Island Bay (A Local's Guide to Wellington)

As you might expect, Island Bay is so named for an island that sits in the bay: Tapu Te Ranga Island. 

Though rugged and rocky, the coastline around Island Bay is beautiful and easy to wander along. You can also clamber amongst the rocks, which requires more concentration but rewards you with sights of pools filled with little sea creatures (and sometimes spiderwebs strung between the rocks!). When we lived in Island Bay, in the evenings we would walk down to the beach and watch the waves lapping against the sand, the light from the street lamps glistening on the water.

In summer, the beach is popular and easily accessible from all over Wellington as a major bus route runs all the way through Island Bay to the seaside (the #1 bus - literally, the route's number is one). 

Early each year, the Island Bay festival is held with stalls and festivities at the little park by the beach. The highlight is a parade that marches down 'The Parade', Island Bay's main street. 

The park is great for picnics and also has a playground. 

There's a strange old building which looks to be an abandoned public toilet at the park. A modern day ruin, it reads GENTLEMEN and is half submerged in sand and grass.

Along the beach is a small aquarium, which is nothing like Auckland's large amusement park-like aquarium of Kelly Tarlton's, but is focused around research and learning. I admit I don't remember much about it apart from it being small, dark, and not like other aquariums. 

Blue Belle Cafe

This cafe once provided the residents of Island Bay with great hot cakes. Firstly you could choose from toppings such as maple syrup and butter or boysenberry compote and cream. Not only that but you could pick things to go inside the batter itself! My personal preference was apple and cinnamon, but blueberry was also delicious. Not having been there for around a year, I was hoping it had remained the same, but I was disappointed to find the hot cakes no longer on the menu. The staff made an exception as I requested it, but I have a feeling they were just being nice and it won't last much longer. The pancake stack was still very good, just not the same. There was also a demon slumped on the booth behind me, which was worrying to say the least.

At Island Bay shops are an assortment of places which makes the suburb a nice little self contained parcel: a high quality butcher, a curry restaurant or two, a Burger Wisconsin, a Hells Pizza and a New World supermarket. We lived down the driveway next to Hells Pizza and it was dangerous as dinner could be only thirty seconds away. 

There are also a plethora of dairies that line the street down to the beach. This makes sense in summer when everyone wants an ice cream, but I'm not sure how they stay in business the rest of the time. The most confusing are two dairies that are exactly opposite each other on one street. You may think that these dairy owners don't like each other, but I have found just the opposite: one early evening I saw them outside of their respective shops talking to each other across the street as though they were great friends. 

Empire Cinema

Having reopened in May this year after a long period of renovations, Empire is another small cinema with comfy couch seats that joins the ranks of Lighthouse for comfortable film watching experiences. It's situated on the Parade, is right next to a bus stop and has plenty of free parking around. The restaurant has been completely revamped and I haven't eaten there, but I know they serve good cabinet food and hot chocolates (I drank four of them one afternoon when I had locked myself out of the house).