VictoriaMay 17
Happy USA Birthday Mitch! One of the best things about being a day ahead is that you get to celebrate the great things twice.
Those in the States celebrating Mitch’s real bday started texting and calling when we woke up. So today was the second day celebrating his birthday.
We had a great sleep on a comfortable bed and oh, those wonderful sheets. We awoke to the sound of peace and quiet. A good start to the day is breakfast at a B&B and going out for great coffee. We did both.
Jenny, our B&B host, delivered our breakfast of poached eggs, toast, tomato jam and fruit at the prearranged time of 9 a.m. We ate at the table in our sitting room, grateful that we didn’t have an awkward communal breakfast making small talk with total strangers.
We got a decent Devil’s Cup roast coffee at Article Cafe, once upon a time the offices for the Whanganui Chronicle – New Zealand’s oldest newspaper. Filing and type trays still reside in the foyer, relics from the former occupants.
We took our coffee to go and browsed the artsy part of Whanganui. This town is beautiful, located at the mouth of the Whanganui River. Originally spelled “Wanganui,” the name changed in 2017 because the word had no meaning in Māori, versus the current spelling Whanganui (“big bay”), which has much more cultural significance.
The Durie Hill elevator was built in 1919 and is NZ’s only public transport elevator. It’s used on a daily basis by locals and visitors as a shortcut down to the town from the Durie Hill suburb. Access is through an adit, which is a long pedestrian tunnel.
We “boarded” the elevator, which cost 2 pounds a person, per ride. The elevator operator collected our money and pulled the door shut. She pulled a lever and the lift worked its way down as we traveled 216 feet below ground. We exited into a white tunnel, 650 feet long, with fantastic acoustics.
We arrived at the street entrance to the elevator and saw the alternative way up, by stairs.
We decided against taking the steps back up to the top.
Instead, we took another ride in the elevator, which to me sounded much more rickety than the ride down. I was relieved when the doors opened.
The orange lookout tower sat atop the elevator shaft, so we climbed the narrow iron spiral staircase to the lookout for some good views.
Next to the elevator is the Durie Hill War Memorial Tower, standing 104 feet high. The rock is estimated to be over two million years old. It was erected to the memory of armed service members who died in the first world war.
Mitch took one for the team and climbed the 176 steps to the top for panoramic views of the city and Tasman Sea.
We had high hopes for the pizza at SourBros Bakery and Pizzeria.
The bread came highly recommended by the chefs at Maria Lane Eatery, so we figured the pizza would be great too. While it wasn’t terrible, it definitely needed tweaking: more sauce, less salt in the crust, more time in the oven. It was no Blue Pan pizza, that’s for sure!
We finished our night early and crawled into those divinely soft sheets to binge a few more episodes of Suits.
Tomorrow we head to Wellington with a pit stop in Raumati Beach to visit friends we met on our first hike way back in January, The Queen Charlotte trek.
