Monday, 27 February 2012
Mr. Alfred gets a haircut
Little Alfo has been in desperate need of a haircut lately! It's been hot and humid and the poor puppy has been pretty hot all week. His attempts at staying cool include lots of panting and moving from spot to spot on the wood floor. We decided it was time for a haircut! Andrew is his stylist from Salon Bathtub. Alfo was a trooper although he kept wanting to escape to his mom... but now he looks just Oh So Cute!
Sunday, 5 February 2012
Motueka and the Ferry to Wellington
The third part of our adventure started with a drive back to Queenstown where we had to catch a flight through Christchurch to Nelson. Here's a few photos from the drive. I can't take how pretty it is! I wish all driving from place to place was through scenery this beautiful!
When we got to Nelson we drove a little ways to quiet Motueka. Ding ding again... Dad and I stayed in Motueka last time too! We even ate at the same diner! I only have a few quick pictures from our stay in Motueka because our only full day there we went kayaking and hiking through Able Tasman National Park and I didn't want to risk my expensive camera in a kayak... I was wishing I had it with me the whole time though! We even got to kayak with seals! They literally swam under and right next to our kayaks and there were cute little seal pups playing on the rocks! I could have watched them all day but we had to get our hike on! It was a really fun day! Anyway, here's a couple of our dinner at the diner and the Equestrian lodge that we stayed in.
The next day we drove from Motueka to Picton where we caught a ferry across to Wellington. It was a rough day for me and my motion sickness. We drove a couple hours through incredibly windy mountain roads. We even went through Havelock, the muscle capital of the world! This place has muscle everything and is famous for NZ Green Lipped Muscles. Yummo! (mmm maybe not so much...) This is Havelock in the pictures below.
We then tested my stomach again on the ferry from Picton to Wellington. I did OK for the first 30 minutes and the last 30 minutes when we were in quieter water... but the middle 2 hours were a bit rocky even though the seas were forecasted as "calm".... hmmm... lucky I took motion sickness medicine which made me sleepy so I kind of passed out for those middle 2 hours when things started getting a little rough. The voila! We made it to Wellington!
Wellington was sadly, our final destination for our week long adventure. We had 2 full days there so got to do some great sightseeing! The waterfront along Wellington's coast is beautiful and offered plenty to do.
We went to the Te Papa museum where we saw an earthquake exhibit (oh yes, it included a replica house that shakes like an earthquake) along with a giant squid in the animal exhibition (it's eyes are the size of soccer balls!) and Madre and I went to see a special exhibit called Unveiled which was featured at the museum while we were there and featured 200 years of wedding fashion! (The boys amused themselves for an hour while we did this). It was pretty cool!
We explored the city a bit more and saw some cool art deco buildings and then found Cuba Street!!!!
Cuba street is just a long street of shops and restaurants but I LOVED Cuba street for a different reason... MEXICAN Food!!! Andrew and I went in search of sushi but ended up seeing a sign for the Taco Shop... being a huge fan of Mexican we went exploring down a back alley to this tiny little hidden Mexican restaurant. (We left Mom and Dad at a Deli because Madre doesn't like Sushi or Mexican!) Oh boy am I glad we found it. It was amazing! The best Mexican I think I've ever had. I was in heaven. LOVED it so much we went back the next day for lunch again! The owner and all of his staff are from Mexico City and let me tell you... if you're ever in Wellington and are in the mood for Mexican... go immediately and as often as you can to the Taco Shop! It was delicious! Here are a few pictures of the deliciousness in all it's glory. (I can hear heavenly music in my head when I think about this place... do you hear it?)
After an amazing lunch we explored a bit more before a quick rest at the hotel before dinner and our evening activities. We decided to take the cable car to the lookout which showed us all of Wellington (cute group photo!) and then we went to the planetarium where we saw a really cool space show and then got to use a really big telescope to see a planet! The telescope was really old and really big for its time and it was cool to see the planet through it but if you want more info as Andrew... for me it was lots of pretty stars in an artistic sense where all the scientific stuff made sense to him. We all had fun though and it was a great way to end the night.
