We Love Palmy!

The Square at night.

We have been living in Palmerston North for 3 months now and I just realized I have not really written anything about what it is like here. When I was first arranging for our trip over to New Zealand whenever I mentioned to a Kiwi that we were going to live in Plamerston North they would say “why?”.  I started to get a little concerned that maybe it was a dive but now that we are here I am happy to say that it is not.

I think that many New Zealanders don’t think of Palmy as various glamorous as it is not a big city like Auckland or Wellington. It is also not a real tourist destination but is more of a University town that is located a little off the beaten track. For us the location of Palmy is ideal. It is in the Central North Island and although it is not on the coast it is not far to drive to either the east or west coast from here. In fact we can drive to a beach in around 30 minutes. That means it is easy for use to take weekend trips to a variety of places (Napier, Wellington, New Plymouth to name a few). It is also located between the Ruahine Ranges to the north and the Tararua Ranges to the south; this makes it ideal if you like to get out and do some hiking (or tramping).

I also really like the layout of the town as it is fairly compact and easy to get around. The majority of the town is on the east side of the river and is very flat, a novelty to Bree and me. This has made biking to school and walking places very convenient for us. In fact Bree is now riding her bicycle without training wheels which may have taken a long time to happen at home given that we live on the side of hill and I even find it challenging to bike in our neighbourhood.



Bree's school - Hokowhitu



Palmerston also has all of the amenities we need. With a population of around 80,000 it has a downtown core with a wonderful library (we spend every Friday afternoon there), lots of shops, and a nice large park in the center. Spread throughout the community are several swimming complexes, lots of smaller shops, restaurants and cafes. What I like is that it is never very far to find a local dairy (small corner shop) and everything is not centralized into areas that you can only reach by car. We can walk to our local grocers and there are a variety of smaller shops in our neighbourhood or district as it is called here.

The other advantage to living in a University town is the cultural diversity. There are people from all over the world here. Even in Bree’s class at school there are students from several different countries. I think that this is wonderful and there are always different cultural events being held at the Square (the downtown center). For Bree this has meant that she is not really different at school and the other students have been very welcoming as they are used to seeing new students from other countries.

The wind farm.

The climate here is pretty mild and even though it will get cooler in the winter it won’t ever be cold enough for snow here. The surrounding area is mainly lowland farming and they pretty much have year round grass growth. That is great for the cattle and sheep but I guess it would mean year round lawn mowing! Fortunately the flat I live in has a person who takes care of the lawns so I have not really worried about it.

Palmerston can get windy though and on the nearby ridge there is a large wind farm. There is also quite a bit more rain here then I am used to but so far we have had more clear skies than cloudy. We are into fall now and the daytime temperatures still reach 18-20 degrees C although it is dropping down to 9 degrees at night. I am still wearing flip-flops (jandals) and Capri pants so I won’t complain.

Overall, I am very happy that we ended up in Palmy. For me it is a nice size town making it easy to meet people and to get around but still has all the services available. We were lucky to get a nice flat that backs onto a park so that we can play outside in the evenings. Bree’s school is wonderful and I am really enjoying my time at Massey University. And even though winter is on its way we are not worried since we will be going home to summer just as it starts to get cold here.