Wellington Walks: Whitireia Park

Another weekend, another walk. This time we decided to check out Whitireia Park located in Porirua, a 30 minute drive from Wellington city. Daniel must have picked this walk with me in mind because it was pretty damn short and easy. There were hardly any hills to walk up.

Although you would hardly notice, the path is shared with cyclists, pedestrians, and four-legged friends. One thing I love is that the trails in Wellington never seem to be filled with people. There is the occasional mountain biker zooming around the corner, but that’s usually it. Nice and quiet.

Whenever we’re on a walk, we always keep an eye out for birds and insects to checkout. This is a copper butterfly, which is the smallest of New Zealand’s butterflies.

Spring has brought out many wonderful flowers too, many of which seem to be purple. (My favorite!)

But flowers also bring massive bumble bees. Some the size of my big toe!

The first 35 minutes of our walk snaked through the hills. We passed joggers with dogs, five-year-old kids on bikes, and couples hand-in-hand.

Eventually the hills opened up into the nearby bay so we could walk back in a loop along the harbour.

On the way back Daniel got distracted by a couple of pied shags sitting on the beach. I waited as he spent 10 minutes sneaking up on them before spending another 10 minutes taking numerous photos.

He settled on this one as his favorite.

Finishing the loop, we turned the last bend to be met with a face full of sea wind.

Wellington is notoriously windy, especially by the sea. But it seems many locals have embraced this and no matter where you go you’re guaranteed to see boats and kite surfers on the water.

Walk done. Hooray!

As we left the park though, we felt we hadn’t had enough, so we decided to hike up a hill to a viewpoint. (I say hike, but it was only a five minute walk.)

Obligatory handstand with Mana Island in the background.

Driving home, we believed we’d just about done the bare minimum of exercise needed to treat ourselves to an ice cream. As fortune would have it we spotted a Mr. Whippy truck, which is apparently a big deal back in England.

Daniel was excited as he could get a soft-serve ice cream covered in sherbet. I opted for the M&M sundae.