Times and Travels: Devonport village

“Pass the time?” said the Queen. “Books are not about passing the time. They’re about other lives. Other worlds. Far from wanting time to pass, Sir Kevin, one just wishes one had more of it. If one wanted to pass the time one could go to New Zealand.”
~ Will Schwalbe, The End of Your Life Book Club

I took the SkyBus from the airport to the hotel, thinking it would give me a good view of the city--unfortunately, the bus windows were comparatively high up so I didn't get a very good view of anything but heavy traffic and rain. I took some time after I checked in to recharge my devices and devise a plan. It was overcast and raining. By noon, I decided to head down to the wharf to either visit the Maritime Museum or take a ferry to the village of Devonport.

I opted for the ferry to Devonport.

By this time, I was starving--having eaten on the plane somewhere about 5:00 a.m. I decide to eat lunch at Devon on the Wharf because it was convenient and had a nice view. It's a Mediterranean style restaurant and my Jordanian lamb and zigana-tini (an espresso martini) were tasty.

I took advantage of the wi-fi to plan my trip around the village.

It's currently winter in New Zealand. With the rain and breeze today, it was cool, but perhaps not as cool as some New Zealanders would have you believe. (Today's temperature was 14 C / 58 F.)

I made hiking up this hill my goal. The Moari name is Takarunga, the English name is Mt. Victoria.

It was steep and I'm not a fan of climbing. Besides, I needed to stop to take pictures, right?

This house was originally built for the area's signalman, the guy responsible for sending naval signals from the hill. It now houses the Michael King Writers Centre.

This old bunker is now the home of the Devonport Folk Music Club.

The "mountain" was important defensively dating back to ancient Maori times. When it housed Fort Victoria, a "disappearing gun" was installed in 1899. These defensive weapons used by the British in New Zealand and Australia from 1885-1925 retracted below ground between shots so it could be loaded out of sight of any attacking ships. It did this using the power generated by the recoil of the gun as it fired.