After a three hour ferry ride across the Cook Strait from the South Island to the North Island, we landed in Wellington, the country’s capital.  We stayed about 20 minutes outside of Wellington, at the home of a couple we had met in Picton.  They had a lovely home, up high on a hill, overlooking Cook Strait and you could see across to the South Island.  They were wonderful hosts and we enjoyed getting to know them better.

Queued for the ferry.

On our way to the North Island and Wellington.

The view from our hosts back deck.  Cook Strait and the South Island.

Sue and Greg Shotter, our hosts in Wellington.

The first day we ventured back into Wellington to get a tour of Weta Design, a design studio that creates costumes and props, mostly for the movie industry.  They produced most of the battle costumes for Lord of the Rings and the Hobbit, and most recently Chappies.  We had a one hour tour where they explained their design and production process, using digital designs and CNC’s to cut out molds, which are then used to produce the body armor, guns, etc.   It was very interesting and had similarities to the mannequin business.  We then went to see Te Papa, the NZ national museum.  The first floor had an excellent exhibit of the flora and fauna of the country.  However, after that – we were lost.  The exhibits didn’t seem to hold together or have a story that could be followed – I think the curators over thought the whole thing and were trying too hard.  We were both underwhelmed.  From there we went to meet our hosts at the Havana, a wonderful little restaurant made up of two attached cottages rammed between high rises.  We shared some wonderful tapas and had a great time.  Then we headed back to their house to catch the tail end of one of NZ’s world cup cricket matches.  NZ is currently undefeated heading into the quarterfinals.

The trolls from the Lord of the Rings.

These things were about 10 or 11 feet tall and amazing detail.

You want to buy a life size sculpture of Gollum?

The next morning, we packed up again headed north to Masterton, to see the Vintage Aviator collection.  Lonely Planet described Masterton as “utilitarian” and I would have to agree.  Our motel was dreary and we struggled to even find a restaurant for dinner.  There was a hot air balloon festival in town, which overwhelmed the few restaurants around.  So we had a really bad meal at a “Mexican” restaurant (chicken fajitas that were marinated in soy sauce?).  But we were there to see the airplane exhibit, which was excellent.  Spencer had seen a Nova program about this group and wanted to come see it himself.  It is another Peter Jackson associated venture, apparently started by people that had been working on LOTR and took up the challenge to build accurate replicas of WW I planes, at Jackson’s behest.  They had a large collection of planes, a few original and many that had been meticulously manufactured from original plans.  For the most part, all of these planes are airworthy, or as airworthy as the originals, unlike the plane collection near Blenheim.  They now build replicas and sell them to others, including the group in Blenheim.  They even starting machining their own engines using the original designs, when they couldn’t find old ones to repair and use.  Spencer got to talk with one of the young pilots from the Nova show.  He had apparently started just hanging around the place as a teen and ended up getting his commercial pilots license.  The tour was fascinating and the planes were basically works of art.

I’m not going to name all of the planes as I don’t remember them all but they were just beautiful.

An old WWI troop transport truck.  I took the video below, while standing on the top level of this truck.

Sopwith triplane.  I have seen pictures of these but never a real one.  Apparently it inspired the more famous German version, the Fokker DR1

Pretty cool cockpit.

This video shows the whole hanger.

One thing that Barb did not mention is that in addition to all of the planes there was a VERY special car.  Remember the movie “Chitty Chitty Bang Bang”?  Well this is the car from the movie.