Toured gallery, museum and the coastal walkway in New Plymouth today.

It’s Day 30 of our road trip! Due to the tiredness from yesterday’s long walk and drive (I only went to bed last night after 1am), today we started the day pretty late (we only head up at 11am). By the way, I have to mention on how large, well-equipped and comfy the motel room we stayed here in New Plymouth for 2 nights. By far the best accommodation that we have stayed during the road trip.

We first visited the New Plymouth Coastal Walkway. We only walked two sections of the walkway (entire walkway is over 13km long). The first section we walked is at the east side where the Te Rewa Rewa Bridge is. It is a uniquely shaped pedestrian bridge (looks like skeleton of a fish/whale to me) and at one end of it, view of Mount Taranaki is framed within the skewed arches of the bridge. However, it was very cloudy and hence the mountain was not visible.

We then went to the other section of the Coastal Walkway closer to the city centre. This section is where there are a number of sculptures present like The Wind Wand, Honeyfield Fountain, Light on the Land sculpture, Mothers and Daughters sculpture, etc. Well, it’s certainly time for some photos with these interesting sculptures.

Next, we move on to visit the Govett-Brewster Art Gallery. Before stepping into the gallery, we found ourselves amazed with its exterior architecture. Its unique facade is made of curved walls of mirror-like stainless steel panels. We spent about 30 minutes just on the outside of the gallery to take some couple of good shots of this fantastic looking building.

We finally entered into the gallery (NZD5 per pax, this is a temporary discounted price due to parts of the gallery currently closed off for exhibition changeover works) when it is already past noon. Only a small section of the gallery is open currently and so we only spent about 30 minutes in there.

After a quick lunch, we head to Puke Ariki Museum (free entry). The museum has three permanent galleries showcasing life in Taranaki, its unique geology, flora and fauna, and the museum’s Māori taonga (object or natural resource that is highly prized). This is a small museum and we spent less than an hour in there.

We thought of returning to the Kent Road today to check out the cool viewpoint of Mount Taranaki from there. We have to give it a pass as the entire mountain is covered with clouds today. Well, at least we have been there yesterday and took a quick shot although it was a bit dark as evening approaches. That’s it for our travel here in New Plymouth. We will be heading to National Park town tomorrow as our hike on Tongariro Alpine Crossing will be happening few days later.