After dinner, we decided to go for a walk along the length of Ponsonby Road. For DC residents, Ponsonby Road is best likened to 14th Street, but on steroids. Along its length are scores of restaurants, cafes and boutique stores. Even on a Tuesday night it was bustling. Many of the early street names in Auckland were derived from military officers involved in the Napoleonic Wars. The Ponsonby area that sits along the western side of the Ponsonby Road has a number of examples, including Collingwood, Cockburn, Anglesey, Picton and Vandeleur. So it appears likely that Ponsonby Road is named for General Sir William Ponsonby who was at Waterloo. The Maori name for the ridge along which the road runs is ‘Te Rimu Tahi’ which translates to ‘The Lone Rimu Tree’, which apparently refers to an ancient Rimu tree that stood on the ridge.
We started off at the north end in the area called “Three Lamps.” We are not sure how this part of the road got its name, but as you can see in the following photo, there is indeed a street light with three lamps.
Standing behind the three lamps is the prior Gluepot Tavern. Until it closed in 1994, the Gluepot was a great place to catch local bands. We spent many a night there in the eighties enjoying such classic New Zealand bands as Hello Sailor, The Chills, and The Clean.
Here are some of the sites you will see walking along Ponsonby Road on any given night.
During the walk we stopped and chatted briefly with Suresh, the proprietor of D. Jairam & Sons, Quality Fruiterers. A couple of weeks before, we had watched a fascinating history on Dairies in New Zealand and Suresh and his small store took a starring role. As we have discussed in earlier posts, Dairies are what Kiwis call small neighborhood stores or bodegas. Suresh’s grandfather had arrived in New Zealand in 1915 and quickly got a job in a general store on Ponsonby Road. Suresh’s father had come out to New Zealand as a 12 or 13 year old and went to work helping his father. Suresh is the third generation working at the shop. Both of his sons have trained as engineers and have no interest in taking over the store so it appears that Suresh will be the last of the family line to run it. It is a tough way to earn a living and he and his wife work incredibly long hours. Most days he wakes well before dawn and drives to the flower market to buy flowers which are popular with the locals and the store stays open well into the evening.
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Mal and Lauren 