Wellington, New Zealand

From the moment of our arrival in Wellington we were welcomed in true Portuguese style by Tereza’s cousins’ Joe, Rita, Andrea and Daniella De Atouguia. We were collected from the airport by Joe and, an initially shy but later very vocal, Andrea. They whisked us off to their home. Tereza: “I had not seen them in about 10 years or so - it was really good to catch up. Andrea and Daniella you have the cutest Kiwi accents (sorry Andrea – I know you say you have a South African accent but I am afraid you are becoming a Kiwi).” The next day we went for lunch at the waterfront which had a fantastic out door aerial photograph display on (see the disturbing photo of the abandoned city of Pripiat near Chernobyl).

Wellington is situated on the shore of a large bay which looks like a Titan inspecting a sapphire between the tips of its tropical forest clad forefinger and thumb, with the centre of the town nestled in the crook between the Titan’s thumb and forefinger and the airport on the narrower forefinger. Marori legend considers the entire Northern Island to be a great fish with the bay as its eye. Obligingly, the bay has an island as the pupil in the middle. Humorously, locals are quick to point out that by way of comparative location, Auckland must be the asshole!

While the centre of the town has some modern high-rises and a few stately older buildings, the residential areas are generally very picturesque with neat cottage-like wooden buildings painted in soft pastels and laced with decoratively carved eves. While it has similarities to Cape Town, the weather was colder and wetter. Tereza: “Oriental Parade was one of my favourite areas - beautiful Victorian houses and modern flats clinging to the hillside with great views over the bay – apparently a very expensive area.”

Joe was an ineffable host and, between his hectic working hours doing training and auditing for Burger King, he took us all around Wellington, showing us the boat used for the King Kong Movie, the “South African” shop, the coastline and more.

Tired from our travels and lulled by the great hospitality, we took a few days to recuperate and settle in. As a result, we didn’t have the time to travel by sea and land to Queenstown and the scenic South Island and, unfortunately, it was too expensive to fly - so maybe another time. We did, however, explore Wellington and some of the walks around it.




















Exhibition in the park: Picture of Chernobyl, Ukraine