Hey everyone, Lauren here to continue sharing our time in Wellington! We were there at the beginning of February 2019, and were lucky enough to be in Wellington on Waitangi Day, a New Zealand national holiday.
Waitangi Day is on February 6th every year, and marks the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi between representatives of the British Crown and over 500 Māori chiefs in 1840. The Treaty of Waitangi is often considered to be New Zealand's founding document!
Weta Workshop
Gerrod and I had been looking forward to visiting Weta Workshop since we arrived in New Zealand! For those of you that don't know, Weta Workshop is the special effects and prop company that produced sets, costumes, armor, weapons, creatures and miniatures for The Lord of the Rings films!
We decided to book the There and Back Again: The Full Experience tour, which cost $88 NZD. Unbeknownst to us, we happened to schedule our tour of the famous workshop on Waitangi Day. This was lucky for us because we could not find the parking location the booking specified! After driving around the block a few times and looking for the lot, we ended up going to an information center that informed us all parking was free in the city since it was Waitangi Day! Also, since many people were off work, it was very easy to find a place to park at 9am.
Off to Weta
We waited around for sometime before a bus showed up to drive us to Weta Workshop. Weta is located in Miramar, which is a suburb located on the Miramar Peninsula south-east of the Wellington city center. Our driver also acted as our tour guide, and pointed out several landmarks on the way to Weta.
We also learned some things about Wellington, including how there is a tradition among people from Wellington to “toot” their vehicle's horn as they pass through the Mount Victoria tunnel, leading to it being nicknamed the "Toot Tunnel". Our guide said the reason this originated was as a tribute to a woman named Phyllis Symons, who was buried alive in construction material by George Coats during the construction of the tunnel.
Watching a Documentary at Weta Cave
We finally arrived and began our tour at the Weta Cave. The tour began with a documentary about the history of the Weta Group from co-founders Richard Taylor and Peter Jackson. The documentary was pretty short, but was interesting and discussed how Weta has evolved over the years.
Weta Cave Shop
After the documentary, we explored the Weta Cave shop. They were selling all sorts of movie merchandise and collectables. They also had a small museum-like thing with movie props from films Weta has worked on. We were tempted to buy some things, but since we are traveling so long, we don't want to carry around a bunch of souvenirs.
Weta Cave Workshop Tour
Next, we walked to the Weta Cave Workshop for a tour. We got to look at and touch a bunch of movie props. Our guide also described movies Weta has worked on and the movie making process. There were some drawings of movie costume concepts that were ultimately not used in the film, and it was interesting to think about what the movies would have looked like if that was the design they had gone with!
Normally there are people working in the shop and you can see them work during the tour, but because of Waitangi Day it was very quiet. Unfortunately, we weren't allowed to take photos here.
Miniatures Stage Tour
Next, we boarded a bus to head to the miniatures/bigatures located in another studio. They had a display set up for a reboot show filmed there called Thunderbirds Are Go. Gerrod had never heard of Thunderbirds at all, but it looked a lot like Team America. It turns out that Thunderbirds was the inspiration for Team America!
The miniatures were incredibly detailed, and even though we had never heard of the show, it was very cool to see how the miniatures were made and how everyday objects were used to represent other things in the sets.
Back to Downtown Wellington
After the Miniatures Stage Tour set, we headed back to the Weta Cave and waited for a while before our tour bus picked us up to head back to Wellington!
Museum of New Zealand
After getting back to the city, we decided to get some lunch. We ended up at a place called Enigma cafe and had some burgers and coffee. Next we headed to the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa. We heard about the museum from our lovely bus driver/guide who said they have a wonderful exhibit put together by Weta Workshop and Peter Jackson called Gallipoli: The Scale of Our War. Of course we had to check it out after seeing all of the cool stuff at Weta Workshop!
The museum is free to get into, with paid entry only into specialty exhibits. Luckily, the The Gallipoli exhibit was free. Being from America, we do not learn much about foreign war involvement beyond the basics, which made this exhibit super interesting to us. The exhibit described the eight month ANZAC (Australia and New Zealand Army Corps) Gallipoli campaign in Turkey during World War I.
It tells the story of Gallipoli using the stories of eight ordinary New Zealanders involved in the war. Weta created lifelike sculptures of each of these individuals at 2.4 times human size.
This exhibit was simply incredible, and also very depressing. In total, 2,779 Kiwis lost their lives on Gallipoli, and the detail of the war and of the eight New Zealanders whose stories were focused on really made you feel the loss of the war.
After finishing the exhibit, we walked down the waterfront. We heard music, and decided to walk towards it! We ended up at Waitangi Park, where there was a free Waitangi Day concert!
Next we ended our day in Wellington at Basque rooftop bar for some drinks, and a view of the street where they held the Return of the King premiere!
Last day in Wellington
We spent the morning of our last day in Wellington... not in Wellington. Gerrod and I decided to get some of our travel vaccinations in New Zealand, and we needed to get our second round of shots! We had to drive to Palmerston North, which is about a 2 hour drive north of Wellington. I will discuss our experience getting vaccinated in New Zealand in a later post!
Miramar and The Roxy Theatre
After getting our vaccinations, we headed back to Wellington and went to a local cafe recommended by our Airbnb host. The cafe, Scorch-O-Rama, was located in Miramar and had a great view of Scorch Bay.
After coffee and lunch at Scorch-O-Rama, Gerrod and I headed to The Roxy Cinema to see Spider-Man: Into the Spider Verse. The movie was awesome, and the Roxy Theatre had a great atmosphere. After the movie, we went back to our Airbnb to prepare for our ferry to the South Island the following day!
Until next time!
Lauren (and Gerrod)
