24 Dec 2003 - 4th day in New Zealand - Arrive Wellington
1604
- I'm safely tucked away up in hotel room 1901 of the
Hotel Grand Chancellor - James Cook. The
room looks out towards the harbor and the view is quite beautiful.
I
arrived here about 1130 and after we arranged where to park my Campervan, they
checked me in. It turns out that the height of my vehicle precluded
it from entering their parking garage so they parked it on the sidewalk out
front. That made me feel rather special!
The hotel is on a street called "The Terrace". I suppose it has that name because it runs parallel to the main city streets and it situated above them up the side of a hill which backs downtown Wellington.
Here are some photos from the street in front, the lobby and out the window of my room:
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| My room | Another of my room | View from the window | A Wellington bus |
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| Across the street & up the hill | The Terrace looking left | Hotel lobby |
Thus far, I've been for a walk to locate a public high speed Internet connection. It is about six blocks away and it is $4NZ/hr which seems very reasonable. The hotel offers a "CafeNET" wireless service in the lobby (ground floor) and the piano bar (floor 16) but it will be 10 MBs rather than 100MBs and I suspect it'll be more than $4NZ/hr. They also allow you to connect analog from your room but that would be 56K - yuck! The six block walk will be worth it.
I've also been down to the restaurant and had their buffet for lunch. I read most of the essay by Daniel Dennett in The New Humanists over lunch. I think I'm going to like him.
During my search for the Internet connection, I walked quite a ways through downtown Wellington. It is a busy place with everyone Christmas shopping. Everything it clean and dense. Lots of three-dimensionality as the whole area is built on a slope. Sometimes, you enter spaces between buildings which turn into small nooks with shops and statues. it is all quite magical and fun. The weather has improved. It has stopped raining and it is about 70-75 outside with partial overcast. I've heard Wellington is a windy city because of its proximity to the Cooks Straights and I think it is so. Later, I'll go out and shoot some candid shots of people and bustle on the streets.
I had a long talk with Sharon after several days from here in the room. We worked on the phone to get her E-mail up and running again. It's been off since this morning for some reason. It is the 23rd there and today is Christmas Eve, the 24th here.
Well, let's go back and catch up on this morning and all that transpired before I arrived in Wellington.
I awoke at 0600 again (I always seem to wake up a 0600!). I'd had some strange dreams probably because I'd had two Tui beers and a bowl of ice cream at the pub in Himatangi last night.
After I rose and put the van into daytime order, I had a bowl of Musilex, some fruit juice and a cup of coffee and then decided to go for a walk down to the beach since it wasn't pouring at the moment.
Himatangi is a small community at the end of a road branched of the main highway 1. Maybe 60 houses and few businesses are here. It has been a slow place but the locals told me last night that people from Wellington are beginning to discover it for summer homes and prices are going up. Here are the photos I shot this morning of the beach, the town and some real estate sale posters
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| Himatangi Beach | And another | Tuft grasses by the beach | Drift wood |
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| Real Estate offerings | More offerings | Himatangi's main street |
The folks who ran the motor part were very nice - Dennis and Margaret Penney. They told me that one can lease a lot in their park for $1200NZ/yr and park a trailer there all year. You cannot live there all year but you can be there much of the time. People build attachments onto their trailers and make them semi-permanent and come down to enjoy their "Bach" summers and weekends. These motor parks are quite common in New Zealand and the "Himatangi Beach Motor Camp" was, I believe, quite typical. Each spot has electrical you can plug into. Cost is typically $9 to $12NZ/night. The park generally has bathrooms, showers, a laundry and a cooking area in a common area to be shared by all guests. The Himatangi park also had a trampoline and game room. Some photos:
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| Entry to the Himatangi Beach Motor Camp | Common kitchen | Common kitchen |
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| A typical 'Bach' | Trampoline and more 'Bachs' | Managers - Dennis & Margaret Penney |
After leaving Himatangi, it was a beautiful drive to Wellington. I'm comfortable now with driving on the left side so I'm better able to see what I'm driving through. There are lot's of interesting towns everywhere you go - anyone of which would be worth a stop to walk the downtown and snoop the 2nd hand stores. But, this morning, I wanted to get to Wellington and get checked into my hotel so that I could start my 'city' adventure.
