Some friends in Wellington

After a couple of really relaxing nights in Palmy, we journeyed south again for our second visit to Wellington. Although we had spent a night here before, it wasn't the most enjoyable time, so we were looking forward to seeing the city in a better light this time around. My old workmate Simon had very kindly offered to put us up for a couple of nights, so we followed his directions and found a parking space in the city centre so he could meet us after work. I was a bit nervous about driving into the centre, having been warned about the bad traffic and confusing one-way system, but it all went smoothly. Simon made things a lot easier for me by taking over behind the wheel on the way back to his house, and detoured via Victoria Mount to give us a good overview of the whole city. I stupidly forgot to take my camera out of the car as we walked up to the peak, so I've got no photos, but we were able to see a lot and it was a good way to grasp the layout of the whole place.

Simon and his wife Gilly were heading out for dinner, so they gave us direction to a very nice restaurant, One Red Dog, and I enjoyed the novelty of a pizza topped with crocodile and coconut while Skry stuck to the vegetarian options. After dinner, we returned to the house and spent some time chatting before bed. The next day, Gilly took us on a driving tour of the bays, telling us a little bit about the history of the area and pointing out the most interesting sights (including "Lord of the Rings" director Peter Jackson's house), before dropping us off at the main museum, Te Papa. I had planned to meet another friend there, Katy, who arrived with her two toddlers, and we sat chatting in the cafe for an hour or so before going upstairs to the exhibits. Due to the amount of chat and playing with the kids, we didn't see all the exhibits, but we did get to try out the Earthquake House, a little house built to simulate what it feels like to be in an earthquake. Wellington is built on a fault line, so this is something with which most people here are already familiar, but it was exciting/scary for us.

After a lovely afternoon with Katy and her family, and a stop in Starbucks for refreshments, Skry and I took the bus back to Simon's house (pausing only to admire the government building, which is made of wood but looks like it's made of stone, and to imitate another statue). Back at the house,we learned that we had actually slept through an earthquake last night! It was 4.0 on the Richter scale, which isn't enough to cause any damage, but it does explain why I was dreaming about earthquakes and why Skry woke up in the early hours and couldn't get back to sleep.

The next day was an unexpected full day in Wellington, because we weren't able to get onto the earlier ferries and had to wait until the 8pm sailing back to Picton. Gilly dropped Skry off at a nature reserve, and I spent the afternoon in the shops - only window shopping, since we don't have any spare cash for proper spending, but it was still nice to get some time to myself for girly pursuits. The plan was to meet Skry at 4.30pm, but he had some trouble with buses and it was nearly six before we got ourselves onto the bus back to the house. Because of this, it was a bit of a rush to get our stuff packed up, say goodbye, and get ourselves to the ferry on time, but we made it and had an uneventful crossing. Arriving in Picton in the pouring rain at nearly midnight was a bit daunting, but Skry was confident that he could drive through the night, so we filled up the petrol tank and headed for Christchurch, arriving at 4.45am. It was a strange experience driving in the pitch black, with almost no company on the roads except for some lorries, and the rain made it quite grim, but everything worked out fine and we collapsed into bed in Christchurch before the sun had come up.