Wine tasting and day-trips in lower North Island. The drive from Wellington to Martinborough in the Wairarapa Valley is a one-hour roller-coaster ride – a narrow, winding road with blind corners through the Remutaka Range (aka Rimutaka). All good!
A Walk in the LOTR Woods
Barely out of Wellington is Kaitoke Reserve – aka Rivendell, House of Elrod (and Liv Tyler), Lord of the Rings (LOTR). The swinging bridge and hike was a good start to our day.
Rimutaka Crossing
At the mountain summit, a memorial commemorates 60,000 NZ WWI soldiers who marched over the Rimutaka Crossing to embark to the front from 1915-1918.
Tips for Next Time:
- At the summit, the Te Ara Tirohanga Track. Translation “The view that improves as you climb the ascending pathway” (aka Rimutaka Trig Track) Walk – 45 minutes return.
- The Rimutaka Rail Trail is a gently graded 18km track with historic tunnels and railway bridges. Mountain Bike Ride – 2-3 hours to summit, and back. https://wairarapanz.com/see-and-do/remutaka-rail-trail
Martinborough Wine
THE BIG NEWS is that Sauvignon Blanc made in the Wairarapa Valley, and North Island, tastes NOTHING like the Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc ubiquitously and feverishly marketed around the world. Marlborough SB is grassy, lime, tart green apple. Everywhere else…crisp, refreshing, floral notes, soft – beautiful!
Favorite Cellar Doors (White/Red/Rose) – Poppies, Moy Hall, Ata Rangi, Margrain (Chenin Blanc), Te Kairanga
Air Bnb – 26 Rows (of Sauvignon Blanc) 
And of course…craft beer 
Rapaki Hillside Walk
Walking Opportunity at the edge of Martinborough, over stiles, through the fields.
Sentries at the gate 
Wairarapa Valley
Putangirua Pinnacles
Enroute to Cape Palliser: What started as an “easy walking path next to a stream – 90 minutes return” devolved into a tramp through the rocky streambed, crossing the stream 5 times. We persisted well beyond 90 minutes. The pinnacles were spectacular.
Description – Badland erosion/geological formations, and another LOTR filming location – “The Paths of the Dead”, the waking of the dead army.
The Paths of the Dead – Lord of the Rings
Cape Palliser – The Bottom End of Lower North Island
Beyond the Pinnacles to a road wedged between the sea and soft stone cliffs, with evidence of erosion under the cliffs. The roadbed narrows on a cliff edge and becomes gravel then sheets of flat rock. Impassable if waves and winds are high, but what a thrill!
View of Mountains on South Island – Kaikoura Range 
Ngawi Village (“Nawi“)
Tucked under a cliff, with a long line of rusty bulldozers and tractors whose purpose is to push/pull commercial fishing boats in/out of Cook Strait. The boats float away once in deep water, the tractors fight the wild surf to return to their spot on the beach.
Palliser Lighthouse (built 1897)
At dusk, a dash up 253 steps. North Island’s most southern point. Early lighthouse keepers hauled cans of oil and kerosene up a dirt track before the steps went in.
Below the Lighthouse
Seal Colony at Palliser
The fur seal colony at the cape is the North Island’s largest. Located before the lighthouse on Cape Palliser Road – before the lighthouse.
Castlepoint Lighthouse – A Spectacular Day Trip
On Wairarapa Coast is NZ’s tallest lighthouse and possibly the most photographed, built in 1913. Aprox 90 minutes drive north and east of Martinborough via Masterton-Castlepoint Road
Fossils embedded in the limestone cliffs 
Deliverance Cove Track runs along the lagoon to 160 steep stairs up the cliffs and a ridge track with amazing views.
260 Steps Here 
Deliverance Cove 
Christmas Cove – on the opposite side of the ridge 
The track on the ridge 
Related Post in Lower North Island: Click Here to Read Previous Post: Wellington
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Travel Broadly - Marlene & Steve 
Spectacular scenery that must touch your soul in the joy of life! The coastal scenes, straight up mountains… LOTR and sunsets are beyond words!
Steve looks pretty stately there in the reserve!
Never saw or read LOTR… perhaps when Patente is finito! x
WOW, life is grand and the scenery is spectacular! Keep the pictures coming! I’m enjoying the trip as much as you….thank you Steve and Marlene.
Rivendell! And all those steps and vistas. Wow. Thanks for taking us with you. We could all use a “walking opportunity” that feeds the soul with such beauty. xo