So There I Was…

I’m in Wanganui now, a couple of hours northwest of Wellington. It’s a great town with lots of history. The Whanganui River runs through town and Wanganui is one of the oldest towns in New Zealand. (Yes, the town is spelled with a “W” and the river is spelled with the original spelling of “Wh.” You can thank the English for that.)

I arrived here on Wednesday afternoon after hitching a ride from Opunake. Getting a ride turned out to be pretty easy, considering that Opunake is off the beaten track and doesn’t get much traffic. I only had to wait about 20 minutes for a ride, getting a lift from a Samoan guy named Shane who lives in Opunake and is a sales rep for a school supply company. He was up on the Surf Highway calling on a school and was on his way back to Wanganui when he picked me up. It was about an hour and a half ride to Wanganui, and he dropped me off at the local visitors center where I got my bearings and booked a backpackers for Wednesday and Thursday night. I stayed at a place called the Tamara Backpackers Lodge which was really great. I got a good bed, not a bunk, for only $19 NZ a night. The host, Rory, was very friendly and knows a lot about the area. He gave me a map and pointed out all the places to see in Wanganui. After checking in I walked downtown to browse the shops and pick up some groceries. I spent Wednesday evening relaxing and visiting with some of the other travelers.

I got up Thursday morning with the plan to see as much of the town as possible. I started at Cooks Gardens, a local sports stadium and the place where Peter Snell broke the world record for the mile back in 1962. Back then the track was grass, and it has since been replaced with a new artificial track surface. After Cooks Gardens I walked back downtown and visited the Whanganui Regional Museum and Sarjeants Gallery. The museum had a lot of great Maori exhibits, as the Whanganui region has a very strong Maori history. Sarjeants Gallery was a very nice art gallery with three great exhibits. One neo-classical, another of Whanganui inspired art, and a third of modern art.

After seeing the museum and gallery, I stopped to grab a kebab for lunch then headed across the river to Durie Hill. Atop Durie Hill is a War Memorial from which you can view the entire city, as well as the Tasman Sea, and on a clear day you can see the surrounding mountains. (Unfortunately, it was cloudy yesterday so the mountains were not visible.) In 1919, an elevator was built to carry people from Durie Hill down to the river and town below. Access to the elevator is through a long tunnel in the side of the hill, and for $1 you can ride the elevator to the top. Nowadays, there are also stairs to the top of the hill, but I opted to take the elevator up and walk the stairs back down. After riding to the top of the hill, I climbed the 176 steps to the top of the war memorial. The views of the city and river were indeed great. After walking back down to the bottom of the hill, I followed the river bank back to the backpackers, walking through Kowhai park on the way. The riverbank has about 5 miles of paths that loop around both sides of the river. It reminds me a lot of Eugene in that way.

After returning to the backpackers, I spent an hour or so chilling out, and then set off again to walk to Virgina Lake, a man-made lake at the other edge of town. Rory had shown me a route to take that went through one of the several parks in town, and along the way I passed a Deer Sanctuary. The Peat Park Deer Sanctuary had probably a couple of dozen deer, including one Buck that looked to have at least a three or four point rack. Unfortunately, it was now dusk and I wasn’t able to get off a good shot. (With the camera, that is.) After walking about ten more minutes I finally arrived at Virginia Lake. The path around the lake takes about 25 minutes to walk and I saw several ducks, geese, and swans (?) swiming in the lake. It was obvious that they were very used to having people around as they followed me around expecting me to feed them. The lake also has a small fountain in the middle, which at night is lit up with multi-colored lights, as are the surrounding trees.

The walk to the lake and back took about an hour, after which I cooked dinner and enjoyed a couple glasses of wine before calling it a night. I awoke early this morning to do some laundry and re-pack my bag before checking out of the backpackers. I spent the day relaxing, and watched “The Terminal” in the backpackers lounge. I’m catching a bus this evening to Wellington where I’ll spend a couple of nights before taking the ferry across Cooks Strait to the South Island on Sunday afternoon. I’m anxious to get to the South Island since I only have two and half weeks left in New Zealand before heading out to Australia.

Cooks Garden and the Wanganui Opera House

Women rule the country in New Zealand. The Brick building is the “Ladies Room.” (The men’s room is the little white building down the block.)

Anyone for some lamb brains?

Sculpture in Wanganui; each of these circles is a handprint.

Wanganui Alleyway

Druie Hill Tunnel and War Memorial

Dog poo receptacle in Kowhai Park

Virginia Lake

Wanganui River from Tamara Backpackers

Tags: New Zealand, Photos, Travel, Tag Index

This entry was posted on Friday, April 7th, 2006 at 5:26 pm and is filed under Photos, Travel. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.