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| A self-regarding place |
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| Depiction of how the 1931 earthquake changed the landscape; almost within minutes |
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| Main street sculpture |
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| More beautiful buildings |
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| And thoughts |
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| Old theatre |
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| And thought |
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| Over in the harbor area, the old National Tobacco Co. |
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| Entry |
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| Interior |
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| Detail |
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| Additional detail |
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| All around the old town, many great old historical signs |
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| More great thoughts |
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| Napier's other beach, on Hawke's Bay, a wild surf |
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| Thus |
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| The Art Deco Centre offers film showings, walking and bus tours, and all manner of Art Deco literature, furniture, clothing, accoutrements, etc. |
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| Thus |
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| Period cars hanging around; Napier holds an annual Art Deco festival--we missed it by a couple weeks this year--a giant adult dress-up that attracts an international audience; imagine thousands of Gatbys and flappers walking around... |
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| More great old buildings |
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| Ditto |
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| Ditto |
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| Ditto again |
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| On the way out of Welly, on the west coast, Kapiti Island |
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| Along the way, in Woodville, more Art Deco, and more interesting collectibles shops |
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| In Napier, another place that adorns its boulevards with Norfolk Island Pines |
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| Napier has two big beaches, this one, beyond the port, swimmable; the other, the long sweep of Hawkes Bay, definitely not for swimming (later post) |
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| Next morning, we're exploring Napier's downtown streets |
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| The old buildings now are prized and very well cared-for |
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| Central square; we visited the Saturday farmers' market adjoining it |
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| The whole place reminded us of old Miami, specifically Miracle Mile in Coral Gables, before the high-rises... |
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| Every now and then, you look up, and there is a memorable quote on the wall of some building |
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| The streets are named after authors |
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| And Art Deco is everywhere |
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| Thus |
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| There's a national campaign on against over-inbibing, and nowhere more conspicuous than in Wellington; with booze prices such as they are, it's hard to see how anyone could afford to get drunk |
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| We've had great Thai food in places all over...Bangkok, Koh Samui, Redwood City, San Fran, Oxford, and now Wellington, at Phu Thai Esarn, a northern Thai restaurant in downtown Welly |
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| Some of the best and richest Thai flavors ever, pictured just the Tom Kha Gai and green curry; my faith in restaurants at least briefly restored; incidentally, Thai ingredients, e.g., kaffir lime leaves, galangol root, are available at larger supermarkets all over NZ; Thai restaurants easily dominate the Wellington scene, although the guidebooks we use took no notice of them whatever; NZ cuisine, bland and meats-and-potatoes a generation ago, is now fully international, with particular emphasis on Asian |
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| Interesting sculpture is all over the place |
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| There are plenty of Victorian and Art Deco specimens around, but Wellington also displays a great deal of interesting contemporary architecture; neat place! |
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| Thus; all these museums are free, I might add |
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| One floor is a sort of Wellington by the year, major developments, artifacts... |
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| Container ships are the main trade now, since the 70s |
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| Match-stick clipper |
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| Diorama of the sinking of the Wahine, a ferry that ran aground and capsized at the harbor mouth in 1968; of the 700 aboard, 50 perished; mental note for ship captains: always order "abandon ship" before the list incapacitates half your lifeboats as well as any movement on deck |
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| Photo of the Wahine; all this transpired a few hundred meters off shore, was captured on film and TV, in one of the Strait's most violent storms ever |
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| Cook Strait shipwrecks |
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| View of some of the museum |
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| From Maori settlements near Wellington |
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| 1870 wedding gown |
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| My sentiment exactly... |
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| Dragon boat racing in Wellington, March 8-9 |
