I forgot to mention in my last post that the trip from Auckland to Wellington was almost 650km.

First thing this morning I went for a walk around the quay in search of a suitable place for Mick and I to have our breakfast. It is only a few hundred metres from where we are staying.

I had expected the weather to be very windy, as that is what Wellington is well known for, but I was pleasantly surprised. However, that did not mean it was not cold.

There is actually quite a lot of street art in Wellington’s CBD – on almost every corner or in front of key buildings is a sculpture of some sort. The small alleyways that lead to steep stairs are also places to find items of interest.

This man and his dog were in the alleyway next to the one that houses the cable car – a very famous Wellington attraction. But as we had been on that with Derek and Helen in 2017, and we opted out for this stay.

There was a silent protest in support of Palestine occurring in front of this building when I walked past.

The city is filled with some lovely old buildings. And one or two of them I had to re-visit later in the day when the shops were open, just to see what was on offer of course.

Mick and I spent an hour exploring the Wellington Museum , which is very, very different to the Te Papa (New Zealand’s Museum) which we had visited before. This museum seems to be a collection of quite random pieces of memorabilia – that seem to have some link with Wellington. One section was devoted to the disaster of the Wahine – a ship that sank on a crossing from the South Island to Wellington in 1968. Fifty-one people died in that incident. The images of the ship and the size of the waves made me anxious for the rest of the day. We are on a ferry tomorrow from here going to Picton, on the South Island. I received an email yesterday from the company alerting me to some possible delays.

“This is to advise that weather is forecast to deteriorate in the Cook Strait on Saturday 11th May. Southerly gales and moderate to heavy seas are expected, which may result in delays.”

We originally were booked on a sailing at midday, but that time was changed a few weeks ago by the company. The options were changed to 8.45am and 4.15pm. We want to get to Picton before dark so I chose the earlier one. That choice is going to cost us an extra $20NZ each! Anyway, I don’t really care about that – I just hope the weather is not as bad as they have suggested.

We sat right next to that open fire and had to take off all the clothes we could while still remaining decent. We enjoyed several different red wines – and the staff kindly allowed us to taste several of of them before we made our decison. It was a great experience.

And then Mick chose a flank steak, while I had meatballs. Mick was very keen to learn how to cook and ‘plate’ flank steak. He left there thinking he had it sorted.

There was time for a little TV before we went to bed – and Mick found a TV station showing the live NRL game between Penrith and Canterbury. We both were happy.

Go Panthers!!