Wellywood

The main purpose for my trip to New Zealand was to attend the 12th Annual New Zealand Tango Festival. So on Tuesday night I arrived in Wellington. After checking into the hotel, I wandered down the infamous Cuba Street. I felt very much at home. Cuba street was alive with restaurants, cafes and bars. I felt very much at home there as I walked down Cuba street trying to find somewhere to have dinner. Sure it was a little cold, but I've seen worse in Melbourne. With the warnings about windy Wellington ringing in my ears, I kind of laughed to myself and as it started to drizzle I muttered to the sky, "c'mon Wellington, is that the best you can do"?

It seems as though Wellington heard me. Thursday after the workshop had finished, I went and had a coffee in a nearby café, about 15 minutes walk from the hotel. As I sat and sipped my coffee, I noticed the wind picking up. By the time I started to make my way back to the hotel, the wind was howling, and it had begun to pour with rain. It totally destroyed my $10 umbrella I had purchased the day before, and by the time I eventually got back to the hotel, I was totally drenched. Winds got up to 200km/hr, and even the locals were surprised at just how bad the storm was.

The miserable weather lasted for a few days, but it didn't stop me, and the people who had already made it into Wellington from doing what we'd come to do; dance tango. Others weren't so lucky as Wellington airport was closed for some of the first day of the tango festival.

After the festival was over (for me at least, others were still doing post-festival immersion courses), I decided to linger in Wellington for a couple of days, partly to see a bit more of the city, but also because there was some more social tango to be had in Wellington with some of the new friends I had made during the festival (I know, what can I say, I'm an addict).

The first day post-festival I decided to check out the "Te Papa" Museum. It was a really great experience, and had some very interesting exhibitions detailing New Zealand's volcanic history. It kind of makes you realize when faced with all of the amazing natural beauty that New Zealand has, that it's origins are due mainly to plate tectonics resulting in devastating earthquakes and volcanic eruptions.

The second day post-festival I decided to go to take the cable car up to the Carter Observatory and planetarium. Again another really enjoyable day as I pondered the stars and the plugged in my estimations into the simulated Drake Equation to determine the probability of their being life on other planets in the universe (by the way I got a score of 6 planets, now all we have to do is find them).

My final night in Wellington was spent (you guessed it) dancing tango. It was a lovely night, although when it ended at 11:00pm a small group of us decided to descend on a café on Cuba Street called "Midnight Espresso", and beg them to let us put some tango music on, and we danced til after 1am.

I really liked Wellington (otherwise known as Wellywood). I had an awesome time dancing at the festival and the post festival events, and met some new friends, and had some very deep and beautiful connections on the dance floor.