Saturday - day 5 port day 1 - Wellington

Exciting day today - we get to walk on land finally!  From memory I fully expected to have sea legs, as with the last cruise I felt wobbly back on land. Didn’t happen though!

We all met for breakfast today down in the dining room.  Tony and I had watched the ship come in to Harbour, not that we specifically chose to wake up extra early, it just happened.

We decided to avoid getting of as soon as the gangway was down, probably a good decision in the end.  The port was a walking port so we had to catch the free shuttle into town.  The buses were provided by the port and it didn’t feel like they had anywhere near enough for this crowd.  Also a second cruise ship was in port too - Pacific Encounter, and that holds 3000 ish passengers too.

We decided to leave just after 930. There was a long queue to get off the ship but it moved pretty well.  The 6 of us didn’t have to wait too long to get a bus which was good.  Our plans for Wellington were pretty simple, we chose just to try the cable car up Mount Wellington.  When we got off the bus we noticed that there were lots of volunteers around who were more than happy to answer questions about where things are and so on. It really was super welcoming and useful.

It wasn’t too far a walk to the cable car station - right in the Main Street! Again a queue but it moved quickly.  The cable car itself was similar to the one in Hong Kong, a lot less steep though.  There was a museum at the top, but we decided just to have a look around and take in the spectacular views over the city.  Once back down at the bottom I detoured into the local “countdown” store, essentially that’s Woolworths!  I stocked up on NZ chippies and chocolates.

We wandered back to the shuttle stop and started our trip back.  Again probably only 15 mins plus 5 minutes to go through the security checks.  Nate and Tara stayed in Wellington a bit longer to have a good look around and explore.  Once back we headed to the buffet for lunch, probably just after 12.

The rest of the day was pretty lazy, lounging around after dinner and watching the tv.