Morning on Feb 5 came and we hit the hotel’s buffet for breakfast. After getting fueled, we headed over to the Wellington Zoo to see the sights.

The zoo was awesome. The walk through it wasn’t too bad, but it was beautiful. The gardening was nice, the animal enclosures looked nice, and we actually got to see a lot of the animals. We saw gibbons, tamarinds, baboons, chimps, giraffe’s, a zebra, an ostrich, dingo’s, otters a meerkat, and lots more. The one animal I was really wanting to see was the Red Panda, which is a relative of the raccoon. They are also nicknamed firefox 🙂 Alas I caught a glimpse of one scurrying through the bush, and never got to actually see it.

Below is a Malayan Sun Bear, also called a honey bear. Gorgeous animals that seem very curious.

The zoo had a bunch of hilarious signs like this scattered throughout the zoo.  This was my favorite. Another good one was “If you feed the animals they will get sick and may die.”.

The giraffe enclosure was my favorite. Their were three giraffes there, and the way their pen was set up, they could get close to you. Very close to you.

We had lunch at the zoo. Sox and Sprout had hotdogs, and I found a panini in the cafe (I didn’t feel like anything on the menu inside the zoo). Sox was a little surprised at the color of her hotdog. Sprout found a new favorite juice drink too!

Feb 4 we drove from Napier to Wellington. The drive was beautiful, and it was interesting to see that all of a sudden the hills were green and not brown. We crossed some rain threshold along the way that was quite striking.

We stopped only a couple times, one of them being in Dannevirke for lunch. Other than that, we drove straight through.

Sox drove for quite a while as my mind needed a bit of a rest. Wouldn’t you know it, she got to drive this crazy, steep, windy, switch back pass that had very tiny lanes and lots of faster traffic. I was jealous she got to drive it. The hillsides were very steep, and extremely dense and lush. Scattered throughout the hillsides were really cool looking palm trees that are native to New Zealand.

Once we got into Wellington, the havoc began. It was raining kind of hard, and we were having trouble finding the street signs on the roads. There was a lot of traffic, and there were lots of one way streets at odd angles to other streets. It made for a difficult time navigating. We made it though, dropped our stuff, and set off for a bit of a walk.

We were staying on Cuba street and they have what they call a mall, essentially a pedestrian only area. We walked through here a bit taking in the sights (the rain had stopped).

Sprout was tired, so he was riding on my shoulders. A local person saw him and his face lit up. He looked up at Sprout, put his hand up, and in a loud voice said “Gimme five!”. I could feel Sprout try to shrink as much as possible. Not what that tired boy needed.

Kiwi’s are definitely very nice people. There are no problems asking for directions, or even starting up conversations. Makes traveling here a lot easier.

For dinner we decided on The Flying Burrito Brothers. It was an excellent mexican restaurant that we all thoroughly enjoyed.

After dinner it was time for the kids to bath and get to bed.

Surprisingly we got the kids to sleep at a reasonable time.

Here is Sprout sleeping on the bed next to Sox and I.

Final note. For a hotel called the Quality Hotel, that billed itself as new, we certainly found a lot of dirt, bad workmanship, and it was less than ideal for us due to the lack of a separate bedroom. Our tub was also missing the drain plug, and we had to call the front desk to get one brought up. I compare this stay to the one we had in St Catherines. The St Catherines hotel was much better set up for people travelling with kids.

Back on Feb 3 Sox and the kids were at the pool which allowed me an hour of so to do some exploring of downtown Napier. I had about an hour, and I managed a really nice walk, some shopping, some exploring, and even time to sit and enjoy a coffee. It was lovely. The weather here has been spectacular to say the least. I keep hearing reports from home on the weather. Last I heard it was 7° and raining. Here a cold had is low 20’s.

I am loving the coffee here, and haven’t had a bad one yet (except the one I made recently). At home I do love a good Starbucks Coffee, but with the plethora of excellent coffee shops, I can say that I haven’t been tempted in the least to visit a Starbucks.

Napier has interesting architecture too.  There is a lot of Art Deco buildings here due to their ability to withstand earthquakes.  Apparently during the big earthquake in 1931 lots of the Art Deco buildings survived quite well. There is even an art deco festival here.

Back from a 3 day trip to Wellington. We probably drove close to 1000 km’s for the trip, and it was fun. I am sorting the pictures still, and will post more about it later, but it was exhausting. Lots packed in, and our hotel room was just that, a room. All one room for the four of us meant Sox and I didn’t get to sleep all that well.

