New Plymouth

We celebrated our four-year wedding anniversary a little early and spent last weekend in New Plymouth. New Plymouth is on the west coast and is about a four-hour drive from the Mount. We hopped in the car early on Saturday morning and headed out.

Our first stop once in New Plymouth was for lunch at the café in Puke Ariki, the regional museum. Breakfast and lunch are not left to the restaurateurs, with small cafés often being found in shops, parks, and museums. Cory had pizza, which he swears is the best he’s had since leaving Iowa. He desperately misses Wig ‘n Pen, Pagliai’s, Salvatore’s, Old Chicago – anywhere that can make a pepperoni pizza to his liking. He has suggested we might have to drive back just so he can order pizza again, so that alone probably would have made the weekend worth it!

After a quick tour of the museum, we headed to Pukekura, a fantastic park in the city. There are several different kinds of gardens, plus a cricket oval and an amphitheatre. It also boasts a 2000-year-old puriri tree and a flock of pukekos. Pukekos are also known as swamp hens and are very common all over New Zealand. And while some might find them annoying, I think they are fascinating to watch! Maybe sort of like squirrels…

We stayed that night at the Ahu Ahu Beach Villas, right on the coast. The villas are gorgeous and, interestingly, made from reclaimed materials from the area. The view from the windows was pretty great too. That night and the next morning, we walked along the black sand beach. Cory can’t really walk along a beach without collecting, and we came back with some driftwood, a great paua shell, a snail shell, and a few other bits of detritus that he eventually decided wouldn’t get to make the trip home. At some point we are going to have to creatively display the shell collection we are amassing, as it is starting to take over the flat surfaces in the house…

Speaking of taking over, we headed to the Govett-Brewster Art Gallery Sunday morning and viewed an installment by Peter Robinson. The multiple floors of the small gallery had been filled with huge linked chains carved from Styrofoam. While it sounds completely bizarre, it really was awesome to see. We caught the last day of the show, and the staff were discussing how exactly the work would be “un-installed.” A company was going to take all of the Styrofoam and recycle/re-use it, but there wasn’t a set plan as to how it was all going to get taken down – though someone did mention a chainsaw!

The gallery is also known for its Len Lye collection. In addition to film projects, Lye did a lot with kinetic sculptures. We saw some crazy video of a few of his works, and then got to see his “Wind Wand” up close and in person down at the waterfront. Wacky, but fascinating.

We headed out of town, hoping to catch a glimpse of Mount Taranaki. The entire weekend it was clouded in misty fog; we never saw the peak. We did a short hike in the Egmont National Park (Egmont being Taranaki’s other name) and if you had not known there was a mountain in the area, there is no way you would have guessed it.

On our drive home, we made a short side-trip to see the Three Sisters. Sadly, since naming, one has crumbled into the sea, so only two of them remain. Again, I would be at a loss for how to describe them, so make use of your imagination and Cory’s small photo on the sidebar. These are the spots that really blow me away. Again and again, we have stumbled onto areas that are really fascinatingly beautiful and often indescribable but that don’t make it into guidebooks or the local town’s tourist information. Word of mouth and a small sign are often all that points you in the direction. I think, though, these areas are often the highlight of our travels. And maybe that inconspicuousness adds to the draw.