Our weekly roundup of best things in Wel­ling­ton con­tin­ues and this week we’ve got con­tri­bu­tions from Alan, Joanna, Martha and Tom.

Best new place for dogs off leash

an extremely fluffy small dog

We dis­covered that dogs are ok unleashed on the Remu­taka Incline so we were able to take our fluff­beast bik­ing with us (she’s got her own bike seat for when she gets tired). This was a good thing! - Alan

(Edit­or­’s note: Des­pite appear­ing to be a very large Dulux dog, Eibh­neas is appar­ently an an extremely fluffy small dog, a Tibetan ter­ri­er to be spe­cif­ic, which makes the vis­ion of her rid­ing on a bike slightly less com­ic­al. Sorry.)

Best indulgence: three milks! In this economy!

The Tres Leches cake from Viva Mex­ico ($12) is a ridicu­lously rich and sweet kind of trifle that does­n’t both­er with fruit or jelly.

tres leches cake in a plastic cup

One day I will actu­ally write up all the tiram­isu I have tried around town, but for now know this is a great sub­sti­tute if you don’t like cof­fee. And heed my advice bet­ter that I do, and don’t try and eat the whole thing by your­self in one sit­ting. Oooooof. - Joanna

Best synchronicity of another Wellingtonista also enjoying a leche-based dessert (along with a pie)

Mairana's kitchen sign

I had an excel­lent chick­en and leek pie and salad at Mariana’s Kit­chen at the Lower Hutt War Memori­al Lib­rary and it was only $12.50. Gor­geous spot to sit in the sun. I took home a pan de leche for later. - Martha

Best use of being really open about your diagnosis because it makes the world a better place when people are able to be honest and accommodated

May­or Tory Whanau. And though I too have ADHD, it should­n’t take being neuros­picy to see that hon­estly, most meet­ings could be and should be just 15 minutes long instead of an hour! - Joanna

Best weird little guys: native orchids

little native orchid

There’s not much flower­ing in the nga­here right now, but a few spe­cies of nat­ive orch­id are at their peak in winter. The east­ern hills are good places to see them, and here are two spe­ci­mens of winter green­hood (Pter­o­styl­is alob­ula) and pix­ie cap (Aci­anthus sin­clairii) that I snapped just now a few minutes walk from the Days Bay ferry. They’re far from showy and only a few cen­ti­metres tall, so they can take some find­ing, but theses weird little guys can be worth the hunt. - Tom B

Worst departure from Twitter

The Wel­ling­ton City Coun­cil social media team, a couple of weeks ago. Admit­tedly, this is fair enough because a) twit­ter is awful and b) people on social media are awful (see: how in Nel­son 46 people were gen­er­at­ing 25% of all the work) but now who’s going to provide me with speedy answers about whatever road­works are hap­pen­ing at night in Thorndon? I’m going to have to… go on Face­book?

But ser­i­ously, Simone and Molly are among the very best in the busi­ness, and well done Wel­ling­ton City Coun­cil for trust­ing them to do their job and empower­ing them to shut down racist dick­heads. - Joanna

Best bonus picture of Alan’s dog

very floofy dog

(any­one else remem­ber when this was ‑not- the kind of dog­ging loc­a­tion we used to talk about?