I shot a few pictures along the way to Wellington but they were digital movies so putting them up on the site will have to wait. Hopefully, this afternoon, at the Internet pace, I can download a nice QuickTime Viewer so I can see some of the movies I've been shooting.
1700 - The radio here's just announced that the roads leading north from Wellington are crowded and that people should consider planning for delays if they are heading that way. Indeed, I saw the traffic going north as I came in. That was the first and only time I've seen a road here in New Zealand looking even remotely crowded. These folks are all heading for those 'Bachs' out in the rural areas.
Highway 1 runs next to the ocean on your right for awhile as you come south and that was a particularly scenic bit as the weather was still stormy and the seas were high just to the side of the highway.
But the road shifts around and I was surprised to see that one enters Wellington from its eastern side with the arc of the bay all stretched around in front of you so that the full city is visible.
Before I knew it, I was into the city proper and I jumped off into the city streets from Highway 1. About then, I realized (Sharon will, I'm sure, say this is 'typical') that I hadn't bothered to note the name of my hotel or the street it was on yet. Mmmm.... And traffic was heavy and dense and parking was small and at a premium. I drove and headed uphill for a mile or two before a convenient place to stop and turn around presented itself.
Once stopped, I pulled out my map of Wellington and my hotel reservation and I could see that I needed to get to '147 The Terrace'. Confident, I would chance across Terrace if I headed in that general direction, I leapt into the traffic again. Close and tight with pedestrians and one way streets. It was very good that I was comfortable with driving on the left or I would have no tension deficit <a small pun>.
At one point, I found myself on Featherstone and I knew The Terrace was just up the hill to the right. So, I picked out a light several ahead that I planned to turn right at so I could sweep back down the length of The Terrace and not enter it in the middle and not know which way the hotel was; left or right. When I got to the light, it was one way the wrong way and then Featherstone turned left itself and went some distance before it offered another right turn. Bummer, I was badly out of position and now I'd lost The Terrance again.
Up another big hill again I went looking for a place to turn around (not too easy in a left hand drive vehicle while is hard to see behind). Finally, I made the reversal and headed back town trolling again for The Terrace in a groping way. Finally, I came across it and turned onto it. I checked the numbers and yes, the hotel was in front of me a few blocks on the right.
When I got to the hotel, it was in a very dense area and the parking garage was on its near side so I was by it before I could turn in. Probably best anyway as the van is 2.7 meters high and I suspected the garage would accept it. So, down The Terrance and another complex turn around maneuver and this time I pulled in where the valets meet you and asked one of them where I might park. And that's the story of how it turns out that I am parked right on the sidewalk in front of the hotel.
1815 - Just got back from a second walk. The streets are vastly different. Most shops are now closed and most of the people on the street are gone as well. Sharon said that she's going to see the new Lord of the Rings movie on Christmas day with some of our friends so I think I'll go see it tonight. It is playing close by at 7 PM.
2330 - I went and saw "The Lord of the Rings - The Return of the King". A wonderful story well told of the victory of good over evil. Towards the end of the movie, after I'd been deeply lost in the story, I started thinking how magical and special it was and then I realized with surprise how very magical and improbable it is that I'm sitting here in a movie theater in Wellington, New Zealand on Christmas Eve watching this.
I doubt that there are many safer cities of this size in the English speaking world. I can't cite any statistics - I just feel it. Certainly, we have neighborhood or areas that feel like this but this sense of pervasive social order seems to exist virtually everywhere here. Oh, I've seen an exception but it was pretty isolated.