Makara Beach Walk

Last Saturday was an absolutely gorgeous day here in Wellington and so me and Emma decided that her studies would be put aside for the day and we would go out and enjoy the weather. There was a slight constraint on what we would chose to spend the day doing as due to the fact I am unemployed and broke as, whatever we did had to be free. Fortunately for me I am in New Zealand which isn't exactly short on scenery and ways to enjoy the great outdoors for free so we decided to explore around the Wellington area a little bit.


The previous weekend we had spent looking at some of the beaches closest to Wellington, including Oriental Bay which is literally less than 5 minutes from the CBD (you can see how close it is on the map below so this weekend we thought we would venture slightly further afield.

Oriental Bay Fountain

Oriental Bay looking toward City Centre

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After a spot of googling we found that Makara Beach was about 20 min away from our house and there was  good walk there that apparently including some awesome views and a fort. Being a sucker for cool fort things I was immediately sold although I have to admit that Emma did take a bit of convincing on having to go on an actual walk and do some actual exercise!The walk started off quite gently along the shoreline however rapidly became more steep as we climbed up to the top of the cliffs. This gave some awesome views and let us have a good look around the gun emplacements from the fort before descending back down and walking back along the stoney beach. All in all it was a good 8km walk and a great way to spend a sunny Saturday and I highly recommend it if only for the views. Although be warned - walking the 2km back along a pebble beach is not that much fun!


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Damn Pebble Beach!

Move to Wellington

So the last month has been a little hectic and as such I haven't had the chance to update this as much as I like. This is mainly because I have been busy doing things like job and flat hunting but also because I haven't been up to much that is notable enough to bother writing about; there is only so many times you can write about how you spent the day waterskiing on the lake in gorgeous sunshine...

The main thing that has occurred since I last wrote is that I am now livining in the captial of New Zealand, Wellington. I moved down to Wellington over a week ago however have only sporadic internet access and have consequently not been able to update this blog since I got here. This is due to moving into a rather nice 2-bed flat located 5 minutes away from the University in a area of the city called Kelburn. For those who know Bristol, the area is very similar to clifton as it is filled with big townhouses and a university and all the houses seem to be occupied either by well off professionals such as lawyers and the like, academics or students. There is even a little section of shops and what-not called Kelburn Village however it is a little smaller than cliftion village and is quite quaint.

House from the outside - we have the bottom flat underneath this one

Lounge

Kitchen - Em baking cookies!

Bathroom

Spare Bedroom

Master Bedroom

Garden

At the minute my life mainly revolves around walking to coffee shops and using the free wifi in the centre of the town (they refer to it as the central business district, CBD) in order to search for jobs, however being unemployed does have a few advantages as it allows me to appreciate some of the scenery around here. Living up on a hill means that the walk back up is a bugger but you certainly get some decent views!

View from near our flat

Overlooking the bay

Victoria University - Where Emma will be studying

Walking around Wellington has also been quite a pleasant experience as for the most part the weather has been good and the city has some very nice areas and gardens such as the victoria botanical gardens. See below for pictures of these and the cable car.