Thursday, June 5, 2008

Sunstrike Season ... #371

YES it is that time of the year when the sun rises a bit later ... just when most of us head to work .. so take care with sunstrike when driving.

The bottom end of the Ngauranga Gorge ... turn left and you are on State Highway 1 as it climbs up from the harbour edge to the hills on the northern side of Wellington. Keep on this road for another 8 hours and you will get to Auckland. This photo was taken looking east towards Petone as the the sun was rising and streaking through the motorway flyover.

Ngauranga is a suburb of New Zealand's capital city, Wellington, in the lower North Island. Situated on the western bank of Wellington Harbour, it lies to the north of the centre of the city. It is a Maori name meaning "the landing place", and the original spelling was "Nga-Uranga". The Ngauranga Railway Station was known as "Ngahauranga" when it opened in 1874.
It is lightly populated, and for statistical purposes is divided into Ngauranga East and Ngauranga West by Statistics New Zealand.

It includes the Ngauranga Gorge, through which State Highway 1 passes on its route out of Wellington to Porirua and the west coast. To the east, State Highway 2 runs wedged between hills and Wellington Harbour on its route from Wellington to the Hutt Valley, Wairarapa, and beyond. Alongside State Highway 2 is the Hutt Valley Line portion of the Wairarapa Line railway, which includes a station in Ngauranga served by frequent commuter trains. The North Island Main Trunk Railway also passes through Ngauranga, via two tunnels of the Tawa Flat deviation, with a bridge between them crossing the Ngauranga Gorge.

The small amount of usable land in Ngauranga is primarily used for commercial and industrial activity, though there are some houses on the hill overlooking the motorway

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