Last week I took a short break to Wellington, New Zealand’s capital, and my old home town. I went specifically to stay with a friend I’ve known most of my life, and now that she lives alone, I try and visit often. Jayne is Wellington-born like me and lives in an apartment high up on The Terrace which affords marvellous views out over the harbour. It’s a great place to see the breadth of changing cloud with each shift of the weather, and I could spend hours watching its passing moods.
The reason I haven’t posted recently is, that I had an unexpected road trip to Wellington with my daughter. She was filming in the city for a couple of weeks, so, I arranged to stay with my friend Jayne for a week. ‘Have you been to Somes Island?’ she asked me that first night, as we talked about what we’d like to do, or see. I originally came from Wellington and worked in the city when young, travelling from the Hutt Valley by train, which skirted the harbour and I came to know Somes Island well. In those days Matiu/Somes was known as a quarantine island. Day-trippers were unheard of, and its status only changed in recent years. The weather was hot and clear when I arrived at my friend’s, but wild winds and brooding skies blew in, and plans quickly changed.
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