New Zealand; Day 5

Today we followed a much gentler pace, starting with a bit of a sleep in and a leisurely breakfast. Oh, and the first of four loads of washing that I managed to get done in the combined washer/dryer. At least now we have some clean clothes for the next few days.

We wandered through the streets and squares of Wellington down to the waterfront and the incredible Te Papa museum. There were heaps of activities for kids all the way through. The first was an enormous granite orb floating on a layer of running water, which was so perfectly balanced you could spin it any any direction. I'm not sure if Bevan or Eleanor enjoyed that more.

Inside were fantastic displays of New Zealand's birds, animals, marine life (including a giant squid in formaldehyde and video footage of it being caught), rocks and social life. One of the kids' areas had lots of small things in resin for them to touch and play with, such as a drawer containing the life cycle of the Very Hungry Caterpillar from a tiny egg on a leaf right through to cocoon and butterfly. There was even a life size model of a blue whale's heart with a note encouraging kids to climb through the chambers. As you can see, Eleanor was happy to oblige.

There was also a large display on the changes between when the first humans landed about 800 years ago and today, both for those species that the Maori hunted to extinction before white settlement, and the species that have subsequently been endangered by the introduction of flora and fauna to make the place more English and the extensive land clearing for the timber and to create grazing land. There was one entire room showing what it would have been like before humans, with lots of the large flightless birds that were first to be hunted out. Eleanor really doesn't like birds and seems to be especially wary of pigeons and peacocks, and she'd been remarkably brave in front of a cabinet that had stuffed examples of both. However, the "this is how it used to be" room with recreated Moa and other really large flightless birds was just too much for her.

Equally educational, and more to Eleanor's liking, was the menu board in the cafe confirming that there's no such thing as a babycino in NZ, but one can order a "fluffy". That rather explains the funny looks I've been getting all week.

After Te Papa it was back to our hotel for Eleanor and Mummy to have a nap while Daddy went on his half day Lord of the Rings filming locations tour. He hasn't admitted whether or not he chose to wear the elf ears that are apparently available on the minibus for the more hard core fans, and it sounds like he had to bite his tongue during various comments about the books/films that didn't agree with his interpretations. He now has a better appreciation of how much CGI was involved and how much the government indulged every one of Peter Jackson's wishes. Need to dig up a national park? Sure. Just put the native plants in storage and plant them back in when you're finished. You want the army to build a road to give you access for eight days filming? Not a problem, Bro! Do you want a strictly-enforced no-fly zone with that? You're employing 25,000 people; do whatever you want. Apparently for one scene they cut down a pine tree, moved it to a new location, stripped it of its own leaves and then stapled on 250,000 new ones at a cost of $35,000 to help create the right look for just a few moments of film.

Honestly, I did spend less than $35,000 at the yarn shop Eleanor and I hunted out while Bevan was unable to stop me. They had a fantastic range of possum/merino blend yarns, which is a NZ specialty. Australian possums are an introduced species in plague proportions, and for the last ten years they've been part of a combination culling / recycling program. Possum fur is hollow, which makes it incredibly warm and it's very soft. It's also fairly labour-intensive to produce, and therefore not cheap. I'm trying to pretend that buying lots of the yarn is my contribution to the environment, and somehow offsets the carbon emitted flying us over here and back.

We had dinner tonight at a Korean BBQ restaurant. The place had a BBQ set into the middle of each table, and the smell coming from the other diners cooking their own dinner was incredible. Given Eleanor's seemingly unlimited arm length lately we forwent the pleasure and stuck with pre-cooked dishes from the menu. And yes, that is our two year old eating with chopsticks and making less mess of it than we generally do.