writers walkway – Kiwi Travel Writer talks food, travel, and tips

Wellington Writers Walkway . . . spread along the Wellington waterfront, a stroll along it is a great artistic, historical, and literary way to spend an enjoyable couple of hours in New Zealand’s capital city.

Brochures that lead you around them are available at the local iSite in Civic Square – the link above has a map and here’s link to the Writers Walkway FaceBook Page

With ‘quotations from 23 authors, past and contemporary, including poets, novelists, and playwrights the walk celebrates the place of Wellington in these writers’ lives’. and their place in the life of Wellington. It also introduces New Zealand literature to a wider public, and in particular, tourists and visitors. I heard cruise ship passengers discussing buying a NZ book and I’m sure without this great addition to our public art they would not have known about the author whose quote they were photographing.

See an earlier blog I wrote about the opening of some new quotes. (All in a different form, ie not concrete)

Last week I attended the launch and unveiling of four new quotes on the Wellington Writers Walkway – and the honouring of the writers and their city, or the city their quotes mention.

These tributes to the city by the sea are dotted around the Wellington waterfront as typographical sculptures in wood and concrete. Use your smartphone to guide you around the sites and learn more about the writers behind them. See it here. ( or download the brochure or pick it up at the Wellington i-site centre.)

It was also wonderful to meet 3 young woman travellers, from Malaysia, who said “it’s great that you honour your writers this way”. Funnily, one of the woman lives in the city I land at in my Borneo trip (Kuching, June – August 2013) and who I now will meet for a coffee after I’ve been the Rainforest World Music Festival. As the CEO of the Sarawak State Library, it’s no wonder she noticed the group of us wandering the waterfront and we were glad they joined us.

The writers honoured at this launch were: Joy Cowley, Elizabeth Knox, James McNeish and Jack Lazenby who’s pole and quote is behind the visitor-students to Wellington. Read more about them on the Writers Walkway website or on the New Zealand Society of Authors one.