Oh yes, this next photo was taken on our way back from the planetarium to show you just how quiet Wellington is at night. We ended up eating dinner that night at McDonalds because it was the ONLY place open anywhere near our hotel and this was like at 7pm or something. The streets looked like this probably about 9.30pm... deserted! There were no cars and barely anyone around!
The next day started with mom practicing her balance on the sidewalk and a big red bus tour of the city! (Yes, you may be surprised but those 2 things DO in fact go together and mom's balance practice was a frequent activity throughout OZ and NZ!) Along our travels we saw Parliament House which is a gorgeous building with lots of marble. There was also a cool house looking building next to Parliament House (with Andrew in front) but I forget what it was but it had a pretty rose garden out front dedication to Women earning the right to vote. Did you know NZ was the first country to give women the right to vote? I didn't!
Then we saw Old St. Paul's which is a beautiful old wooden church which isn't used for the public anymore. You can still get married and baptised etc in there but they don't hold services anymore. It's stunning.
Next we saw Lady Norwood Rose Garden that was part of the botanical gardens in Wellington. Tons of beautiful roses! There was also the peace garden across from the rose garden which was dedicated to NZ being a nuclear free zone. The flame in the peace garden comes from the bomb dropped on Hiroshima during WWII and was given to NZ by the Japanese in honour of their efforts to prevent the use of atomic weapons. Pretty cool!
Then we had a quick stop at the Sheepskin Warehouse where they have all sorts of beautiful woollen things and went onto Weta Caves. Weta Caves is pretty much a museum of props and characters from movies like The Hobbit, Lord of the Rings and The Adventures of Tin Tin. Andrew loved it!
Our final stop on the bus tour was at the Mt. Victoria lookout which showed us Wellington from the other side of the harbour. It really is a pretty city. We saw the airport as well and found out the Wellington has one of the world's shortest runways! Eeep!
Sadly, our adventures came to an end after a delicious last dinner with Madre and Padre. It was so much fun to have you guys in OZ and to be able to travel with you in NZ. Very special and lots of good memories. Frederick! We hope you had as much fun as we did and we're so glad you got to experience our side of the world for a little while. Thanks for making the effort to come all the way over to visit! Miss you and love you already Parentals! Heart.
When we got to Nelson we drove a little ways to quiet Motueka. Ding ding again... Dad and I stayed in Motueka last time too! We even ate at the same diner! I only have a few quick pictures from our stay in Motueka because our only full day there we went kayaking and hiking through Able Tasman National Park and I didn't want to risk my expensive camera in a kayak... I was wishing I had it with me the whole time though! We even got to kayak with seals! They literally swam under and right next to our kayaks and there were cute little seal pups playing on the rocks! I could have watched them all day but we had to get our hike on! It was a really fun day! Anyway, here's a couple of our dinner at the diner and the Equestrian lodge that we stayed in.
The next day we drove from Motueka to Picton where we caught a ferry across to Wellington. It was a rough day for me and my motion sickness. We drove a couple hours through incredibly windy mountain roads. We even went through Havelock, the muscle capital of the world! This place has muscle everything and is famous for NZ Green Lipped Muscles. Yummo! (mmm maybe not so much...) This is Havelock in the pictures below.
We then tested my stomach again on the ferry from Picton to Wellington. I did OK for the first 30 minutes and the last 30 minutes when we were in quieter water... but the middle 2 hours were a bit rocky even though the seas were forecasted as "calm".... hmmm... lucky I took motion sickness medicine which made me sleepy so I kind of passed out for those middle 2 hours when things started getting a little rough. The voila! We made it to Wellington!
Wellington was sadly, our final destination for our week long adventure. We had 2 full days there so got to do some great sightseeing! The waterfront along Wellington's coast is beautiful and offered plenty to do.
