A few days ago, there was some discussion on a Cruise Ship forum I participate in, and the question was asked “When our ship docks in Wellington, what things should we do?” The most consistent answers were the Te Papa museum, and the Wellington Cable Car. Strictly speaking, however, Wellington doesn’t have a cable car…
This week’s theme is U – for Undulations. For Saturday, it’s a sleepy New Zealand seaside site. Dolphins with droopy dorsal fins; earthquake-damage apologies; French street signs; frigid teal waters; rose gardens; mosaic galleries – we’re talking about Akaroa, on New Zealand’s South Island. The town is on the Banks Peninsula in the Canterbury…
Today’s ‘Undulations’ are in New Zealand’s Fiordland National Park. The region, on the southwest of the Southern Island of New Zealand, features three main sounds: Doubtful, Dusky and Milford – each of which has deeply gouged fiord valleys – remnants of the glaciers which have dominated the area for millennia. There are few roads .. in…
Sound shells at seaside resorts aren’t new – they are as old as the holiday trade – but Napier’s sound shell looks more California than Clacton-on-sea. That’s because this, like much of the New Zealand town, was built in the Art Deco style after the 1931 Hawkes Bay earthquake. It was built by the Thirty Thousand…
If you grew up in Australia or New Zealand (or the UK, or many Commonwealth countries) chances are you are familiar with the BBC show “Till Death Do Us Part starring Warren Mitchell as Alf Garnett. But if you were in the US, the equivalent show was All In The Family – which featured “Archie…
I’ve mentioned in earlier posts this week that Napier’s Art Deco architecture is the result of the town being wiped out by an earthquake in 1931, and the decision to rebuild in the aspirational, modernistic style. I also mentioned that the reason New Zealand gets so many earthquakes is that it sits on the…
The Pania reef, or Napier Breakwater, is a reef in Hawkes Bay New Zealand – and the subject of a statue on Napier’s Marine Parade. The story goes that Pania was a mermaid who lived with her people in Hawkes Bay – but who each night would emerge onto land at a stream which flows through…
This week’s travel theme is N for Napier – and for Wednesday, its a lovely church in the heart of the town. It is “The Waiapu Cathedral of Saint John the Evangelist, Napier” – which is quite a mouthful! It is more often referred to as “Waiapu Cathedral”, “St John’s Cathedral”, or “Napier Cathedral” ……
Napier, New Zealand, is world renowned for its Art Deco buildings – it has such a smorgasbord of structures on display that it could take days just to photograph them. But WHY does Napier have so many? From tragedy rises beauty. One of New Zealand’s nicknames is “The Shaky Isles” – because it sits on the boundary of…
This week’s travel theme is N for Napier, a city on New Zealand’s North Island, most noted for its extensive array of Art Deco buildings. And one of the first places to catch the eye of tourists is the Masonic Hotel, right on the waterfront of this seaside town. It is the third iteration of…
Cairns Communications 