The Auckland City Council, here in NZ, has gone the extra mile (or, since we are metric: 1.6093km!) to put up a rather flash Christmas tree in the main downtown square - Britomart Place (aka ‘Komititanga’ – Junction): a nod to the fact that the square is bordered by the main train station, bus terminal and, behind the tree in this image, the ferry building.
The tree has a Māori name: Te Manaaki’, (in English - Hospitality) and dominates the area with a full height of the 20m (66ft): being 18m tree plus 2m base‘. It is garlanded with 4000 fresh Pōhutukawa flowers, 200 giant baubles and more than 10,000 sparkling LED lights that display a dynamic show about every 20 minutes or so, and is very popular for selfie-takers and vloggers, whom I normally prefer not to include in my images, but did so this time for scale and out of desperation as there was a continuous line of them.
The problem with living in the southern hemisphere at this time has always been that one cannot really appreciate the lights and display until it's dark, which occurs around 9:00pm. Since the city is most conveniently accessed by rail transit, because downtown access by car is limited for parking and with lots of road works, one has to get the photos by about 9:15pm to catch a train, because of shutdowns at night for a major rail upgrade.
The shooting angle was constrained by bright, tall buildings and some very bright lights (see shadows cast) that I wanted to avoid dazzling the camera. I finally went for the classical architecture of the ferry building as a backdrop, which is a bit more picturesque than the more modern glass buildings!
Canon EOS R6, RF 24-105 f/4@42, f/9, 1/13sec, ISO-6400 The streets of Auckland are also garlanded but by nature, as thousands of Pōhutukawa trees bloom at this time of year, and their red and green foliage has caused them to be loved as NZ's Christmas tree.
I wish all members a very safe, relaxing and enjoyable holiday season and that 2025 will deliver all the things you seek
Detail of the decorations
Thank you all for your best wishes. Being down under, it's the shortest day of the year as I write, so a lot of folks don't put out seasonal lighting displays as they would in the Northern Hemisphere. However, there are a couple of exceptions, and one is Franklin Road in one of Auckland City's oldest suburbs. The houses are all (for NZ) pretty old, but exceptionally well maintained, and the streets are lined with mature trees that help shade the houses at this time of the year, helping to get shots as it gets dark after 9:00PM.
The whole street gets together to put on a light show for the couple of weeks before Christmas and while it might not be impressive by northern standards, for NZ it's a rare and welcome treat.
We managed to make it to the area and find a park (the place was heaving with celebratory events) and then applied patience while waiting for it to get dim enough, and then even more so not to get people into my images - the decorations were the purpose.
Here are a few of the results, all taken with the Canon EOS R6 and the RF 14-35L f/4. Hand-held, available light.
This last one below is because the greeting is in Māori!
I wish you all a happy and safe holiday season.
