Windy Welly

It's been a few days since our last update (sorry!) but we've been on the move pretty much every day so it's been hard to find time (I know, wah wah such a hard life we lead, haha).

Anyway, here's what we've been up to over the last few days...

About halfway through our NZ stay we realized that 3 weeks is nowhere near enough time to see this place.  You could spend 3 weeks on just one of the islands and still not see it all.  We've agreed that when we come back (and we will be coming back!) that we'll need 5-6 weeks minimum to do it right.

1am bus rides are no fun

So, pressed for time with a lot of ground to still cover, we decided to get the 1am bus from Taupo and head south to Wellington.  By taking the overnight bus we saved a few bucks on accomodation for the night which was a bonus.  The downside was that the bus was packed and it was pretty tough to get any sleep.  Nonetheless we arrived in Wellington at around 8am in the morning not very bright-eyed but pretty bushy tailed and ready to see the sights.  Our plan was to spend just the day in Wellington before catching the 6:30pm ferry across to the South Island and staying the night in the little port town of Picton.

According to our Loney Planet guidebook, Wellington has a lively cafe scene which was handy as we were in dire need of some caffiene so we decided to look for a spot to grab a coffee and a bite to eat.  We found a great little place called Espresso Republic on Featherston Street that had an eggs, bacon and toast special for $6 (that's a steal in NZ!).  It wasn't the best day weather wise - Wellington is often referred to as "Windy Welly" due to the strong winds the city often gets - so we decided to skip the popular cable car ride and headed straight to the National Museum, Te Papa.  Admission to the museum is free so we didn't have to pull any funny business like we did in Auckland.  The exhibits in the museum were all great although pretty random.  They had everything from Maori history and culture to penguins, birds and whales.  The strangest thing though was a 20 minute "show" that featured what appeared to be random video clips of daily life in New Zealand through the years.  It was set in an old antique shop (or something similar) and in addition to the clips we were treated to lots of different objects moving around and making noises (think Disney's "It's a Small World" ride but on a much, much smaller and less creepy scale). 

After the museum we treated ourselves to a curry at Little India on Cuba Street.  Delicious and a nice change from the usual PB & J.  We spent the rest of the afternoon walking around the city and taking in the sights before heading to the harbour to catch the ferry.

 

Jeremy, look what we found in Wellington!