It was Wellington Anniversary Day a few weeks back, which also happens to be the one-year anniversary of my first visit to Wellington. Each region in NZ has their own anniversary day, usually commemorating the arrival of the first European settlers. It's a public holiday, so there were events and festivals around the city.
There were quite a few vendors and food trucks set up in Frank Kitts Park, and the festival atmosphere coupled with the warm weather made me desperately miss my Ren Scots, especially when I saw the cardboard castle.
Anniversary day is also the time for the annual Birdman event, where people are encouraged to jump off into the bay. I think in years past they've done contests with various apparatuses as people try to get the most distance out into the bay. This year, though, it was mainly people in costume (or not) jumping into the bay. There's always a plank there for people to jump off of year round, though they beef it up a bit for Birdman.
A group of penguins made an oil executive and a an oil rig walk the plank, protesting a recent oil spill.
This gentleman comes in every year from out of town to participate. His costume was handmade out of a bunch of swaths of fabric. It was really cool, I wish I could have taken a better close-up.
A cardboard sea shepherd.
With fish.
Lots of kids in costume, too.
It's sort of an odd tradition, I guess, but utterly charming.
No comments:
Post a Comment