Many people were walking along the waterfront. It is obviously a very popular area.

We walked along the watrefront to the Te Papa Museum which is the offical museum of New Zealand, but natural and human history of the country of New Zealand. It was a really wonderful museum. We spent 4 hours at the museum. This was another venue that was free! Can you believe this?

We walked back along the waterfront, through a beautiful park. There were several fountains in this park. All along the waterfront there are pices of art that use the wind coming off the bay to add movement to the landscape. This makes such an awesome show as you walk along.

We walked back to the cable car and took it up to the top. Lindsay took us on a great tour of the Wellington Botanic Gardens ( another cost free option to do in this wonderful city). The Botanic Gardens are on the top of the hill and look down on the entire city and the bay below. BEAUTIFUL views and the gardens themselves are truly relaxing!