November 28, 2023 Whanganui Architecture (Day 62)
We started out this morning in a drizzle, getting our coffees and gassing up the car. We of course took the scenic route, the curviest road, towards Whanganui. From the mountains to the sea, the Tasman Sea! We know nothing about Whanganui, but the signs as we approached said it is part of the Unesco Creative Cities Network. We stopped in town and took a stroll from the riverfront up to the Regional Museum back down along Victoria Avenue to see the sights.
Unfortunately the Museum is undergoing renovations and was closed, encased in a plastic envelope!
We turned around and went down to the main thoroughfare where they are putting up the holiday decorations!
Insert pre-decorated evergreen branch C into trunk slot Z. It is a puzzle of a Christmas Tree!
On Victoria Avenue there are lots of buildings from the late 1800’s to the Art Deco era of the 1920’s and 30’s. The Watt Fountain is a mainstay, although it has been moved around town many times.
The fountain now sits at it’s original location (installed originally in 1881, returned to this spot in 1993).
We stopped in at the local i-site (the visitor center) and got information about the tower we saw across the river. It is a war memorial erected on Durie Hill in 1925 to commemorate the local men who died in WWI. There is a unique way to get there though. There is a tunnel to an elevator that takes you up the hill to the base of the tower! The Durie Hill Memorial Tower and Elevator.
The walkway to the tunnel is lined with Maori carved totems.
It’s quite a tunnel to the elevator!
We exited the elevator and walked the short distance to the tower and climbed the 176 steps to the top!
The view looking back down to the orange building with the spiral staircase where you exit the elevator, the Whanganui River and the bridge over the river on Victoria Avenue.
We finished our tour just in time. At the top of the tower the wind was roaring and rain started falling. We elected to walk down the hill rather than take the elevator down because a school group arrived that were taking the elevator. We had a leisurely walk down the many stairs and we headed out of town, the rain followed soon after!
December 8th, 2023 at 4:26 pm
The Tower reminds me of the Astoria Column. Did you ever visit it? When Rod was still able to walk we actually went all the way up and flew paper airplanes from it! Great shot of the tunnel.