Taupo to Wellington via the East Coast

The road from Taupo to Napier was mountainous and more heavily forested than I expected, not that I knew much about the road to start with. The road was quite rugged in places and I missed a turn off to a lookout that I think would have provided some awesome views. There was nowhere to turn around, so there was nothing else to do but continue on.

Napier is a pretty little place set around the coastline. The houses are very quaint and have a Spanish influence following a weather event that almost wiped them off the map many years ago. I enjoyed soaking up the views as I had a late lunch at a little place on the beach.

Half an hour on from Napier is Hastings where I had a room booked for the night. Hastings is not on the coastline as Napier is and I was wishing I'd booked at Napier rather than Hastings, even though Hastings is a little bigger. 

The place I stayed was in easy walking distance to a supermarket and during a drive that evening I came across a Humanity Book Store. It was probably a good thing that it was closed otherwise I may have come home with an extra heavy suitcase.

It was a somewhat noisy night with a bunch of rowdy people staying in a few rooms nearby. They eventually quietened down around midnight, then were up bright and early at 6 am for a rather noisy pack and departure! 

I headed off around the same time (if you can't beat 'em, join 'em type of thinking), heading towards Wellington. It was a brisk 2 degrees with ice on the windscreen and a very heavy fog for the first part of the journey.

I saw some of those snow capped mountains that I always enjoy and an abundance of farm animals along the way, including some very curious chooks.

Again, parts of the road were mountainous, heavily forested with steep winding roads, particularly the last 60 km's of the drive. I would have loved to have taken some pics, however, there wasn't too many places you could pull over. I managed to get a couple but it seems there was some operator error with the camera and the pics weren't great.

Wellington seems to be an appealing city as I drove in and I enjoyed a little drive about while I found where I was meant to be. It was very windy that day so I was hoping that the wind would die down overnight before I had to get on the inter-islander ferry the next morning!

 I was staying by the waterfront and thought it would make a beautifully scenic walk, however, I didn't get too far due to a rather icy wind!

I spent a couple of hours at Te Papa Museum and thoroughly enjoyed some of their displays. They had a skeleton of a blue sperm whale on a colossal giant squid on display.  This thing was absolutely massive and the beak on it was flat out scary! There was information about the earthquakes in NZ, plus a room you could go into and experience the simulation of an earthquake.

I liked Wellington and it's another place I wouldn't mind coming back to. I also had the pleasure of catching up with a former work colleague for dinner that night. I hadn't seen her for around 4-5 years, so it was fantastic to catch up and hear what she'd been doing. Ironically she'd been at a conference at the Museum for the day, meaning we were in the same building for a couple of hours without realising.

After dinner it was off to bed ready for an early start to catch the ferry from the North Island to the South Island.