Wellington piccies!

[trixtah]

Due to my shaky hands - I'm sure they're getting worse, btw - none of the pics I took of the hotel or my room here in Wgtn turned out adequately. I need to get a reasonable digital camera with image stabilisation (still a point-and-click - I can't justify the expense of a SLR-style one) - ah, maybe in a few years, when I actually have some money. Still, I have a couple of daytime pics.

The first is of a section of the reedbeds they've planted in the refurbished Waitangi Park, which is adjacent to the harbour, in the heart of the city. The river (Waitangi Stream, surprise surprise), used to be in pipes, but it's now been brought to the surface again, and the reedbeds are part of the way of purifying the water before it reaches the harbour again (about 100m from the place I took the pic).



Well, who knows, maybe they have peons scooping out any rubbish several times a day, but there was no scum anywhere visible, there were a few swallow-type birds swooping in amongst the reeds, and a couple of ducks (which promptly hid when I took the pic). The rest of the plantings (which extend for a couple of hundred metres to the left of the pic) are coming along nicely. It'll be great once the trees get some height.

The next pic is just a generic postcard of part of the harbour. It was a gorgeous afternoon. The hill in the background is Mt Victoria, where the hobbits' first encounter with the Ringwraith was filmed for LoTR. Te Papa (AKA Museum of NZ or MONZ (hee!)) is in the right mid-ground.




The pohutukawa trees (the two trees right by the harbour) were getting little flower buds! Since they're called the "New Zealand Christmas Tree" (for their usual flowering time), this is quite bizarre. Here's an example of one in flower (a slightly unusual distance from the sea - they're very much clifftop trees). Hah, that pic's been taken in Auckland - that's Rangitoto Island in the background.

Comments

[khavrinen.livejournal.com]

Due to my shaky hands - I'm sure they're getting worse, btw - none of the pics I took of the hotel or my room here in Wgtn turned out adequately. I need to get a reasonable digital camera with image stabilisation (still a point-and-click - I can't justify the expense of a SLR-style one) - ah, maybe in a few years, when I actually have some money

Perhaps a tripod/monopod as an inexpensive interim solution? Doesn't help catch candid/time-sensitive shots, but for things like landscapes and wildflowers, I find mine very helpful. And in particularly low light situations, I put my camera on its timer setting, to eliminate even the wobble caused by pushing the button.

[trixtah.livejournal.com]

Yes, that's a good idea. At the moment I'm just using my phone camera, so a tripod won't for that either very well, but I do need to buy something reasonable at some point. I finally figured out the advantages of using the timer setting recently, though, when I do have a surface I can lean it on (I've had the phone for nearly 2 years, duh).

[stormkpr.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the photos - I love them! It's really neat to see in the background a location where a scene of LOTR was filmed.

[felix-femme.livejournal.com]

we did a LOTR driving tour as our holiday in 2003
there's heaps of things to see from the films
http://www.newzealand.com/travel/about-nz/features/lotr/lotr-02.cfm

[stormkpr.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the link - what a great site!

[trixtah.livejournal.com]

Glad you enjoyed. :-)