Wellington, New Zealand
Wellington is a four-hour drive south of Tongariro National Park, which is where we woke up on Christmas Eve. For most of the drive, we passed through beautiful countryside and farmland, spotting cattle, sheep, goat, alpaca, deer, and horse farms. We popped in at a small café in the tiniest little town you can imagine—“Bulls,” which made every effort possible to make a pun about cattle (“this café is unbelieva-BULL”). After lunch, our car zoomed across several smaller mountainsides and eventually wound its way to the West Coast, where I shouted in glee upon seeing the Tasman Sea, which spans between Western New Zealand and Australia.
About an hour from Wellington, Matt and I made a pit stop at Queen Elizabeth Park, which was used in shooting several battle scenes in Lord of the Rings. Importantly, too, the park sits right on the beach overlooking Kapiti Island, a small wildlife reserve in the Tasman Sea. We stopped under a pohutukawa tree and watched riders race horses down the beach and boats make their ways to and from Kapiti Island.
When we finally arrived in Wellington, we were greeted with sun, clear skies, and wind. Wellington is the capital city of New Zealand, sitting at the southernmost tip of the North Island. The city rests in a large harbor connected to the Cook Strait, which is the open ocean between the North and South Island. Because it is a port city, Wellington acts as a direct connection to the South Island, ferrying in loads of people each day on the absolutely enormous Interislander ferry, which takes about 3.5 hours to cross the Cook Strait to the South Island town of Picton. It makes this journey to and fro several times a day, carrying passengers, cars, and shipping containers.
To the people of New Zealand, Wellington carries the monikers “culture capital” and “windy Wellington.” We quickly found out why. The gales were so strong even on that first beautiful, sunny day that they made it hard to drive straight down the road. Getting out of the car was like exiting a building during a tornado.
We arrived at our hotel around 5pm, which overlooked the city and harbor below, and were greeted by the friendliest desk clerk in existence. He soon became a fast friend, giving us two complimentary tickets to the bar once we explained that it was our honeymoon.
Although we’d just arrived in Wellington, it was already dinnertime, so we took a quick walk down the road to Cuba Street, Wellington’s famous restaurant and shopping area. (On the walk, we just happened to spot this beautiful Maine Coon perched in the bushes near our hotel, and he was so pleased to get a few head rubs from us).
Although Cuba Street is named after the man who founded it, and has nothing to do with the country of Cuba whatsoever, the restaurateurs have picked up on Cuban vibes, so there were a lot of Cuban food options on the street.
Along with Cuban food, there was a ton of great international food—Indian, Mexican, Japanese, Chinese, Irish, Thai. With the wind raging around us, Matt and I decided it was time to warm up our bones with a little bit of pho from a Thai restaurant, and I’m so glad we did. Look how delicious this was:
After dinner, we strolled around the city leisurely to get a feel for it, stopping at the harbor to look at the boats and ferries, and scoping out the museums and art galleries around us. Since it was Christmas Eve, the city was slowly closing down around us. We popped in a few stores, and were thrilled to hear Christmas carols in the street and to see a live Christmas band touring the town in an open moving truck, playing music as they drove along.
Once it got dark, we headed home, where we opened Christmas crackers that we had bought at a grocery store in Auckland. We donned our Christmas cracker hats as we ate snacks and watched a good movie, exhausted from a full day of driving and sightseeing.
