North Island Tour with Cait: Part 6

If ever you wanted to walk down a street and pretend it's 70 years ago (like many of us do!), Napier is the place to do it. Though the town was started in the 19th century, much of the city was leveled in 1931 by an huge earthquake and subsequent fires. With so many people out of work due to the Great Depression, there was a mighty workforce ready to rebuild the town. Wanting to make it as "modern" as possible, they chose Art Deco as the predominant style.

Most every street looks this way

After many a night in the van, we were lured into the best hostel in New Zealand, the Criterion Hotel, which was located in the center of downtown. The hostel was beautifully decorated and almost empty when we got there so we felt like we had the place to ourselves.

Our hostel

One of two common rooms at the Criterion

We spent a whole day on a self-guided historic tour through the city. One of the really amazing stories was that of the magnificent Gothic-style cathedral which had been was completely destroyed in the earthquake. The town banded together and rebuilt the church in the 1950s, this time including a Maori chapel.

Fragments of an original stained-glass window that were collected after the earthquake from the cathedral and put into this mosaic in the new church.

The Parker Fountain located along the waterfront -- the light show at night is pretty cool

Ranunculus blooming in one of the city's gardens


Lunch at a cafe around the corner

On Sean's birthday we took a tour the oldest winery in New Zealand (Hawkes Bay is world renown for its wine) and came home for a little celebration armed with fudge, sauvignon blanc and a 1000 piece puzzle.

The Mission Estate Winery


Vineyard

The finished puzzle, very tricky

The above puzzle picture is of our first attempt... though you may think that mid-twenty somethings would be out on the town every night, we actually spent two late nights on this deceptive puzzle. We should have known when the box stated that the picture on the box had 10 errors that you would get to discover. (woohoo!) It was the first, and last puzzle of our trip :)