We went to the Te Papa museum where we saw an earthquake exhibit (oh yes, it included a replica house that shakes like an earthquake) along with a giant squid in the animal exhibition (it's eyes are the size of soccer balls!) and Madre and I went to see a special exhibit called Unveiled which was featured at the museum while we were there and featured 200 years of wedding fashion! (The boys amused themselves for an hour while we did this). It was pretty cool!
We explored the city a bit more and saw some cool art deco buildings and then found Cuba Street!!!!
Cuba street is just a long street of shops and restaurants but I LOVED Cuba street for a different reason... MEXICAN Food!!! Andrew and I went in search of sushi but ended up seeing a sign for the Taco Shop... being a huge fan of Mexican we went exploring down a back alley to this tiny little hidden Mexican restaurant. (We left Mom and Dad at a Deli because Madre doesn't like Sushi or Mexican!) Oh boy am I glad we found it. It was amazing! The best Mexican I think I've ever had. I was in heaven. LOVED it so much we went back the next day for lunch again! The owner and all of his staff are from Mexico City and let me tell you... if you're ever in Wellington and are in the mood for Mexican... go immediately and as often as you can to the Taco Shop! It was delicious! Here are a few pictures of the deliciousness in all it's glory. (I can hear heavenly music in my head when I think about this place... do you hear it?)
After an amazing lunch we explored a bit more before a quick rest at the hotel before dinner and our evening activities. We decided to take the cable car to the lookout which showed us all of Wellington (cute group photo!) and then we went to the planetarium where we saw a really cool space show and then got to use a really big telescope to see a planet! The telescope was really old and really big for its time and it was cool to see the planet through it but if you want more info as Andrew... for me it was lots of pretty stars in an artistic sense where all the scientific stuff made sense to him. We all had fun though and it was a great way to end the night.
Oh yes, this next photo was taken on our way back from the planetarium to show you just how quiet Wellington is at night. We ended up eating dinner that night at McDonalds because it was the ONLY place open anywhere near our hotel and this was like at 7pm or something. The streets looked like this probably about 9.30pm... deserted! There were no cars and barely anyone around!
The next day started with mom practicing her balance on the sidewalk and a big red bus tour of the city! (Yes, you may be surprised but those 2 things DO in fact go together and mom's balance practice was a frequent activity throughout OZ and NZ!) Along our travels we saw Parliament House which is a gorgeous building with lots of marble. There was also a cool house looking building next to Parliament House (with Andrew in front) but I forget what it was but it had a pretty rose garden out front dedication to Women earning the right to vote. Did you know NZ was the first country to give women the right to vote? I didn't!
Then we saw Old St. Paul's which is a beautiful old wooden church which isn't used for the public anymore. You can still get married and baptised etc in there but they don't hold services anymore. It's stunning.
Next we saw Lady Norwood Rose Garden that was part of the botanical gardens in Wellington. Tons of beautiful roses! There was also the peace garden across from the rose garden which was dedicated to NZ being a nuclear free zone. The flame in the peace garden comes from the bomb dropped on Hiroshima during WWII and was given to NZ by the Japanese in honour of their efforts to prevent the use of atomic weapons. Pretty cool!
Then we had a quick stop at the Sheepskin Warehouse where they have all sorts of beautiful woollen things and went onto Weta Caves. Weta Caves is pretty much a museum of props and characters from movies like The Hobbit, Lord of the Rings and The Adventures of Tin Tin. Andrew loved it!
Our final stop on the bus tour was at the Mt. Victoria lookout which showed us Wellington from the other side of the harbour. It really is a pretty city. We saw the airport as well and found out the Wellington has one of the world's shortest runways! Eeep!
Sadly, our adventures came to an end after a delicious last dinner with Madre and Padre. It was so much fun to have you guys in OZ and to be able to travel with you in NZ. Very special and lots of good memories. Frederick! We hope you had as much fun as we did and we're so glad you got to experience our side of the world for a little while. Thanks for making the effort to come all the way over to visit! Miss you and love you already Parentals! Heart.
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