Downtown Wellington is very convenient for walking tours. It stretches south from the train station to the Courtenay Place area along the main artery of the central business and shopping district, Lambton Quay. The main restaurant, bar, and entertainment areas run south and are centered around Willis Street, Courtenay Place, creative Cuba Street, and down to the Queens Wharf waterfront.
From the central Civic Square, the sights diverge in both directions along the waterfront. Among them are the magnificent innovative Te Papa National Museum and the renovated Wellington Museum of the City and Sea, which tells about the development of the city, the history of the Maori tribes (indigenous people of New Zealand) and the traditions of navigation.
Politicians and civil servants fill the streets of the Parliamentary District, where all government offices are located, including the quaint round Parliament building, which locals nicknamed the “beehive”. Nearby is another popular attraction – the childhood home of Katherine Mansfield, a famous New Zealand novelist.
Almost every tourist in Wellington climbs to the top of Mount Victoria in one way or another to admire the incredible view of the city. The slopes of the mountain are covered with dense forests, where locals like to go for morning jogs and take a break from the city noise, and tourists like to admire the beautiful capital of New Zealand from different angles, discovering natural viewpoints that appear out of nowhere. In addition, many scenes of the Shire, the land of the hobbits, were filmed in the forests on Mount Victoria for the movie “The Lord of the Rings”. Fans of this famous trilogy will be especially pleased to find commemorative plaques scattered around the filming locations.
In Kelburne, which is just a 10-minute drive from the center of Wellington, there is a must-see eco-park “Zealandia” – a local sanctuary and a real paradise for wildlife lovers. Unusual animals and endangered birds roam freely here, and the exhibition presents guests with 80 million years of New Zealand’s natural history. In addition to classic guided tours with interactive elements and a full-screen cinema, the park offers fascinating night tours where you can observe the life of rare night birds of the kiwi. Nearby Zealandia is another important conservation site – the Otari-Wilton’s Bush Botanical Garden, dedicated exclusively to New Zealand plants.
To the east of the city are the quiet suburbs and beaches of the Miramar Peninsula, currently best known as Wellywood, the heart of the city’s film industry. You will not miss this place, as it is marked by huge white letters on the hills (in the manner of Hollywood), which, symbolically for Wellington, are blown away by the wind.
If your vacation in Wellington is not limited to a few days, be sure to visit the Wellington Zoo, Red Rock, the wildlife sanctuary on the charming Soms Island, the beautiful Capiti Island and the Wairarapa wine region.