Wellington today – and no keycard to lose since we have our watch and medallion – we are making it to Te Papa today – no matter what!  (The back story:  Years ago when we were here, we had a car and drove out to a winery, had a fabulous lunch, then came back into town with the goal of going to Te Papa, the one of the foremost museums on New Zealand history and culture.  Unfortunately, we lost Ed’s keycard at the winery, and not knowing how hard it would be to get back on the ship, we skipped the museum to navigate the re-boarding process.  It wasn’t onerous at all, actually, but did take time, so we wouldn’t have felt comfortable at the museum at that time.  Now is our chance to make that up.)

We are ready to go at the scheduled disembarkation time, knowing there is a free shuttle into town.  Our plans are to go up to the Botanical gardens and Zealandia on the cable car, then come back down to the CBD for lunch and Te Papa.  Now if we could only get off the ship.  Honestly!!!  The stupid Majestic Princess is also in port today (with 3500 passengers- we only have 2100 with 2500 capacity), and for some unknown reason, they wouldn’t let us off the ship until she docked.  And then, to add insult to injury, they let her passengers off first!  What the hell?  Needless to say, we were a little irritated.  We managed to get on the first of our complimentary shuttles – we were literally first off the ship – so we also got to the cable car first, which was a bonus. 

The cable car was really fun and a beautiful ride up to the gardens.  The views from up here are stunning.  Once there, we wandered around a bit, then went to the Wellington Cable Car museum – which we had read wasn’t going to be open today, but apparently that was wrong.  It was a small, little place and we quickly wandered through and out.  Then we grabbed a coffee to go in the café at the cable car stop and went outside to wait for the free shuttle to Zealandia, the nature preserve that protects endangered animals.

There was another couple at the stop waiting as well, we thought we’d have another 30 minutes to wait, according to the printed schedule on the sign, but the van showed up early, actually really early, because apparently everyone was opening early to accommodate us cruise passengers. So nice!  Not only the shuttle, even Zealandia opened 1 hour early. It was awesome.

So, off we went for our nature walk!  We were the first people inside the park and it was absolutely beautiful.  We started out at the big lake, walking around the pagoda building built out in the middle of the lake.  Then we took the Lake road trail which, of course, skirted the lake. Along the way, besides the incredible scenery, we spotted all types of birds – and walked through this amazing little path with recorded bird sounds.  You pressed a button on a display and they played the call of that particular bird.  Awesome.

Deviating from the Lake road, we went down into the wetlands, crossing a little bridge that spanned a little bay type area of the lake.  Here we saw the two Takahe birds in captivity here.  These are thought to be some of the last remaining Takahe birds anywhere on earth.  They were actually thought to be extinct, there are only 400 left in the entire world, and 2 of them are here, right in front of our eyes.  And they are so domesticated.  Not afraid of us humans at all. They are just like big blue chickens – flightless like chickens – and they just wander about, doing whatever it is they are doing and completely ignoring us.  

Back up on the Lake road, at a restroom stop, a woman comes up and points out these Tuatara lizards that are considered “living fossil.”  Turns out she is a guide her, and today is her day off, so she is just wandering around looking at the wildlife and helping people out.  That’s dedication! 

These guys are sort of hard to spot, behind a fenced in area, using the brush as camouflage.  As we walk down the path, we notice little stepping stools placed next to the fence.  Climbing up on one, we realize that they are placed where the Tuatara lizards are.  Aha!  Never forgo a stepping stool.  We see a bunch of them in this fashion.  Which is great fun.

Moving further into the lush preserve, we come upon a feeding area for the Kaka, a type of big mouthed parrot.  Dwindling in numbers about 20 years ago, they were bred in captivity and now are fairly ubiquitous around Wellington.  The feeding posts are totally cool – the birds have to press on a lever to open up the tanks to get the feed.  We were mesmerized as we stood there watching them fly in and out and slapping the lever for their food. 

Further into the preserve, we reached the upper dam, one of the furthest areas of Zealandia.  Here, crossing the damn bridge you could see how the water was held back and what it was protecting on the other side.  It was so cool.  One side huge deep lake.  The other side all natural forested land in the valleys. 

Heading back toward the entrance, we veered off toward another path, crossing a suspension bridge and hiking up some hillsides through the forest.  It was absolutely gorgeous and fabulous.

Another huge bonus of Zealandia is that they have a free shuttle that goes back down to the CBD.  All we had to do was wait for it, and we were back down in town in no time.  The driver was great, giving us all sorts of suggestions for lunch and pointing out Te Papa for us.  We ended up not following any of his suggestions, but actually having an excellent Vietnamese lunch at Pho Viet Street food.  And Street food it was!  A huge Banh Mi with crispy pork and an excellent Pho with pork belly. 

Then it was finally onto Te Papa, which was everything we’d hoped it would be.  An amazing 6 floor museum that contains everything from Maori culture to volcanoes to earthquakes to Gallipoli.  An overload of the senses.

The Maori art spanned the spectrum – from traditional art to huge fiber weavings and a metal weaving structure that looked completely different when you took a picture with the flash on.  The study of light and darkness, supposedly to represent the womb – but we didn’t exactly get that.  It was cool though – to the bones of Phar Lap, a legendary racehorse that was adored here in New Zealand.

There was an open air patio on the 6^th floor with awesome views across the harbor and the city.  Modern art sculptures about corned beef (“colonialism – all bull?” – who knows?).  Traditional Maori sacred houses, built to scale inside a huge hall.  An exhibit on war canoes with crazily pretty feathers at the hull.

Then, one of the best exhibits on Gallipoli, called “the scale of our war” – which was apparently wildly popular because every time we looked there was a huge line to get in.  We debated whether to go inside at all, but by waiting until the end of our visit, after most of the crowds had gone, we managed to time it so we didn’t have to wait all that long – and we were so glad we did it! The exhibit leads you on a winding path through these rooms with all these gigantic human sculptures in different war poses and scenes (i.e., the “scale” of the war).  Interspersed are rooms with lots of history on Gallipoli and stories from different soldiers points of view.  It was definitely a highlight of the museum.

By then it was getting on into the afternoon and we had to make our way back to the shuttle. There was an Ed Sheeran concert this evening at the Sky Stadium, which was literally right outside the port gates.  The roads were going to be shut down and they were expecting record breaking crowds to start descending when the gates opened at 4.  We had all been warned to get back to the ship early and to expect delays.  We had no intention of missing the ship because of Ed Sheeran, so we made sure we were back in plenty of time – and then got to watch all the fun activities across the way at the stadium from our balcony.  If only we could have stayed in port longer to hear the show- we were in a prime location for that!  Oh well.  But, as it turned out, taking an earlier shuttle back was the right move because we heard from other passengers that the wait for the shuttle later in the afternoon took forever. 

Meanwhile, we were happily ensconced on the ship, enjoying a lovely surprise:  The most beautiful flower arrangement sent to us from Huan, one of the Guest relations staff who always helped us with whatever whacky thing we needed. It seemed we were always there talking to her, on a daily basis!  And she sent us these flowers just as a thank you for sailing with Princess.  Totally unexpected and completely sweet.

The rest of the evening went according to the norm.  Gym. Bar. Beautiful sail away from the balcony. 

Dinner and then the new comedian’s show, which was quite good.