Cape Palliser Lighthouse is a Lighthouse at Cape Palliser in the Wellington region of the North Island of New Zealand. It is owned and operated by Maritime New Zealand.
The light was built in 1897 and was originally fueled by oil. In 1954 the oil lamp was replaced with an electric one powered by a local diesel generator. This was subsequently replaced by a connection to the mains grid in 1967, although a diesel generator is retained for emergency power. The light was fully automated in 1986 and is now managed from a control room in Wellington.
Cape Palliser Lighthouse has 250+ steps to reach the base of the lighthouse, replacing an extremely dangerous and steep climb to the top of the bank which could result in injuries and possibly death if the user wasn't careful. Since the stairs were installed, the lighthouse became more popular around New Zealand and even other parts of the world.
Famous quotes containing the words cape and/or lighthouse:
“A great proportion of the inhabitants of the Cape are always thus abroad about their teaming on some ocean highway or other, and the history of one of their ordinary trips would cast the Argonautic expedition into the shade.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“It is the cry of a thousand sentinels, the echo from a thousand labyrinths; it is the lighthouse which cannot be hidden.”
—E.M. (Edward Morgan)