The start of a very long train trip indeed.

 

For the next 12 hours, I’ll be on New Zealands Overlander train, from

Wellington to Auckland. Originally built in 1908 and “covering every

kind of scenery there is, from coastline to volcanoes to mountains,

from lush green farmland to thick New Zealand bush” (from

http://seat61.com/Overlander.htm).

 

Apparently this journey was also the inspiration for a young Peter

Jackson to film The Lord of The Rings here - he started reading the

book and quickly realised how suited the landscape would be to such an

epic - I might just settle for reading his biography.