Another long day of driving today as we are heading down to Wellington which is our final stop on the north island. We set off early as a direct drive is about 4 hours and we have a couple of stops planned so we had everything packed into the car and we were on the road by about 8.00. We are going to take highway 2 the whole way and we have a Heritage trail map for the first part of the journey. The highway links Napier with Wellington and was used to transport goods from the farms after the WWII. It also was a way of getting workers between towns when the railway was being built. The railway was the first fast way of transporting goods and all the stations are surrounded by Oak trees as these were planted to be cut down for fuel for the steam trains. The first ‘town’ of note was Te Aute which is actually a church, cafe, collage and from what we could see not a lot else. The church was built in 1859 and although it no longer holds regular services, it is used for weddings. The next main town was Waipawa which is one of the oldest inland boroughs in New Zealand. Frederick Abbot purchased 60 acres form the government for £40 he then put the lots up for auction in 1860. He called the township Abbottsford but by the 1870s it returned to being known by its Maori name of Waipawa. We walked the heritage trail, looking at the houses, business and churches which still remain. Although it was about 9.30 on a Saturday morning there were only about 3 or 4 people around, it is definitely a very quiet town. Just down the road was the next town we stopped at Waipukurau which was a ‘model village’ instigated by the towns founder Henry Russell who encouraged immigrants to settle in the town in the 1860s – his only stipulation was that there should only be one per trade. He built an accommodation house which subsequently became the Tavistock hotel when he got a ‘bush licence’ which meant that he could sell refreshments, this was extended to include the refreshment rooms of the railway station. This town is at 40 degrees south so we are now officially in the roaring 40s which rather explains how windy the whole country is! We completed the walk then got back into the car to continue towards Wellington. We stopped for a short picnic lunch in Greytown, then our final stop was Rimutakan Pass which the volunteers marched over in 1915 on their way to the training camp before heading to Europe to take part in WWI. We finally drove into Wellington about 4.00 so we stopped at the apartment to checkin and unload the car as after almost 5,000 KM and 27 days it is time to say goodbye to the red peril. After handing over the car we walked back to the apartment to have something to eat before heading out in search of the firework display that is scheduled to be in the docks this evening.
