Earthquakes, Tsunamis , and Spiders, oh my!

The first morning we woke up in here, Claudine and I were lying in bed talking when we felt something odd. It was a brief shudder of the house. Now, the house is about 100 years old and quite charming, but definitely has its quirks. I assumed it was simply a brief gust of wind or something (after all this is “Windy Wellington”). Later in the day we were told it was a 5.8 earthquake. This house is made entirely of wood and it simply rolls with the punches.

Later in the day we walked down the hill to “The Parade” (the main road) to explore and on the way we saw a big blue stripe across the road with the words “Tsunami Safe Zone.”

Wellington is right next to the bay on the southernmost point of the north island (we live 2K from the beach) and thus subject to tsunamis. Apparently, if Chile gets a really bad earthquake, we might get a tsunami. Fortunately, we live on a hill above the level which the tsunami would rise to. Good to know.

When we arrived in the house we found cobwebs everywhere. It kind of creeped us out. The house had sat empty for two month and since this is a tropical island, the spiders had had their way with the place. We spent quite a while sweeping the spider webs down. Later in the day we were told that some people just leave the webs up because the spiders don’t bite and they help keep the flies at bay. I think we’ll deal with the flies ourselves.

Mark