Today the Foxes set out on their own. We wanted to do a cheese tasting at Te Mata Cheese Company, and a wine tasting at Clearview Winery.

At the cheese place there were 6 cheeses we tried. 1 Sheep’s milk 2 Brie, and 3 Blue. All of them were pretty amazing. The Blue’s were especially good, particularly for a Blue cheese. The taste was there, but it wasn’t as strong. It is hard to explain, but I really, really liked it, which surprised me. The Brie’s were awesome, and one of them was on sale: 2 half wheels for $1 NZD. Yum.

After the tasting we had some coffee and snacks.

A short drive later we were at Clearview. This winery is across the road from the ocean, and had very nice grounds. There was a playground for kids which was nice and a nice outdoor restaurant.

The tastings were good too. This was the first time I had done a wine tasting and it was an experience. I liked being able to try different styles of wines one after another to get a good feel for what I like. Theirs were all excellent and many of them were award winning wines.

Lunch there was excellent. I had a marinated lamb loin that was amazing. Sox had the fish special which was Groper. The only downside was that our food took a long time to come which meant the kids got a little cranky. I would have liked to enjoy things a little more, but that’s life.

I committed a sin though. With lunch I had a beer and not wine. It was an excellent beer. Even though I had just discovered some wines I liked, I couldn’t pick one so I went with a local beer, an amber ale from Hawkes Bay Independant Brewery. It was an excellent beer.

The sunset last night was pretty amazing. I will let the pictures speak for themselves.

As I mentioned earlier today, it was smoking hot. We went to a farmers market today to get some produce and to see some more of the area. It was a gorgeous location. Ringed with trees, there was plenty of shade. There were some performers who had beautiful voices. There was lots of nice looking produce, meat, coffee, and ice creams too. It was fun to poke around, sample some of the wares, take some pictures, and people watch.

In the back there was a pond, and Elliot and I checked it out. There were lots of kids there looking in. It took me a few minutes to figure out what they were looking at. Eels. The pond had eels, and as we learned later, the rivers have eels in them too.

After the market we came home and had some lunch. We were still trying to get to Waipatiki beach, but decided to do something closer. Waipatiki had really hot sand last time they went, but this time it was hotter. We didn’t really want to chance it. While Amy napped I stayed at the house and the rest of the gang drove to Ahuriri beach again (I think).

Apparently my visit to the video store last night was a typical kiwi experience.

I borrowed the membership card to the video place and went to grab a movie. I made my selection then headed to the counter. I handed over the movie, and the card, and started getting some money out.

The clerk slid across a pin pad which I thought was odd. Then he looked at me and asked me to enter the pin. This was a bit of information that I didn’t know.

I told him I was borrowing the card. He asked me for the address, so I gave it. It was not the address that was used when the account was created (Sue’s family here has moved once). He then asked for the phone number. Didn’t know that. He then asked for Sue’s brother in law’s birthdate. Still stumped.

At this point I was getting prepared to hear him say he wouldn’t/couldn’t rent to me. Back home they wouldn’t have tried this hard at all. Don’t know the pin, too bad. He was poking around in the computer, then looks up at me and says, “I’ll enter the pin for you this time.”

I thanked him, handed over the cash, retrieved the movie and headed back to the place. He totally bent over backwards to help me rent the movie.

The movie was Hancock, and it was just so-so.

The other evening Sox and I went for an evening stroll. We walked around the neighbourhood, and ended up at the estuary. There is a nice boardwalk there with a few totem poles that were decorated which I was not able to get a good picture of. The sunset colors looked like they were really going to take off, then they stalled and fizzled. Too bad.

Just before I left, one of my coworkers warned me that the coffee here in New Zealand was pretty bad. She mentioned that it was pretty much all instant coffee.

I was pleasantly surprised to learn that in recent years Kiwi’s have embraced coffee. In fact, most coffee you order is an espresso drink. The lingo is a lot different than home though.

I first noticed coffee at the Auckland airport. In the domestic terminal there were three places that served coffee (one a Dunkin Donuts cart), and all of them were espresso. I was stymied by the drink menu, so I ordered a plain espresso since I recognized what the name was. It was delicious.

At the place we are staying, the coffee they buy is amazing. So rich and flavourful. I may bring some home with me.

I’ve had coffee out a couple times and have learned that what I need to order is a long black. This is essentially an Americano. Sometimes it is just an espresso in a big cup with a side of hot water so you can dilute it to your taste.

Another drink that is very common is the flat white. This is coffee with a lot of milk. It sounds similar to a latte, but isn’t, since that is also usually on the menu.

Point is, New Zealand coffee rocks!