Te Papa

The Cable Car, Wellington, New Zealand

Wellington, New Zealand’s capital, is the country’s third largest city with about 200000 inhabitants. It’s a quaint place in accord with the rest of the country. We came here less for exploring a New Zealand city but to visit its fascinating museum Te Papa, the National Museum of New Zealand.

Botanical garden, Wellington, New Zealand

But as long as we were here we took the cable car and viewed the city and its harbor from above. From the Kelbum suburb we descended the hill through the Botanical Garden where we witness how crews were felling a gigantic dry tree, removed piece by piece by … helicopter. They were cutting one piece, anchor it, the chopper would lift it and dispose it a bit further down. As the garden attendants were saying, this would chew a big chunk of the yearly tree budget.

Parliament, Wellington, New Zealand

The New Zealand’s Parliament can be easily visited by a tour or simply you can walk to the gallery and watch the ongoing session debates session. But it took quite a while to grasp the kiwi accent…

Wellington Harbor, New Zealand

Te Papa offers a great first lesson in Aotearoa culture. The Maori name of New Zealand seems to stem from the first word that was pronounced when the first migrants saw the island while sailing in the Pacific. It appeared to them as a “long cloud” – Aotearoa.

Te Papa, The National Museum of New Zealand in Wellington

The first settlers of the land we know today as New Zealand migrated from Polynesia and became the Māori. The lineage of these ancestors traces back 5,000 years to indigenous peoples in Taiwan. From there, Polynesian people dispersed across a vast area, including Tonga, Samoa, Tahiti, Hawaiʻi, Easter Island (Rapa Nui), and eventually New Zealand.

Credit: Wikipedia

It is not known precisely when Maori settled in Aotearoa but the Maori oral tradition mentions a grand migration between 1320 and 1350 that originated in Hawaiki, that is associated with Tahiti. In the Māori mythology, Hawaiki has its special place. It is known as the realm where Io, the supreme being, shaped the world and its first inhabitants but also it represents the ultimate destination of each individual soul after death.

Food House in Te Papa, The National Museum of New Zealand in Wellington

Some researchers mention of a possible early Māori settlement in the north island between AD 1250 and AD 1275. In any case it is known that in 1315 Mount Tarawera viciously erupted changing the landscape of the north island. The main settlement period is believed to have occurred in the decades after the Tarawera eruption. There are also speculations that Maori seafarers have been the first humans to discover Antarctica.

Crossing

East Coast drive to Picton, South Island, New Zealand

Our time in New Zealand’ south island was coming to an end. Today was our tenth day in the south island and we barely scratched the surface saving only 5 more days for the north island. On the way from Timaru, we stopped a bit in Christchurch and continued on the east coast towards Picton. The spectacular drive follows almost in its entirety the shore, an almost 5-hour drive towards the ferry.

Picton Harbor, New Zealand

Picton’s harbor is surrounded by peaks. The Cook Strait that separates the two islands is formed on its southern side by a collection of fjords from where sailboats or tugboats came out in the caressing sunset. It took more than 90 minutes to reach the end of the fjords and entered the open sea towards the north island. The entire crossing took about 3 hours and ended up in Wellington harbor in close proximity to the city center.

Picton Harbor, New Zealand

In Māori legend, the North Island, named Te Ika a Māui represents Māui’s fish, while the South Island named Te Waka a Māui symbolizes Maui’s waka (canoe). The waka is anchored by Stewart Island-Rakiura translating as “Māui’s Anchor Stone.” . As the story goes, Māui, armed with an ancestral jawbone hook, hauled a colossal fish from the depths of the sea with the help of his brothers. Together, they hoisted the fish to the surface, forming the South Island, which served also as their vessel.

Cook Strait, New Zealand

According to the Ngāti Porou tribe of the East Coast, their sacred mountain, Hikurangi, was the first part of the fish caught by Maui to emerge from the water. They believe that Māui’s canoe, Nukutaimemeha, became stranded on Hikurangi and remains there in petrified form.

Sunset in Cook Strait, New Zealand