It’s a rare thing for me to post a photo of myself on this blog!  But, I decided that I should show you what I look like when I’m all kitted out to go walking in the Auckland winter rain…

Gosh, my hair’s getting long!  And please, pay no mind to the bedroom – we’re still in the process of putting things together.

Saturday, I decided that I wanted to get out and take some more photos.  The weather didn’t cooperate, but I said, “Oh, to heck with it!  I’m going out!”  So I geared up, got my camera, took my umbrella, and invited Chris along for the walk.  We walked to the corner of Queen and Wellesley Streets…

This is the Civic Theater.  You may have seen it before if you watched the movie King Kong.  If you look to the right, you’ll see a bit more of Queen Street {one of the busiest streets in downtown Auckland}…

You should see what it looks like when its not raining.  Packed with pedestrians!  That’s Smith + Caughey’s department store across the street on the left, and yes, that is a Wendy’s up ahead on the right.  I’m happy to say that in the nearly 3 months that we’ve been in New Zealand, we have not eaten at a single fast-food restaurant.  Still, it’s nice to know that there’s a little bit of Americana if we’re ever in the mood 🙂

We walked across the Queen + Wellesley Street intersection, up to Elliott Street.  I’d heard and read about Elliott Stables and I wanted to check it out.  Elliott Stables used to be a warehouse, which was converted into apartments at one point and then re-converted into its current manifestation – a great big room filled with tables and chairs, and lots of shops and restaurants all around the edges.  It doesn’t look like much from the outside…

But once you get inside, you’ll like what you see…

One of the first shops is the Kapiti Cheese Shop.  They have a lot of cheese, as any good cheese shop should!

Chris sampled some of the gouda.  I passed on that.  Me and cheese don’t always agree with each other.

After the cheese shop, there’s the Suri flower stall, followed up by Frankie’s Wurstbude – a European sausage house.  We looked, but didn’t eat.  It smelled delicious!

After this is the Artisan Fine Wine store…

And then there’s my favorite shop in the whole place – The Whisky Shop:

{Yes – that is a chocolate shop in the back, but they were closed.  Otherwise, they might have been my favorite shop in Elliott Stables!}

Look at the inside of The Whisky Shop – isn’t it perfect?

The manager-on-duty was just the right person for this kind of store.  He’s an American from Montana named Sam Snead who looked and sounded just like Patrick Swayze {but still nowhere near as cute as my husband!}.  He was friendly, helpful, and invited Chris and I to come back on Fridays at 3:30pm, when he and a couple of mates have a whisky and bourbon tasting each week.  I don’t even drink whisky, but I wanted to go!  Chris quite happily purchased a bottle of bourbon, and I wouldn’t be surprised if he went to one of the Friday tastings.  We’ll definitely be visiting this shop again.

There are a lot of great sounding restaurants in the Stables.  I wasn’t too hungry, so we didn’t stop for lunch, but I did want to grab some of the cake and cookies off of this tea trolley!

I think that’s enough photos for one day!  Check back tomorrow for more of our rainy shopping adventures 🙂