Sanctuary

“Sanc­tu­ary! Sanc­tu­ary!” was the cry from with­in Wel­ling­ton­ist Towers.

The young ‘uns were blast­ing out the latest loc­al tunes as some old ‘uns moved their bod­ies in decidedly unfunky ways. The anti­quated com­mu­nic­a­tions sys­tem was being updated with new tubes res­ult­ing in lots of bangs and crashes. The rest of the staff were in the recep­tion prac­ti­cing for the Wel­ling­ton­ist net­ball team.

AND it had been a hard day.

So I escaped for some sanc­tu­ary. Wel­ling­ton is full of some won­der­fully quiet places invit­ing us to flee from the rigours of every­day.

Some of the Wel­ling­tonis­tas swear by the many darkened corners of bars in town – back of Kitty O’Sheas, down­stairs of the Dog & Bone, Con­crete before the suits invade at 5pm and even the Malt­house bal­cony dur­ing the day. The ulti­mate is pos­sibly Bodega.
Where’s yours?

Embassy Blondin­i’s Bar dur­ing the day glad­dens the soul. Cool, calm and very col­lec­ted as she sits in all her glory. The wine bar and snack bar is always open with some extremely pleas­ant staff. The sofas ease you in and whis­per in your ear, “You don’t ever have to leave. Let me look after you”.

And how could we not men­tion the cafe scene. Wel­ling­ton is fam­ously run on cof­fee and des­pite the recent inva­sion of Star­bucks the major­ity of cof­fee places are excel­lent. Mid­night Espresso, Fidels or even Mr Bun on Cour­tenay Place come to mind. We’re sure you could pass on more.

Where exactly did your hassled cor­res­pond­ent run to? Wel­ling­ton City Lib­rary
As soon as the doors swoosh open the wor­ries of life slip away. No-one is going to remind me about any­thing I don’t want. I can pick up any book and lose myself on a desert island, in space or any oth­er place. I can be accom­pan­ied on my travels by char­ac­ters from the past, present or future.

Whilst you’re alone, you also not. Human­ity is all around as they sit and read – you can just feel the know­ledge mov­ing around in the air.

And there’s the kids zone which is full of squeals, giggles and laughter as the adults re-dis­cov­er the books from their child­hood.

Haven chosen three books (always three, two to read and one just in case) we pop upstairs to Clark’s Cafe to rest some more with cof­fee, Phoenix Cola and a saus­age roll.

So we urge you all to take time out in your busy lives to re-dis­cov­er the rest­ful areas of our city, give your­self a little time to just be and let it hap­pen around you once in a while.

Enjoy your sanc­tu­ary.