Wellington, New Zealand
Our mission for the day was to secure our Australian Visas prior to departing to the South Island. US Citizens must obtain a Visa prior to arrival in Australia. We assumed it wouldn’t be a big hassle to get our Visas during our stay in Wellington.
We walked about two miles north of central Wellington to consulate-row. When we arrived we discovered a large blue sign with white lettering on the Australian High Consulate security gate; essentially explaining they don’t issue Visas in Wellington… Visas are ONLY issued in Auckland. Shit! Frustrated, we jotted down an Internet address posted on the sign regarding visa procedures and did an about-face back towards the town center.
I was panicking a little, while Marc assured me it was a small issue and we would be fine; “it’s not like we were stuck in Burma without visas.” I was frustrated because I knew we should’ve done our research prior to our latest departure from the US.
After making the trek back to the town center we found an Internet café. After a few minutes of “digging” we discovered that since we are US citizens we can apply for an Australian Visa online. We paid our $20 electronically and our main task was completed. Marc gave me a “see I told you so smile” and off we went to explore the city.
The afternoon started with a ride on the cable car up to Wellington Botanical Gardens
overlooking the city. The much hyped Fall colors were out in force, affording us several photo opportunities as we wound our way down the footpaths of the garden, across streams, over bridges and around ponds filled with mallard ducks. We passed through a vibrant, healthy rose garden with every color of rose possible. My favorite was the Orange-Lemon; a hybrid with orange and yellow swirls. We were surprised at the tenacity of the roses still thriving in the garden in the Fall afternoon and could only imagine how voluminous the garden must be in the heart of the summer.
After we captured several pictures from the rose garden, we continued down the path back towards the city. We stumbled upon an old cemetery which was
partially excavated when the city of Wellington decided to build a highway through the graveyard. Approximately 3000 graves were displaced and relocated to another part of the city. We zig-zagged our way down and through the historic cemetery, stopping occasionally to read headstones dating back to the mid 1800’s. The Autumn colors and weathered wrought-iron fencing surrounding each site was pleasant to the eye, but I’m sure there are several unsettled spirits in the area. As we exited the cemetery on The Terrace street we found a small house that was still inhabited and overlooked the graves (possibly the home of the previous caretaker)… I’m sure the residents have some good stories to tell. I guess we will never know.
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