Circumnavigating New Zealand — Wellington Botanic Garden

As you’ll recall from last Wednesday, we arrived in the hills of Kelburn overlooking Wellington Harbour via the Wellington Cable Car (funicular). From here we had a spectacular view of the harbor:

Now it’s off on foot to the nearby Wellington Botanic Garden, but first we must pass a piece of history — a field artillery piece built in 1907 at the Friedrich Krupp AG factory in Essen, Germany. Yes, the infamous “The Arms of Krupp“, for those familiar with the bestseller, and this particular piece of artillery was used during The Great War (1914-1918). The gun pictured below is a 13.5 cm Kanone 09, which could lob a 92-pound/42-kilogram cased charge projectile an impressive 10.3 miles/16.5 kilometers:

Kelburn is one ritzy neighborhood, as you can see from these nearby homes:

Ursula and I hit the trail heading downhill into the botanic garden. Shortly after the beginning we came across the Treehouse Visitor Centre:

There are some interesting nonbotanical things of interest as you head down the hill, such as this sundial:

But one goes to a botanical garden for the botanicals, right? So here are some: