I’m in a bit of a quandary. Joe is also adding to our blogs, and we’re ending up writing about the same things, naturally, since we’re doing the trip together. He has a different writing style, and different friends, so rather than trying to avoid writing about the same things he writes about, I’m just writing what I feel like, and if you read the same things twice, I apologize. At least, they’ll be described differently.
Day 15 – Dec. 17 – Hamilton to Rotorua
Boogied out of Hamilton, a nothing town, headed for Rotorua, one of the 5 smelliest places on earth. It sits on a lake of the same name that exudes sulfur fumes. It is very pretty, with clear water except where the thermal (hot) area under the lake bottom exists, then it’s cream-colored. It is so acidic that nothing can live in it, but millions of waterbirds call it home. They live along its shores, wade in its waters, but leave for other parts every day to find food. Don’t know what in the world they like about it. The water eats the webbing between their toes, too, so I imagine it is hard for them to walk on lily pads.
We found a great place right on the lake, Cedarwood Lakeside Resort, and got the best suite in the place, closest to the lake with an unobstructed view of the lake across a lovely expanse of green grass. Like so many, 2 bedrooms, kitchen, dining and living room, for about $70 a night.
Before turning in for the night, went to one of the many thermal areas, saw hot pots burping out boiling water, steam vents spewing out rotten-egg fumes to gag you, and all sorts of things like you see in Yellowstone. Because I’d visited Y’stone about 10 times when I lived in Jackson Hole, I feel like I’ve seen most of the types of thermal thingies the world has to offer. Don’t need to see any of the other 10 or so places they’ve set aside as an important thermal activity area around here. Doesn’t mean I don’t want to go to Iceland someday and see what they have to offer, though.
Day 16 – Dec. 18 – Rotorua
NZ has millions of sheep, many more of them than people, and it turns out that sheep farming is a quick way to the poorhouse, according to the son of a sheep farmer who isn’t following in his father’s footsteps. Therefore, it was inevitable that some entrepreneurial sheep farmer figured out how to make a living from the tourists and still keep his sheep. So we turned tourist yet again and followed the herd to a place where they show you how the dogs herd the sheep (boy, those dogs are smart!); how they shear the sheep, card the wool after it’s sheared, and they have one of every type of sheep raised in NZ tame enough for you to pet. Wool on the hoof is really tightly-packed and feels like a wool rug, not a sweater.
At one point they had people from the audience come up and demonstrate how to milk a cow. Joe was selected, and he was asked if he wanted chocolate or white milk. Chocolate, naturally. So the emcee walked around to the back of the cow, lifted the tail, and pointed to where the chocolate comes from, eliciting howls from the audience. Joe got a certificate proving he can milk a cow. Whoopee. I’ll bet he frames that and puts it in his office!
In 1886 one of the nearby volcanoes blew its top and buried a village in ash, sort of like Pompeii. Most of the people died, most of them Maoris but a few British missionaries, too, of course, and the village was forgotten. But 50 or so years ago they began excavating the site and today it is one of the major attractions in the area. We had a guide who is a descendant of some of the Maoris who died there and he told us the story of his people, his individual ancestors, the village, and the Maori culture in such a moving way that I declared him the best storyteller I’ve ever heard. When we parted an hour later, I could hardly express to him how much I enjoyed his narration for the big lump in my throat, and I went away wiping the tears from my eyes.
That night we went to another touristy thing – an evening learning all about the Maori culture. They pronounce it Mahrie, or Mary. I thought it would be hokey, but I was enthralled. I usually steer clear of these types of things, and I’m one of those people who actually left a luau in Hawaii in mid-hula-dance out of boredom (I ate first, however).
Day 17 – Dec. 19 - Rotorua to Lake Taupo
Played a GREAT course today, Wairakei. There were bunkers all over the place. In the first hole I got into 3 of them and ended up with a double-bogey. But I played the rest of the holes in even par, so carded a 2-over 74, not bad for this geriatric, all for $82 + $2.50 for the trundler.
Day 18 – Dec. 20 - Lake Taupo
Learned the distinction between ‘lodge’ and ‘motel’. Motels are bigger and nicer, and even though the lodges usually have the same amenities, they’re just half the size of motels. So we’re dodging the lodging in the future.
Hit the golf course here, and got paired up with a couple of the nicest guys you’d ever want to meet (actually, that’s true of almost every person we’ve met down here). One, Frank Collings, invited us to stay with them if we were ever in the area again. (That’s also typical.) We got rained on about 10 times off and on during the round. In the group ahead of us was a guy of about 85, riding a motorcycle and pulling his ‘trundler’ along behind him. Said that on Wednesdays, when the ‘vets’ (read: old geezers) congregate here, there are a whole herd of them riding their motorcycles and pulling their trundlers. The club stores the pair of them like our clubs store electric golf carts.
All over the golf course are pipes with steam coming out of them. They’re to let the heat out of the ground so it doesn’t burn the grass on the golf course. That’s one thing our greens supe, Greg Hall, doesn’t have to worry about!
About half the people here have tattoos, all over themselves, the parts that are visible, that is. I don’t know if that’s because of the influence of the U.S. or the Maoris, who in the past wore tattooes (I just don’t know how to spell the plural of that word) just about everywhere on their bodies.
Day 19 – Dec. 21 – Lake Taupo to Whakapapa Village
Drove out to Huka Falls, one of the touristy things to do, and were we ever glad! The water was the purest blue-green we’ve ever seen. Made us want to jump right in, but we’d have drowned, it was so raging through the tight defile between the rocks.
Went to an exhibit that showed all about the volcanic history of NZ, thrilling me and boring Joe to near death.
Drove up to the jumping off place for the Tongariro Crossing, billed as the best one-day hike in all of NZ. ‘Challenging’, the brochure says, ’18 kilometres’ (that’s 12 miles, more than we’ve hiked in years). But we feel like we can’t go home and face our friends who’ve done it without doing it ourselves. So off to Whakapapa Village we go. As we got near the town, we could see the huge white lodge off in the distance, backed up to the mountains, looking like pictures of the huge lodges built in the 1920’s – Banff, Jasper, Glacier Natl Park, and others. We got there early enough in the day to get the best room in the entire lodge, with a view out one window of the entire valley we’d driven up, and out the other of the mountains we were going to climb the next day. Several years ago I priced a room in one of those lodges and it was around $300 a day. We paid only $60 for our great room. Love those NZ prices!!!
Day 20 – Dec. 22 - Whakapapa Village
Up at 6 and downed a good breakfast to get us through the day, packed a couple of sandwiches each, and headed off to catch the 8 o’clock bus to the trailhead. The bus was packed with people and when we got to the trailhead, it was crammed with buses, cars, and hundreds of people. The brochures had said it wasn’t a wilderness experience and they were right, it was more like going to one of the Seahawks games, jostling and bumping into one another along the trail. All sizes, shapes, and levels of fitness and preparation. One guy had nothing but the clothes he wore, no water, no jacket, no rain gear, no suntan lotion. After the first mile, we passed a guy coming back who was leaning on a post he’d pulled out of the ground, using it as a crutch while he hobbled back to the trailhead.
The trail was like a freeway, 10 feet wide, sometimes packed hard as iron by so many feet, other times a boardwalk with no rails, other times a staircase of 10-15 steps, each 1 foot higher than the other. After 4 hours of this, my thighs were burning, and we finally reached a flat, ½-mile wide crater, with steam seeping out of the ground. Whew, it was a relief to not be climbing for a few minutes. The next part was the one they didn’t talk about in the brochures, else nobody over 50 who wasn’t really, really fit would have attempted it. It is a near-vertical climb (at LEAST 45 degrees of slope, no kidding) that seems to never end, only several feet wide, with a drop-off on one side several hundred feet straight down into a crater (the sign says if you fall into it, you’ll never come out – encouraging). The footing: sometimes hardpack with gravel over it so you slip and slide; sometimes deep sand into which you sink several inches; sometimes pebbles that give no purchase. When we finally reached the top, panting, thighs burning, we enjoyed the view down into the crater, then started straight down the other side. Went down the slippery slope as scary, dangerous, and challenging as the slog up.
At the bottom of that slide down was a turquoise lake so lovely you wanted to linger, so we ate our lunch on its bank. I was so tired, I could only eat half my sandwich. Now begins the downhill part. Thank goodness, we thought. But the next part was nearly as hard on our feet as the up part had been on our muscles. Pound, pound, pound, again lots of hand-made steps, sometimes with a leap down of 3 feet, killers on already exhausted thighs and feet tired, tired, tired. It was one of the longest 4 hours of my life. When I finally got to the trailhead, I just dropped my pack and collapsed on the ground and didn’t move until the bus came to get us. After a shower back at the lodge, and a soak in the hot tub, Joe and I went to dinner in the lodge’s dining room. He was so tired that he put his head on the table and went to sleep while waiting for our dinner to come and I stared at the top of his sunburned head. When it finally got there, he ate it, and headed right upstairs to bed, while I sat by myself and slowly finished mine. We slept like the dead until 8 am the next morning.
Moral of the story: don’t miss the Tongariro Crossing, but only if you’re very fit and under 50.
Day 21 – Dec. 23 - Whakapapa Village to Napier
Whereas we dawdled the first couple of weeks in the Northland, stopping along the way for pictures and enjoying the views of the sea every time one cropped up, now we’re speeding up and just intent on getting places. But today was one of beautiful pastoral scenes and mountains, with lots of sheep and cows grazing on the hillsides and far-away views down valleys whose trees have been cut to allow for such vistas. The road to Napier takes us over one of the north-south mountain ranges that forms the backbone of the North Island, so it’s very twisty and curvy and not one of the major arteries. All day long on this road we passed only 10 cars until we got back to a main artery.
A number of years back one of the lakes up in the mountains that was being dammed up by a big ice dam was let loose down the mountain when the ice dam burst. All the water poured out and came down into the valley, unbeknownst to anyone, since it happened at night. It took out one of the major railroad trestles, so when the train came along the next morning, it simply went full-steam ahead right into the raging torrent and killed almost everyone on board. We stopped by the spot where it happened and felt the horror of that time, thanks to millions of pictures and pages and pages of print.
We don’t have detailed plans, we just get up in the morning and say, ‘well, where should we go today?’ and look at the map and pick our destination. The ‘Rough Guide to NZ’ has been the source of information about what there is to see and do, so we use it to choose our route. We’re sort of going down the east side of the North Island, and we’ll probably come back to Auckland for our return flight via the west side and see what we’ve missed. I think we’re seeing most of what there is to see in the North Island on the trip down, so there won’t be much to see on the way back.
My thighs are so sore that I can hardly touch them, and I spent a lot of the day massaging them to try to work out the build-up of lactic acid in them from our ‘hike’.
We reached the Art Deco town of Napier, where we checked into the only motel in town that is right on the water. We have an unobstructed view of the lovely Hawke’s Bay for only $67 a day. Walked around the downtown and oohed and aahed at all the cutesy designs they came up with for the storefronts. The town was totally destroyed by an earthquake in 1931, and when they rebuilt it, they decided to go for something unique and consistent, resulting in a charming and eye-pleasing town. I decided that when Renton (where we live) decides to upgrade itself, it should choose Art Deco as a theme for its downtown.
Day 22 – Dec. 24 - Napier
Today being the day before Christmas, everybody who can walk is downtown shopping. There wasn’t a parking spot to be had, and the streets were clogged with cars and the sidewalks with people jostling one another. Nowhere have we seen much of the sorts of Christmas revelry that we have in the US. The shops don’t have decorations, no Santas tinkling their bells to get you to toss money into a bucket, no songs blaring over loudspeakers, no ads on tv trying to get you to buy what they’re pushing, the houses aren’t decorated, nobody’s singing carols in the streets, even the people walking down the streets don’t have huge bags full of packages.
All of the towns have main streets, and a main square or part of town that’s designated as ‘downtown’. Several blocks with small stores on both sides, almost all of which are family owned, so they have unique names; no Walmarts, no huge malls, it’s very refreshing.
It rained most of the day, so we stayed in our rooms a good bit of it, reading, napping, doing laundry, things we don’t normally do on our active days, which are most of them. During a lull in the rain, we wandered out and sat at a table outside a café with a woman and her daughter. Spent about an hour in conversation, and ended up with one more invitation to come stay with them, in Wellington.
Day 23 – Dec. 25 - Napier
Today’s Christmas, but it’s so warm, it doesn’t feel like it. And it’s not Christmas yet at home, since we’re a day ahead of them. But I made some Christmas calls anyway, since we never know where we’ll be on the morrow and if we’ll have access to phones (or internet, which is really catch-as-catch-can).
Our Christmas present to ourselves was a round of golf at NZ’s most expensive course – Cape Kidnappers. It is reached via a winding, narrow track through sheep pastures, whose access is only by calling the club from a remotely-controlled gate and giving them your name and tee time, just like its sister course, Kauri Cliffs, also owned by New Yorker Julian Robertson. It was the highest price we’ve ever paid to be miserable - $550 for one round of golf. And the wind blew so hard I thought it would blow the hair off my head. I took 4 clubs more than I would have with no wind and was still WAYYYYY too short. You had to aim 40 yards to the left or right in a crosswind. Sometimes you could hardly walk against the wind. On one green as I was preparing to hit my putt, the wind blew my ball away, and when it stopped rolling, I had a 50-yard shot to reach the same spot. I shot a 98, the highest score I can ever remember having in my life. I’m sure I had such scores when I was 12 or 13 but not since then. Playing that kind of golf is no fun. Joe didn’t even keep score. The scenery and the setting of this course is as spectacular as it gets, however. The clubhouse is on the site of an old sheep-shearing shed, and it’s all done in the fashion of one, with old wooden tools that you’d find in one of the sheds, and it’s really rustic. I think it costs over $3,000 a night to stay in one of their cottages.
Day 24 – Dec. 26 - Napier
This is Boxing Day in NZ. Don’t ask me what that is. We spent it playing golf at the Hastings Golf Club, in the town of Hastings just south of Napier. We’re using a book that describes the top 285 golf courses in NZ as our guide. The guy who took our greens fees told us to play with one of their members, ‘Patch’, so off the 3 of us went. They call him Patch because he lost one eye at age 21 in a car wreck (showed us his missing eye; wish he hadn’t.) He is a 50-year-old sheep farmer, 3rd generation. Grandfather started out with 9600 acres, he’s down to 900 due to his ancestors having to sell off land to pay the inheritance taxes (which they no longer have here). He buys lambs in the spring, fattens them up, shears them for the wool, then kills them in the fall and sells the meat. ‘How do you kill ‘em?’ ‘I pull their heads back, slit their throats, then pull their heads forward and slit their spinal cords, so they don’t feel the pain so much’. Wish I hadn’t asked.
Day 25 – Dec. 27 – Masterton to Wellington
Drove out to Lansdowne, the golf course in Masterton, that Bob Charles grew up on. He was the first leftie to ever win a majors golf tournament. It’s a bit ratty, the greens were slow as molasses, it is a sort of shooting gallery, with many fairways parallel to one another, but still a fun track. For the first time in a few rounds, I teed off from the ladies’ tees. I have been playing the men’s tees, and it makes the courses so long that it means I don’t ever feel good about my game. So today I took it easy and shot even par, which made me feel good.
Since we’re not able to catch a ferry from Wellington to the South Island for another 2 days, we’re going to hang around Wellington for a couple of days, until we can get on the ferry. We drove 3 hours, over a rugged mountain range by New Zealand standards, to the northern limit of Wellington, and went by a course people had recommended to us. Turns out it’s the only course in NZ that’s been ‘blessed’ by the Queen, so it’s been r e-named to reflect its new inflated status - it’s now the ‘Royal Wellington Golf Club’. We struck up a conversation in the parking lot with a lovely lady, Fiona Heron, who ‘would invite us to my house for dinner, but she’s meeting friends; maybe we can have lunch together tomorrow instead’. So we made arrangements to play golf with her tomorrow, then maybe go out for dinner. That’s typical NZ hospitality.
Wanted to spend the night close to the course, so as we cruised the streets, we saw a sign for lodging and followed it. Turns out it’s on the estate of one of the homes built by NZ’s equivalent of Frank Lloyd Wright – James Walter Chapman-Taylor. An interior designer, just married a week ago, bought it 12 years ago and added 2 ‘guest cottages’ to the property. We’re in one. For $70 a night we’re in a suite that looks right out of Architectural Digest. Antiques on the walls, lovely furniture, and we feel like guests in an elegant mansion. And in the fridge he put yogurt, fresh OJ, fresh strawberries, the ever-present milk, and some soda pop (he found out our faves and went out and got some for us). Perusing the guest book for this place, we found the author of a book written about the architect of this estate (as well as the book, so I read up on him), a French composer, many NZ rock stars, and all manner of famous-in-NZ people.
Day 26 – Dec. 28 –Wellington
A layover day so we headed out for golf at the Royal Wellington GC. When we went into the pro shop, we were greeted by the pro, Jack Oliver. Asked us where we were from, he told us he was from Orlando, I said I was from Leesburg, and he said, "Actually, I grew up in Leesburg, played golf at the Silver Lake Country Club (I lived next door to it!), went to Leesburg High School (so did I)." Small world, huh???
Fiona did show up with John Port in tow and off we went. Had a great game, guys vs gals, the guys won. Fiona asked where we were staying and I told her in a house that was designed by Chapman-Taylor. She yelped and said, "My husband (now deceased, a former judge) and I lived in one of his houses!" There are only 100 of them in NZ and we now have a connection to 2 of them. After golf and drinks, we got a grand tour of the clubhouse, built in 1908. John showed us 2 pictures hanging on the wall and pointed out his face among the foursome in each one; in both groups Prince Andrew’s shining face beamed out at the camera. So we were among the famous of the club today.
Because Neville, the guy who owns this estate, had offered us a tour of the ‘big house’ when we finished playing golf, and because Fiona has a big connection to this Chapman-Taylor guy, we invited her to come back with us for the tour. She took us up on it and Neville had a grand ol’ time showing off all the lovely things he’s done to this nearly-century-old house, all in impeccable taste and meeting Fiona’s approval.
Topped it all off with a delicious Turkish dinner of lamb kebabs for Joe and lamb moussakka for me. Another ‘10’ day for us.
Monday, December 29, 2008
Joe's Post Dec 30
Dec 27 Joe’s post
Did I mention the milk when you check in to a motel? Here, all motels assume that you will be at least be drinking the tea they provide. Well, you can’t drink tea without milk, can you? So when they give you your room key, they also give you a carton, or pitcher of milk. Always. That works well for us, because they also have dishes in the room. Always. And a small refrigerator. Older motels have a two burner stove, the newer ones have only a microwave, so there is not really any cooking you can do but you can eat your cereal in the morning. Life is good.
And palm trees. You see so many pictures of winter sports in NZ, you don’t get the impression that it’s a mediterranian climate in the north. So there are palm trees all over the place. They also have something called tree ferns, which grow like weeds in certain areas. We are about a half hour outside of Wellington, in the process of going from the east coast to the west coast, about a 3 hour drive, if you do it straight through. We are in the Hutt valley, where a good chunk of the Lord of the Rings movies were shot, and there are occasional palm trees here.
The geography is pretty interesting. There is a mountain range that goes down the center of the island, once you get south of Taupo, so east-west travel is limited to a few roads, some of them still gravel. Have gone from west to east to get from Taupo to Napier, and then going south from Napier, we were in a climate with scenery much like Eastern Washington. The town of Masterton, where we were last night, reminds me of Wenatchee. It was very warm today, probably 80, which is as warm as it’s been for us the entire trip. Then we went over the mountains, and it’s cool in North Hutt. But it’s also late, about 8:30.
Tomorrow we play golf at the Royal Wellington Golf course.
Dec 30
We did indeed play the Royal Wellingoton, the only golf course in the country which has been blessed by the Queen. It’s a very, very nice course and club. Not much else to say about it. We played with some very nice people, who are our age, one a recently widowed woman, and the other was a guy who was an excellent golfer, and played with Prince Andrew, when he was here. We saw the picture in the clubhouse.
The golf club is in the town of Upper Hutt, in the Hutt valley , twenty minutes northwest of Wellington proper. Wellington is very nice, a lot like Seattle, but less hectic, because it’s smaller. We were there only long enough to catch the ferry to the south island, but will spend more time on the way home to see Axel and Inge’s kids, who are taking some university courses there.
Then on to Nelson, where we spent the night, just because it was late. Tomorrow we see Able Tasman Ntl park, which is supposed to be spectacular. It is closed to vehicular traffic, so the only ways to get in are to walk or take a water taxi. We will do the latter, then walk for a few hours and the water taxi will pick us up later.
Today is the 30th of Dec, and we are within a few miles of the entrace to the Tasman Park. For whatever reason this little town, Motueka, is like Port Angeles, I guess, except the water is warm enough to swim in. There are bazillions of people, and we can’t figure out why. The locals say it’s the weather, this place is very warm, and it’s just where people go to hang out and party, and new year’s eve is tomorrow, so there will be a lot of partying. Went to the supermarket to buy stuff to eat tomorrow on the trail, and all the kids were loading up on beer. Lots of wineries here and fruit trees growing. In a month or so it will be picking season. I’m not sure what they do for labor, since ….. like… no one lives here.
And now a word about sinks and stoppers. Every sink in the country has rubber stoppers. Wonderful idea, because they work. All the time.
Bridges …. Road bridges. The roads in the country, with the exception of the very heavily (relatively speaking) travelled national Route 1, will have single lane bridges that cross small rivers and creeks. You are going 60 miles an hour, and there is a sign for a one lane bridge ahead! The sign indicates who has the right of way, and as is most likely there is nobody else on the road, you just barrel right on across.
The traditioal architecture in the Bathrooms is to have the window above the sink. The practical effect of that is that there are no power sockets, and if they are they are low wattage things for an electric shaver. Noone planned for hairdryers. The newer motels have this figured out, but there are a lot of things that are not updated. So one of the things we bought and are happy to have is a 12 foot extention cord. Good for the computer too.
Looking forward to seeing the south island. Everone says, oh the south island is soooooo much prettier than the north island. We are incredulous, because the north island was a complete delight. But we’ll see.
Did I mention the milk when you check in to a motel? Here, all motels assume that you will be at least be drinking the tea they provide. Well, you can’t drink tea without milk, can you? So when they give you your room key, they also give you a carton, or pitcher of milk. Always. That works well for us, because they also have dishes in the room. Always. And a small refrigerator. Older motels have a two burner stove, the newer ones have only a microwave, so there is not really any cooking you can do but you can eat your cereal in the morning. Life is good.
And palm trees. You see so many pictures of winter sports in NZ, you don’t get the impression that it’s a mediterranian climate in the north. So there are palm trees all over the place. They also have something called tree ferns, which grow like weeds in certain areas. We are about a half hour outside of Wellington, in the process of going from the east coast to the west coast, about a 3 hour drive, if you do it straight through. We are in the Hutt valley, where a good chunk of the Lord of the Rings movies were shot, and there are occasional palm trees here.
The geography is pretty interesting. There is a mountain range that goes down the center of the island, once you get south of Taupo, so east-west travel is limited to a few roads, some of them still gravel. Have gone from west to east to get from Taupo to Napier, and then going south from Napier, we were in a climate with scenery much like Eastern Washington. The town of Masterton, where we were last night, reminds me of Wenatchee. It was very warm today, probably 80, which is as warm as it’s been for us the entire trip. Then we went over the mountains, and it’s cool in North Hutt. But it’s also late, about 8:30.
Tomorrow we play golf at the Royal Wellington Golf course.
Dec 30
We did indeed play the Royal Wellingoton, the only golf course in the country which has been blessed by the Queen. It’s a very, very nice course and club. Not much else to say about it. We played with some very nice people, who are our age, one a recently widowed woman, and the other was a guy who was an excellent golfer, and played with Prince Andrew, when he was here. We saw the picture in the clubhouse.
The golf club is in the town of Upper Hutt, in the Hutt valley , twenty minutes northwest of Wellington proper. Wellington is very nice, a lot like Seattle, but less hectic, because it’s smaller. We were there only long enough to catch the ferry to the south island, but will spend more time on the way home to see Axel and Inge’s kids, who are taking some university courses there.
Then on to Nelson, where we spent the night, just because it was late. Tomorrow we see Able Tasman Ntl park, which is supposed to be spectacular. It is closed to vehicular traffic, so the only ways to get in are to walk or take a water taxi. We will do the latter, then walk for a few hours and the water taxi will pick us up later.
Today is the 30th of Dec, and we are within a few miles of the entrace to the Tasman Park. For whatever reason this little town, Motueka, is like Port Angeles, I guess, except the water is warm enough to swim in. There are bazillions of people, and we can’t figure out why. The locals say it’s the weather, this place is very warm, and it’s just where people go to hang out and party, and new year’s eve is tomorrow, so there will be a lot of partying. Went to the supermarket to buy stuff to eat tomorrow on the trail, and all the kids were loading up on beer. Lots of wineries here and fruit trees growing. In a month or so it will be picking season. I’m not sure what they do for labor, since ….. like… no one lives here.
And now a word about sinks and stoppers. Every sink in the country has rubber stoppers. Wonderful idea, because they work. All the time.
Bridges …. Road bridges. The roads in the country, with the exception of the very heavily (relatively speaking) travelled national Route 1, will have single lane bridges that cross small rivers and creeks. You are going 60 miles an hour, and there is a sign for a one lane bridge ahead! The sign indicates who has the right of way, and as is most likely there is nobody else on the road, you just barrel right on across.
The traditioal architecture in the Bathrooms is to have the window above the sink. The practical effect of that is that there are no power sockets, and if they are they are low wattage things for an electric shaver. Noone planned for hairdryers. The newer motels have this figured out, but there are a lot of things that are not updated. So one of the things we bought and are happy to have is a 12 foot extention cord. Good for the computer too.
Looking forward to seeing the south island. Everone says, oh the south island is soooooo much prettier than the north island. We are incredulous, because the north island was a complete delight. But we’ll see.
Tuesday, December 23, 2008
On the road to Napier
We took no more pictures on the Tongariro crossing hike. We were too tired to pull the camera out of our pockets. We staggered down for 4 hours and collapsed at the parking lot where bus took us back to the hotel. There we took a shower, and sat in the hot tub, and went to dinner where I absolutely fell asleep eating dinner. Next day we got to go for the drive over the mountains to Napier. This was a pretty valley on the way. We counted 15 cars on this 5 hour drive. As I may have said, all the people in this country are in Auckland or on the Tongariro Crossing trail. The rest of the country looks like this.... just eye candy at each turn.I would like to acknowledge the 2 people I know of so far who have found the blog, and who are not (yet) friends or family. I do appreciate your comments, and I'm glad you are following our adventures. I think you live in NZ, and we will make contact with you when we get in your neighborhood. Thanks again for your comments.
Marilyn, let Barb know that the Maori use Lemmie sticks in their dances. If she writes me email I'll send her a picture.
Emerald Pools
Volcanic lakes often have a lot of mineral content that turns them green. I'm guessing that it's gneiss, same as we have in Washington. The significance of this picture is that it's the half-way point and we ate lunch here, and it's downhill all the way from here.
Comming down
This is the half way point.... if you look hard you can see the trail of people coming down the sand slide here. The trail is ankle deep in sand, and you need to keep your feet moving, or you slide down without control. There are buried rocks about 2 or 3 inches in diameter, so there are a lot of twisted ankles coming down here. But from where the picture was taken, it's lunch time. Half way there and three-quarters of the way to death. God were we tired. Did I mention that?Winding our way up
We just thought this was a nice picture which conveys sort of what the Tongariro Crossing is all about. You can see the trail of people going off and up in the distance.
At the Top!!
We can see the top!! It's no so much that our legs hurt, tho they did, but that I was just exhausted; tired to my very core. The only thing keeping me going was that, 1, lunch is over the next hill, and 2, it is a very inconvenient place to die.Picture - Three-quarters up
I guess we are about 3/4 of the way to the top now. This trek is ike grand central station. Everyone who is a tourist is here, and dispite the difficulty of the hike, everyone is in good spirits. The weather can get very nasty. We are almost to the snow line here. When the forecast is bad, they don't let people go. It has not been good for the 3 or 4 previsous days, so we were lucky to be able to do this at all.
Picture - Inside the central crater
We are inside one of the 3 volcanos in this immediate area. The ground is warm, but not hot to the touch. The view is so interesting, I could forget about how much my legs hurt.
Picture - about half way up
Here I am near death, and it's only 2 hours into the 8 hour hike. We started on the floor in the background and have are about half way to the top.
Picture - Start of the Crossing
Here is the start of the Tongariro Crossing. See those mountions in the back? We're going up them.
Picture - Chateau Tongariro
Here is the hotel at Tongairo National Park, and the jumping off spot for the Tongariro Crossing. More preisely it's where the bus picks you up and takes you to the trail head.
Joe's post -
Dec 24 – Joe’s post
A word about the Tongariro Alpine crossing. It’s best done if you are under 30. The first 8 hours were the worst, but the last 5 minutes were not so bad, expcept that we were already near dead. The first 4 hours were really hard… all uphill, very steep. Went straight up to the rims of the craters. After that it wasn’t so bad, but we were so tired that the next four hours were really hard to do. After we got to the hotel, we sat in the hot tub and then ate. I fell asleep at the table. Went to be at 7 and slept for 12 hours and felt much better.
The scenery was really great, and we’ll post pictures of it. Definitely worthwhile, but getting old is no goddam picnic.
The mystery about why there are no people in the Country is, however solved. They are all doing the Tongariro Crossing. Every hour between 6 and nine, 5 or six large busses disgorge people for the hike. Every language imaginable is being spoken. You are supposed to bring bad weather, and cold weather clothing, food and above all water, because, the water up in the volcanic area is not drinkable. Some people brought very little, and given the difficulty of the hike, we expected them to get into trouble. But the weather was good, and these young people don’t seem to flag. The trail was full of people all the time…. I guess pictures are best….they will come. I’ll do that today.
A word about the Tongariro Alpine crossing. It’s best done if you are under 30. The first 8 hours were the worst, but the last 5 minutes were not so bad, expcept that we were already near dead. The first 4 hours were really hard… all uphill, very steep. Went straight up to the rims of the craters. After that it wasn’t so bad, but we were so tired that the next four hours were really hard to do. After we got to the hotel, we sat in the hot tub and then ate. I fell asleep at the table. Went to be at 7 and slept for 12 hours and felt much better.
The scenery was really great, and we’ll post pictures of it. Definitely worthwhile, but getting old is no goddam picnic.
The mystery about why there are no people in the Country is, however solved. They are all doing the Tongariro Crossing. Every hour between 6 and nine, 5 or six large busses disgorge people for the hike. Every language imaginable is being spoken. You are supposed to bring bad weather, and cold weather clothing, food and above all water, because, the water up in the volcanic area is not drinkable. Some people brought very little, and given the difficulty of the hike, we expected them to get into trouble. But the weather was good, and these young people don’t seem to flag. The trail was full of people all the time…. I guess pictures are best….they will come. I’ll do that today.
Random thoughts
Sun Dec 21 - Posted on the 23
I’m trying to think of things that make NZ unique, or at least different from the US. ON a day to day basis, I guess it is striking about how inexpensive it is to get along here. Most of that is due to the spectacular exchange rate. A US dollar is worth NZ$1.75 – 1.80. That means that a motel room in a nice place is maybe 60 or 70 US dollars, and the place we are staying tonite, the Chateau at Tongarara is about $100 US. We don’t stay in places like this very often, but it’s nice to do once in a while. It’s sort of like the Canadian Pacfic Hotels, a destination for the non-adventuous, who want to see great scenery.
Tomorrow we do the "Tongarara Crossing", which the guide books call the most spectacular hike in the country. It’s about 10 miles, and a van takes you to the starting point and picks you up at the end of the day at the other end. The whole country is made from volcanic eruptions, and this area has 3 volcanos which have erupted recently, like 2007 recently. Everything in this area steams, there are hot springs, pools and spas all over the place from Rotorua to Taupo to here. Life is very good.
Another thing is the almost complete lack of people everywhere. This hotel could house maybe 500 people. I count 29 cars in the parking lot, and I’m guessing that most of them are just parked there for day hikes. There are lot of people in the big cities a very few medium sized towns, like Napier, where we’re going when we’re done here, and then the zoos at Rotorua and other major resorts, but other than that, you should hope your car doesn’t break down, because there is no help.
Speaking of cars, I’ve determined that it’s impossible to get a speeding ticket here. The speed limit is 100 km/hr and it doesn’t change whether you are on the freeway in Auckland (Auckland is the only place in the country there is a freeway), or on a tiny windy back road.
There is not a gas station whenever you want one. And there are no places to get your oil changed, except gas stations… just like the US in the ‘50s.
Another striking thing is the number of songbirds all over the place. You know when the sun comes up, because the bird racket outside can’t be dulled by putting pillow over your head. I persevere, however.
An odd thing we’ve noticed is that even though most things are a bargain, houses, if you want to buy one are just about what they would cost in the US, or I should say around the Seattle area. That strikes me as odd, because most people really don’t have a lot of money, so I don’t know how they live. There aren’t that many apartment buildings outside of Auckland. A mystery to me.
I had thought that we’d find someplace we liked and rent an apt or a condo or something, so we wouldn’t have to pack and unpack every day. It hasn’t worked out that way. We have two very good guide books, "The Rough Guide to NZ" and the Dorling Kinserly one which has a lot of neat pictures, but not a lot of information. What’s happened is that we read them in the evening and say, "Ooooo let’s got to (fill in the blank) tomorrow." Every 4 or 5 days, we say, this is nice, let’s stay here another night. But we haven’t been anywhere for more than two nights, and it’s been just fine. There is another breathtaking thing to see around every curve in the road, and we like stopping for the night if there is a good golf course or something else which we need to spend time at.
Our ability to do the Tongara Crossing is heavily dependant on the weather. It’s been raining and cold in the mountains the past 2 days, so we are staying in the area until the weather clears. It’s supposed to be nice tomorrow, so that’s what we’ve planned to do. It’s nice to have enough time so that for this "must do" thing, so we won’t have to come home and say, "the weather was bad, so we didn’t get to do it."
Gotta go and make the sandwiches for tomorrows hike.
It's now Dec 23, and we did the hike yesterday. Damned near killed us at our age. More later.
late. We are in Napier now, and will be here for a couple of days, so more pictures will be forthcoming.
I’m trying to think of things that make NZ unique, or at least different from the US. ON a day to day basis, I guess it is striking about how inexpensive it is to get along here. Most of that is due to the spectacular exchange rate. A US dollar is worth NZ$1.75 – 1.80. That means that a motel room in a nice place is maybe 60 or 70 US dollars, and the place we are staying tonite, the Chateau at Tongarara is about $100 US. We don’t stay in places like this very often, but it’s nice to do once in a while. It’s sort of like the Canadian Pacfic Hotels, a destination for the non-adventuous, who want to see great scenery.
Tomorrow we do the "Tongarara Crossing", which the guide books call the most spectacular hike in the country. It’s about 10 miles, and a van takes you to the starting point and picks you up at the end of the day at the other end. The whole country is made from volcanic eruptions, and this area has 3 volcanos which have erupted recently, like 2007 recently. Everything in this area steams, there are hot springs, pools and spas all over the place from Rotorua to Taupo to here. Life is very good.
Another thing is the almost complete lack of people everywhere. This hotel could house maybe 500 people. I count 29 cars in the parking lot, and I’m guessing that most of them are just parked there for day hikes. There are lot of people in the big cities a very few medium sized towns, like Napier, where we’re going when we’re done here, and then the zoos at Rotorua and other major resorts, but other than that, you should hope your car doesn’t break down, because there is no help.
Speaking of cars, I’ve determined that it’s impossible to get a speeding ticket here. The speed limit is 100 km/hr and it doesn’t change whether you are on the freeway in Auckland (Auckland is the only place in the country there is a freeway), or on a tiny windy back road.
There is not a gas station whenever you want one. And there are no places to get your oil changed, except gas stations… just like the US in the ‘50s.
Another striking thing is the number of songbirds all over the place. You know when the sun comes up, because the bird racket outside can’t be dulled by putting pillow over your head. I persevere, however.
An odd thing we’ve noticed is that even though most things are a bargain, houses, if you want to buy one are just about what they would cost in the US, or I should say around the Seattle area. That strikes me as odd, because most people really don’t have a lot of money, so I don’t know how they live. There aren’t that many apartment buildings outside of Auckland. A mystery to me.
I had thought that we’d find someplace we liked and rent an apt or a condo or something, so we wouldn’t have to pack and unpack every day. It hasn’t worked out that way. We have two very good guide books, "The Rough Guide to NZ" and the Dorling Kinserly one which has a lot of neat pictures, but not a lot of information. What’s happened is that we read them in the evening and say, "Ooooo let’s got to (fill in the blank) tomorrow." Every 4 or 5 days, we say, this is nice, let’s stay here another night. But we haven’t been anywhere for more than two nights, and it’s been just fine. There is another breathtaking thing to see around every curve in the road, and we like stopping for the night if there is a good golf course or something else which we need to spend time at.
Our ability to do the Tongara Crossing is heavily dependant on the weather. It’s been raining and cold in the mountains the past 2 days, so we are staying in the area until the weather clears. It’s supposed to be nice tomorrow, so that’s what we’ve planned to do. It’s nice to have enough time so that for this "must do" thing, so we won’t have to come home and say, "the weather was bad, so we didn’t get to do it."
Gotta go and make the sandwiches for tomorrows hike.
It's now Dec 23, and we did the hike yesterday. Damned near killed us at our age. More later.
late. We are in Napier now, and will be here for a couple of days, so more pictures will be forthcoming.
Wednesday, December 17, 2008
Joe's post
Thursday Dec 11
One of the funny things about NZ is that the hole in the ozone which started out over Antarctica has spread over to NZ. Depending on who you talk to, the ozone layer is either completely gone here, or it’s just thin. I need to look at the internet, which I don’t have as I compose this, to find out the facts. But what I know for sure is that if you don’t put on sun screen when you go out, you burn fast . Sunscreen is a way of life as are hats.
The climate here is in general a lot like Seattle. Best place on earth durning the summer, and mostly wet for the rest of the year.
We saw a bunch of Orca whales just off the beach here where we are staying tonite in Mangonui. If you can find a NZ map, it way the hell north, but not to the top. What you have to get used to, is that more north is more warm it is, altho this is substantially mitigated by the fact that the island is much narrower, so being near the water cools things off. We’re staying at a motel near the beach, and last nite we needed a jacket as we walked on the beach to watch the whales.
One of the funny things about NZ is that the hole in the ozone which started out over Antarctica has spread over to NZ. Depending on who you talk to, the ozone layer is either completely gone here, or it’s just thin. I need to look at the internet, which I don’t have as I compose this, to find out the facts. But what I know for sure is that if you don’t put on sun screen when you go out, you burn fast . Sunscreen is a way of life as are hats.
The climate here is in general a lot like Seattle. Best place on earth durning the summer, and mostly wet for the rest of the year.
We saw a bunch of Orca whales just off the beach here where we are staying tonite in Mangonui. If you can find a NZ map, it way the hell north, but not to the top. What you have to get used to, is that more north is more warm it is, altho this is substantially mitigated by the fact that the island is much narrower, so being near the water cools things off. We’re staying at a motel near the beach, and last nite we needed a jacket as we walked on the beach to watch the whales.
Tuesday, December 16, 2008
Picture
Accomodation is no problem. There is no shortage of wonderful places to stay. The country is set up for students and backpackers. This one has 2 sections, one for backpackers, which has spartin rooms, and the loo is down the hall, and one which has marvelous period funishings and bath in the suite.
Because of the exchange rate, everything is about half of what you would expect to pay in the States
Picture
Here , they have a tree which bloom red blossoms in Dec, so they call it a Christmas tree. This picture doesn't really capture how red the blossoms are, but it does dress up the golf course.
Picture
This is the beach where the Maori was pulled out by the rip tide, and his body was recovered a few hours later on 12/12.
Picture
This is Kauri Cliffs Golf course, one of the top 50 in the world. Everything about this is first class; it is owned by an American, so it lacks the flavor of a real New Zealand golf experience, but it is nice to have uniform grass on the fairways.
Pictures from our trip
This shows the lovely Villa du Fresne where we stayed. It sits on top of the cliff and has a red roof.Days 13-14
Day 13 – Dec. 15 – Omopere to Helensville
NZ is like America used to be before the days of the corporatocracy, before the almighty dollar became king. They close most of their stores on Sunday, with the exception of the big chains, of which there are very few here. And they close most of them by 7 pm, instead of staying open until 10 pm or all night. That’s sort of comforting.
The motel we stayed in last night – the Copthorne – was a welcome relief for breakfast this morning. After days of granola with a banana on it, they had a huge spread – eggs, bacon, sausage, sweet rolls, peaches (canned), yogurt, and some round purple thingie that turned out to be a pickled ‘rid plom’ (after 3 repeats I figured out it was a red plum. Sounds horrible but it was so tasty I ate 2 of ‘em.
We’re now officially heading out of the Northland where we’ve spent our whole vacation so far. There are very few things of real interest before we get down to Rotorua and the beginning of our dissection of the south part of this island. One of them was the last large kauri forests (relatively speaking, since the whole northern half of the island was once one huge kauri forest) still remaining ‘undisturbed’ (i.e., destroyed). The largest tree in the whole world is just a hundred yards off the road. As we were heading for it, I glanced over to my left and there it was. I have rarely been stunned into disbelief and awe, but this tree did it for me. It was larger than any redwood or sequoia I’d ever seen, and very strange-looking, with its branches beginning 60 feet in the air and of a very unusual shape. Now 20 feet in diameter, it was just a seedling when Christ was born. We just stared, wordless, for several minutes, until our necks ached from looking so far overhead.
Just down the road is a must-see museum where we spent several fascinating hours, and could have spent a whole day. The Kauri Museum shows in great detail, with many pictures and millions of words, the whole history of how they discovered the trees, sawed them down (a monumental effort since they’re so HUGE!), hauled them out to a river or road or harbor where they could then transport them on ships or railroads to the sawmills, where they had to invent new machines to deal with cutting trees so huge, then to their final owners. They even had a working sawmill, created from actual machinery that had been in the real sawmills, to show how they cut the monsters into boards, planks, panels, or smaller pieces that could then be made into ships’ masts, furniture, walls, ceilings, floors, and small items like bowls.
Most of the rest of the day was spent just driving through beautiful pastureland and hills that just 100 years ago had been dense forests filled with the giant kauri but are now bare of most trees. We’re headed out of the Northland at a pretty good clip, as fast as these very curvy roads will allow. Stopped for the night in a non-descript town called Helensville. Stayed in a B&B called Malolo that used to be a hospital during WWII, so it has many rooms and a very strange configuration, having been added to in several directions as they needed space. Only place open, since it’s Monday and most restaurants are closed that day, was an Indian takeaway (their word for take-out) that had 5 tiny tables. Even though it was served on plastic plates from plastic containers and they only gave us spoons with which to eat it, it was piping hot and delicious. Since we were the only customers, the very friendly Indian guys who ran it asked us a million questions about America, our political situation, Obama, the war, and, like everyone else, are glad Bush is on his way out.
Day 14 – Dec. 16 – Helensville to Hamilton
We have now seen all of the Northland (that is the part north of Auckland, NZ’s only really large city, of 1.2 million inhabitants), and are headed for parts south. On travel days, as opposed to sight-seeing days, we like to break it up by playing a round of golf. Our golf book mentioned an Alistair MacKenzie course, Titirangi, in west Auckland, so we stopped off to see if we could play. There were only 2 people on the range, nobody on the course, and the parking lot was empty. We knew something was off, then it was confirmed by a sign on the pro shop door saying they were closed for several days due to ‘coring’, our version of ‘punching’ the fairways and greens. So we went instead to a mediocre course, Maungakiekie, paid our $20 each, including ‘trundler’ to haul our bags, and teed off with a couple of Kiwis. They were delightful, and hit the ball in every direction but towards the green. We had a great time and got to see parts of the course we never would have without their being along, as we hunted in the weeds and woods for their balls. Saw our first wild parrot, rooting in the grass for bugs or whatever he eats. Bright yellow, red, and green, he entertained us for several minutes.
After eating at the excellent Thai restaurant called Tusk, which one of our golf partners recommended, we made a beeline for the south side of Auckland and the open country. We’re on our way to Rotorua, one of the 5 stinkiest places on earth. Stopped off in Hamilton, a good-sized town with a million motels, and chose the Aquarius because of its internet connection. This is the biggest motel room we’ve seen yet, with a living room/dining room combo with a bed, separate large kitchen, bedroom, hallway and bath, all for $55. Love that NZ dollar - $1 of ours buys $1.60 of theirs, so this is going to be a relatively inexpensive 3 months. Especially with golf so cheap – except for the Kauri Cliffs types.
None of places we’ve stayed, with the exception of Villa du Fresne in Russell, has had a plug for a hair dryer in the bathroom. I guess Kiwis dry their hair in the bedroom, but few of our bedrooms have had mirrors, essential for that morning task. So we bought a 12-foot extension cord so I could stand in the bathroom and dry my hair.
NZ is like America used to be before the days of the corporatocracy, before the almighty dollar became king. They close most of their stores on Sunday, with the exception of the big chains, of which there are very few here. And they close most of them by 7 pm, instead of staying open until 10 pm or all night. That’s sort of comforting.
The motel we stayed in last night – the Copthorne – was a welcome relief for breakfast this morning. After days of granola with a banana on it, they had a huge spread – eggs, bacon, sausage, sweet rolls, peaches (canned), yogurt, and some round purple thingie that turned out to be a pickled ‘rid plom’ (after 3 repeats I figured out it was a red plum. Sounds horrible but it was so tasty I ate 2 of ‘em.
We’re now officially heading out of the Northland where we’ve spent our whole vacation so far. There are very few things of real interest before we get down to Rotorua and the beginning of our dissection of the south part of this island. One of them was the last large kauri forests (relatively speaking, since the whole northern half of the island was once one huge kauri forest) still remaining ‘undisturbed’ (i.e., destroyed). The largest tree in the whole world is just a hundred yards off the road. As we were heading for it, I glanced over to my left and there it was. I have rarely been stunned into disbelief and awe, but this tree did it for me. It was larger than any redwood or sequoia I’d ever seen, and very strange-looking, with its branches beginning 60 feet in the air and of a very unusual shape. Now 20 feet in diameter, it was just a seedling when Christ was born. We just stared, wordless, for several minutes, until our necks ached from looking so far overhead.
Just down the road is a must-see museum where we spent several fascinating hours, and could have spent a whole day. The Kauri Museum shows in great detail, with many pictures and millions of words, the whole history of how they discovered the trees, sawed them down (a monumental effort since they’re so HUGE!), hauled them out to a river or road or harbor where they could then transport them on ships or railroads to the sawmills, where they had to invent new machines to deal with cutting trees so huge, then to their final owners. They even had a working sawmill, created from actual machinery that had been in the real sawmills, to show how they cut the monsters into boards, planks, panels, or smaller pieces that could then be made into ships’ masts, furniture, walls, ceilings, floors, and small items like bowls.
Most of the rest of the day was spent just driving through beautiful pastureland and hills that just 100 years ago had been dense forests filled with the giant kauri but are now bare of most trees. We’re headed out of the Northland at a pretty good clip, as fast as these very curvy roads will allow. Stopped for the night in a non-descript town called Helensville. Stayed in a B&B called Malolo that used to be a hospital during WWII, so it has many rooms and a very strange configuration, having been added to in several directions as they needed space. Only place open, since it’s Monday and most restaurants are closed that day, was an Indian takeaway (their word for take-out) that had 5 tiny tables. Even though it was served on plastic plates from plastic containers and they only gave us spoons with which to eat it, it was piping hot and delicious. Since we were the only customers, the very friendly Indian guys who ran it asked us a million questions about America, our political situation, Obama, the war, and, like everyone else, are glad Bush is on his way out.
Day 14 – Dec. 16 – Helensville to Hamilton
We have now seen all of the Northland (that is the part north of Auckland, NZ’s only really large city, of 1.2 million inhabitants), and are headed for parts south. On travel days, as opposed to sight-seeing days, we like to break it up by playing a round of golf. Our golf book mentioned an Alistair MacKenzie course, Titirangi, in west Auckland, so we stopped off to see if we could play. There were only 2 people on the range, nobody on the course, and the parking lot was empty. We knew something was off, then it was confirmed by a sign on the pro shop door saying they were closed for several days due to ‘coring’, our version of ‘punching’ the fairways and greens. So we went instead to a mediocre course, Maungakiekie, paid our $20 each, including ‘trundler’ to haul our bags, and teed off with a couple of Kiwis. They were delightful, and hit the ball in every direction but towards the green. We had a great time and got to see parts of the course we never would have without their being along, as we hunted in the weeds and woods for their balls. Saw our first wild parrot, rooting in the grass for bugs or whatever he eats. Bright yellow, red, and green, he entertained us for several minutes.
After eating at the excellent Thai restaurant called Tusk, which one of our golf partners recommended, we made a beeline for the south side of Auckland and the open country. We’re on our way to Rotorua, one of the 5 stinkiest places on earth. Stopped off in Hamilton, a good-sized town with a million motels, and chose the Aquarius because of its internet connection. This is the biggest motel room we’ve seen yet, with a living room/dining room combo with a bed, separate large kitchen, bedroom, hallway and bath, all for $55. Love that NZ dollar - $1 of ours buys $1.60 of theirs, so this is going to be a relatively inexpensive 3 months. Especially with golf so cheap – except for the Kauri Cliffs types.
None of places we’ve stayed, with the exception of Villa du Fresne in Russell, has had a plug for a hair dryer in the bathroom. I guess Kiwis dry their hair in the bedroom, but few of our bedrooms have had mirrors, essential for that morning task. So we bought a 12-foot extension cord so I could stand in the bathroom and dry my hair.
Days 8 - 12
Day 8 – Dec. 10 - Russell to Cable Bay, Golf at Kauri Cliffs
The owners of Villa du Fresne, where we’ve been staying, flew an American flag from their flagpole so all the neighbors would know who’s staying there . I wondered if that was a good idea, seeing as how the image of America has been so tarnished over the past 8 years. Truth is, the NZ-ers understand that the government and the people are not the same thing, and they mostly love the Americans they’ve met, wherever they’ve encountered them. Some said they’d never travel to America as long as Bush was president. All ask us what we think of Obama, how we think he’ll get us out of the mess we’re in, and all sorts of other questions best left out of this discussion. In general, everyone we’ve met feels very hopeful about the upcoming change in administration.
Maureen, the owner of Villa du Fresne, usually fixes breakfast for her guests, but last week she was in a hardware store and an ax handle fell off a shelf and bonked her on the head. Ever since, she’s had a headache and hasn’t felt up to cooking. She said nobody sues anybody here for things like that. There’s a government fund for things like that, and the hardware store paid for all the expenses related to the ‘bonk’, and the health care is basically free.
Before we left, we did some research on NZ golf courses and the names Kauri Cliffs and Cape Kidnappers kept coming up, with the added info that they were very expensive. Well, now here we are, as close as we’re ever going to get to Kauri Cliffs, and we have to figure out if we’re going to bite the bullet and play it or not. This is probably the only time in our lives we’ll have the opportunity. But it’s about $600 for the round for us two. We debated at some length about playing and in the end, we justified it by saying it would be my early birthday present (my b’day is in 2 days). We called the course to see if we could get a tee time. ‘Whenever you want one’ Can you put somebody with us? ‘No, the only other people playing today besides you is a couple who like to play alone.’ Do you think somebody else might show up to play with us? ‘No, we don’t get drop-ins here.’ My gosh, are we going to play golf by ourselves for 3 months???
We drove for many miles through beautiful, uninhabited pasture country, coming to realize why nobody ‘drops in’ here. It’s in the middle of freakin-nowhere. Finally we got to the turnoff and went down a dusty dirt road for several miles and dead-ended in a claypit Turned around and a mile or so back saw a tiny road with a tiny sign for the course. Down that road another mile was a closed gate with a phone next to it. The guy who I’d talked with earlier answered and opened the gate remotely for us. When we pulled into the parking lot, which had about 6 cars in it, prolly mostly employees, he met us in a golf cart and chatted with us all the time we got out stuff together. It was prolly a break in the monotony for him.
From the driving range we hit balls (for which we had to pay extra!) into one of the most spectacular views on earth. And the views from every hole on the course were so breath-taking that it took us an extra half-hour or so because of all the photo ops. The course architect made 46 trips from Florida to complete the design. That’s a lot of hours in the air. I imagine Julian Robertson, the Wall Street magnate who built both these great courses sent his private jet for him. But based on the play it appears to get, he must have created them for the tax write-offs. Great course, beautiful weather, worth every penny!
Drove on down the road to a lovely little resort town called Cable Bay and got a room at the Driftwood Lodge right on the beach. Took a walk on the sand and out in the water in front of our motel we saw some black fins about 3-feet high slicing through the water. Turned out to be a pod of about 10 orca whales and they frolicked for about a half-hour right in front of us, rolling, blowing, and breaching. What a sight!!
Day 9 – Dec. 11 – lounging in Cable Bay
Decided to take a day off from traveling, so we’re staying put here for another night. When we finally rolled out of bed, we found out we’d missed seeing about 60 dolphins playing out in front of the motel for about an hour before we got up. Spent the whole day reading, walking on the beach, and relaxing. The highlight of the day was tossing a loaf of moldy bread into the air right into the gaping maws of about 100 seagulls that surrounded us as soon as they saw free food. They would hover right above our heads, and when I made eye contact with one, I tossed a piece right at him. They are the most agile of birds! No matter if I threw it above, below, or behind them, they’d swoop down, soar up, or turn themselves inside out to get behind them for the tidbit. We spent a delightful 15 minutes in pretty intimate contact with these entertaining creatures.
This motel has its own water system, as do all of the buildings in this hamlet. They have gutters all around the roofs that funnel down into one pipe that goes out to a huge cistern that collects the rainwater. I asked if they then filter the leaves and bugs out of it before it goes into the house? ‘Oh, no, we drink it, bugs and all. When we go to the other islands, we never catch anything because we’ve built up immunities to everything.’ Yuk.
Cable Bay got its name from the fact that a telephone cable was laid by ship from Australia to this place in 1902!!
Had one of the best Thai meals we’ve ever had anywhere in a lovely town of Mangonui, which means big shark.
Day 10 – Dec. 12 – my birthday; Cable Bay to Rangiputa
Well, today is my 65th birthday, and we began the celebration with eggs Benedict for breakfast at a café right on the beach. Then we played golf at Carrington Resort, another deserted course. I don’t see how these courses stay in business. Again, there wasn’t a soul around for us to play with, and we didn’t see anybody else on the course until we were teeing off on #18. It was another excellent course, though not quite the caliber of Kuari Cliffs.
My birthday lunch was a peanut butter and jelly sandwich eaten on #12.
We drove to a place out on a peninsula that the owners of the Driftwood Lodge had recommended – the Reef Motel in Rangiputa. Went for a walk on a crescent beach about 3 miles long. Started at one end and walked to the other end and back. Took 2 hours. In the middle of walk we came upon the only other people on the beach, about 8 Maoris in bathing suits sitting in 2 cars on the beach. As we walked up, they greeted us, solemnly, and the oldest one, grizzled and toothless, told us they had been swimming and one of their friends got separated from them, and got swept out to sea by an undertow. It had been 2 hours since he’d been gone, and they were sure he was dead. They were waiting for his body to wash up on shore. Further down the beach we came upon the only other people on the beach – 2 policemen who were in contact with a Coast Guard boat which was cruising up and down the shore looking for the body.
As we walked we kept scanning the surf for a dead body. I wasn’t sure I wanted to see it. About an hour later the Coast Guard boat stopped, right out from the Maori party, and spent about 15 minutes leaning over the edge. When we got back to the Maoris, they said the Coast Guard had found the body and were trying to pull it into the boat. After they did, they pulled away at full speed, headed for the harbor at Mangonui. That experience was a first for both of us. My birthday, his death day.
Rangiputa is miles from nowhere. We wanted to celebrate my birthday with a nice meal, but by the time we got back to the motel, it was already 7 pm and the closest town with a restaurant was nearly an hour away. So I ate a peanut butter and smashed banana sandwich, with a glass of tomato juice and a few squares of Hershey bar, then watched ‘Bad News Bears’ on tv.
Day 11 – Dec. 13 – Cape Reinga, Ahipara
Had to get up at 6 am to catch a tour bus. It picked us up at one of the tourist stops, the Ancient Kauri Kingdom, which was a repository for a collection of old kauri stumps. Before the Europeans came, the entire northern half of the north island was covered in forests of kauri trees. They are HUGE trees, like the redwoods, as big as 15 feet in diameter and a couple of hundred feet tall. Their wood is soft and workable like pine and their grain is straight, making it good for furniture, boats, and masts of ships. The Maoris hollowed them out to make their canoes. Once the Europeans found out how marketable these trees were, they set about chopping them down and selling them all over the world. Today there are only a few left and they’re protected.
In addition to the trees’ wood, they secreted a sap that was found to make excellent varnish. So the Europeans harvested this ‘gum’, too. Once they ran out of the living trees for wood and gum, they investigated a bunch of stumps they found sticking out of the ground. Turns out that twice in ancient history, once 150,000 years ago and again 45,000 years ago, great cataclysms occurred to destroy most life on New Zealand. Tsunamis caused by earthquakes or meteors hitting the earth washed over the islands, breaking off the trees and leaving their stumps in the ground. Erosion has covered up many of the stumps, but many are still visible, nearly fossilized after so long in the swamps. Because the kauri wood is so prized, it is worth it to spend the money to winch these 150-ton behemoths out of the swamps, clean them up and sell them. The gum was also worth reclaiming for a while during the early part of the 20th century, though it was back-breaking work. With the advent of man-made products to do the same job for lots less money, the trade dried up. The holes left in the ground from digging out the gum are everywhere, and now the landowners charge the bus tours money to bring the hordes by to see the holes, the shacks the gum-diggers lived in, and the tools they used.
The Maoris own the entire north end of the island, which is almost entirely pastures full of sheep and cows. We even saw a bunch of wild turkeys and some emus – the large flightless birds - standing in a field. The land grew more and more rugged as we got further north. Finally, the road became steeper and curvier and suddenly we were on top of the world, at the northernmost point of land in the country. At the tip of the peninsula sat a lighthouse, serving no purpose any more except for fodder for photographs, as all the ships use GPS now. This is the place where the blue-green Tasman Sea meets the gray waters of the Pacific, and it’s a dramatic demarcation.
Sand dunes comprise a lot of the northern landscape, several hundred feet tall and very steep in places. At one spot the bus stopped, we all climbed out, the brave and/or young each grabbed one of the plastic ‘sleds’ being handed out by the driver, and we clawed our way up to the top of one of the highest and steepest dunes. When we got to the top, we sat down, pushed off, and, using our hands behind us as brakes and steering, went flying down the face of the dune, screaming all the way, while sand flying up from our hands poured down the backs of our shirts and filled our hair.
We befriended one of the other couples on the bus, Maureen and Peter Morrow, originally from Capetown, South Africa, and now living in Auckland. At each stop we would gravitate together, until by the end of the day we’d become fast friends. We spent the night at the same campground at Ahipara, us in a cabin, they in their tent. We went to dinner together at the Bayview Restaurant, overlooking the water, and I finally got my birthday dinner – a very tasty Scotch fillet steak, french fries (served with EVERYTHING here), and cheesecake. He’s a 10-handicap golfer, so we had a long conversation about golf.
Day 12 – Dec. 14 – Ahipara to Omopere, golf with Stefan and Mark
Exchanged addresses with Maureen and Peter and set off for the golf course, which was right next to the campground. We had to tee off in a hurry to get ahead of a tournament group, so we joined a twosome of men. Finally we get to play with somebody!!! Joining up with them resulted in today’s being a 10. The layout was a links course, with narrow, undulating, winding fairways, true greens. A brisk wind wrought havoc with our tee shots. Some of the fairways were completely covered with little 1-inch high sand piles made by black flies that filled the air. These little hills were so thick sometimes there were only 2-3 inches between them, thousands to a fairway. Those fairways had little grass on them. And then other fairways had no fly hills at all. Go figure.
The men we joined, Mark and Stefan, were delightful. Lots of light-hearted banter bounced around among us all. After our round, we sat out on the deck for about an hour and discussed the U.S. economy, politics, China, the Iraq war, Obama, golf, and about everything you can cover in an hour. When Stefan disappeared for a break, Mark told us that Stefan came over from England and paid the highest price for a house that has ever been sold in the Northland, right on the bay in Mangonui. ‘He’s a bazillionaire, probably the richest man in the Northland’, Mark told us. And one of the nicest I’ve ever met.
They told us that we’d seen almost everything the Northland has to offer, and their suggestion is to boogie on down to the South Island and spend the rest of our vacation down there. We still have a couple of things to see, but we’ve mostly seen everything the books say is important. We hopped in the car and headed south down the winding, narrow road at a good clip. Ended up in Omapere at the Copthorne Motel, one of a string of really nice motels in the bigger towns. After the rustic and primitive places we’ve been staying in the past week or so, it seems like the Ritz. Had dinner at the one restaurant that was open on Sunday night, with white linen tablecloths and menus that weren’t greasy. Truth is, I now prefer the laid-back and rustic to this sterile and brand-new place. But I could get used to nice things again.
The owners of Villa du Fresne, where we’ve been staying, flew an American flag from their flagpole so all the neighbors would know who’s staying there . I wondered if that was a good idea, seeing as how the image of America has been so tarnished over the past 8 years. Truth is, the NZ-ers understand that the government and the people are not the same thing, and they mostly love the Americans they’ve met, wherever they’ve encountered them. Some said they’d never travel to America as long as Bush was president. All ask us what we think of Obama, how we think he’ll get us out of the mess we’re in, and all sorts of other questions best left out of this discussion. In general, everyone we’ve met feels very hopeful about the upcoming change in administration.
Maureen, the owner of Villa du Fresne, usually fixes breakfast for her guests, but last week she was in a hardware store and an ax handle fell off a shelf and bonked her on the head. Ever since, she’s had a headache and hasn’t felt up to cooking. She said nobody sues anybody here for things like that. There’s a government fund for things like that, and the hardware store paid for all the expenses related to the ‘bonk’, and the health care is basically free.
Before we left, we did some research on NZ golf courses and the names Kauri Cliffs and Cape Kidnappers kept coming up, with the added info that they were very expensive. Well, now here we are, as close as we’re ever going to get to Kauri Cliffs, and we have to figure out if we’re going to bite the bullet and play it or not. This is probably the only time in our lives we’ll have the opportunity. But it’s about $600 for the round for us two. We debated at some length about playing and in the end, we justified it by saying it would be my early birthday present (my b’day is in 2 days). We called the course to see if we could get a tee time. ‘Whenever you want one’ Can you put somebody with us? ‘No, the only other people playing today besides you is a couple who like to play alone.’ Do you think somebody else might show up to play with us? ‘No, we don’t get drop-ins here.’ My gosh, are we going to play golf by ourselves for 3 months???
We drove for many miles through beautiful, uninhabited pasture country, coming to realize why nobody ‘drops in’ here. It’s in the middle of freakin-nowhere. Finally we got to the turnoff and went down a dusty dirt road for several miles and dead-ended in a claypit Turned around and a mile or so back saw a tiny road with a tiny sign for the course. Down that road another mile was a closed gate with a phone next to it. The guy who I’d talked with earlier answered and opened the gate remotely for us. When we pulled into the parking lot, which had about 6 cars in it, prolly mostly employees, he met us in a golf cart and chatted with us all the time we got out stuff together. It was prolly a break in the monotony for him.
From the driving range we hit balls (for which we had to pay extra!) into one of the most spectacular views on earth. And the views from every hole on the course were so breath-taking that it took us an extra half-hour or so because of all the photo ops. The course architect made 46 trips from Florida to complete the design. That’s a lot of hours in the air. I imagine Julian Robertson, the Wall Street magnate who built both these great courses sent his private jet for him. But based on the play it appears to get, he must have created them for the tax write-offs. Great course, beautiful weather, worth every penny!
Drove on down the road to a lovely little resort town called Cable Bay and got a room at the Driftwood Lodge right on the beach. Took a walk on the sand and out in the water in front of our motel we saw some black fins about 3-feet high slicing through the water. Turned out to be a pod of about 10 orca whales and they frolicked for about a half-hour right in front of us, rolling, blowing, and breaching. What a sight!!
Day 9 – Dec. 11 – lounging in Cable Bay
Decided to take a day off from traveling, so we’re staying put here for another night. When we finally rolled out of bed, we found out we’d missed seeing about 60 dolphins playing out in front of the motel for about an hour before we got up. Spent the whole day reading, walking on the beach, and relaxing. The highlight of the day was tossing a loaf of moldy bread into the air right into the gaping maws of about 100 seagulls that surrounded us as soon as they saw free food. They would hover right above our heads, and when I made eye contact with one, I tossed a piece right at him. They are the most agile of birds! No matter if I threw it above, below, or behind them, they’d swoop down, soar up, or turn themselves inside out to get behind them for the tidbit. We spent a delightful 15 minutes in pretty intimate contact with these entertaining creatures.
This motel has its own water system, as do all of the buildings in this hamlet. They have gutters all around the roofs that funnel down into one pipe that goes out to a huge cistern that collects the rainwater. I asked if they then filter the leaves and bugs out of it before it goes into the house? ‘Oh, no, we drink it, bugs and all. When we go to the other islands, we never catch anything because we’ve built up immunities to everything.’ Yuk.
Cable Bay got its name from the fact that a telephone cable was laid by ship from Australia to this place in 1902!!
Had one of the best Thai meals we’ve ever had anywhere in a lovely town of Mangonui, which means big shark.
Day 10 – Dec. 12 – my birthday; Cable Bay to Rangiputa
Well, today is my 65th birthday, and we began the celebration with eggs Benedict for breakfast at a café right on the beach. Then we played golf at Carrington Resort, another deserted course. I don’t see how these courses stay in business. Again, there wasn’t a soul around for us to play with, and we didn’t see anybody else on the course until we were teeing off on #18. It was another excellent course, though not quite the caliber of Kuari Cliffs.
My birthday lunch was a peanut butter and jelly sandwich eaten on #12.
We drove to a place out on a peninsula that the owners of the Driftwood Lodge had recommended – the Reef Motel in Rangiputa. Went for a walk on a crescent beach about 3 miles long. Started at one end and walked to the other end and back. Took 2 hours. In the middle of walk we came upon the only other people on the beach, about 8 Maoris in bathing suits sitting in 2 cars on the beach. As we walked up, they greeted us, solemnly, and the oldest one, grizzled and toothless, told us they had been swimming and one of their friends got separated from them, and got swept out to sea by an undertow. It had been 2 hours since he’d been gone, and they were sure he was dead. They were waiting for his body to wash up on shore. Further down the beach we came upon the only other people on the beach – 2 policemen who were in contact with a Coast Guard boat which was cruising up and down the shore looking for the body.
As we walked we kept scanning the surf for a dead body. I wasn’t sure I wanted to see it. About an hour later the Coast Guard boat stopped, right out from the Maori party, and spent about 15 minutes leaning over the edge. When we got back to the Maoris, they said the Coast Guard had found the body and were trying to pull it into the boat. After they did, they pulled away at full speed, headed for the harbor at Mangonui. That experience was a first for both of us. My birthday, his death day.
Rangiputa is miles from nowhere. We wanted to celebrate my birthday with a nice meal, but by the time we got back to the motel, it was already 7 pm and the closest town with a restaurant was nearly an hour away. So I ate a peanut butter and smashed banana sandwich, with a glass of tomato juice and a few squares of Hershey bar, then watched ‘Bad News Bears’ on tv.
Day 11 – Dec. 13 – Cape Reinga, Ahipara
Had to get up at 6 am to catch a tour bus. It picked us up at one of the tourist stops, the Ancient Kauri Kingdom, which was a repository for a collection of old kauri stumps. Before the Europeans came, the entire northern half of the north island was covered in forests of kauri trees. They are HUGE trees, like the redwoods, as big as 15 feet in diameter and a couple of hundred feet tall. Their wood is soft and workable like pine and their grain is straight, making it good for furniture, boats, and masts of ships. The Maoris hollowed them out to make their canoes. Once the Europeans found out how marketable these trees were, they set about chopping them down and selling them all over the world. Today there are only a few left and they’re protected.
In addition to the trees’ wood, they secreted a sap that was found to make excellent varnish. So the Europeans harvested this ‘gum’, too. Once they ran out of the living trees for wood and gum, they investigated a bunch of stumps they found sticking out of the ground. Turns out that twice in ancient history, once 150,000 years ago and again 45,000 years ago, great cataclysms occurred to destroy most life on New Zealand. Tsunamis caused by earthquakes or meteors hitting the earth washed over the islands, breaking off the trees and leaving their stumps in the ground. Erosion has covered up many of the stumps, but many are still visible, nearly fossilized after so long in the swamps. Because the kauri wood is so prized, it is worth it to spend the money to winch these 150-ton behemoths out of the swamps, clean them up and sell them. The gum was also worth reclaiming for a while during the early part of the 20th century, though it was back-breaking work. With the advent of man-made products to do the same job for lots less money, the trade dried up. The holes left in the ground from digging out the gum are everywhere, and now the landowners charge the bus tours money to bring the hordes by to see the holes, the shacks the gum-diggers lived in, and the tools they used.
The Maoris own the entire north end of the island, which is almost entirely pastures full of sheep and cows. We even saw a bunch of wild turkeys and some emus – the large flightless birds - standing in a field. The land grew more and more rugged as we got further north. Finally, the road became steeper and curvier and suddenly we were on top of the world, at the northernmost point of land in the country. At the tip of the peninsula sat a lighthouse, serving no purpose any more except for fodder for photographs, as all the ships use GPS now. This is the place where the blue-green Tasman Sea meets the gray waters of the Pacific, and it’s a dramatic demarcation.
Sand dunes comprise a lot of the northern landscape, several hundred feet tall and very steep in places. At one spot the bus stopped, we all climbed out, the brave and/or young each grabbed one of the plastic ‘sleds’ being handed out by the driver, and we clawed our way up to the top of one of the highest and steepest dunes. When we got to the top, we sat down, pushed off, and, using our hands behind us as brakes and steering, went flying down the face of the dune, screaming all the way, while sand flying up from our hands poured down the backs of our shirts and filled our hair.
We befriended one of the other couples on the bus, Maureen and Peter Morrow, originally from Capetown, South Africa, and now living in Auckland. At each stop we would gravitate together, until by the end of the day we’d become fast friends. We spent the night at the same campground at Ahipara, us in a cabin, they in their tent. We went to dinner together at the Bayview Restaurant, overlooking the water, and I finally got my birthday dinner – a very tasty Scotch fillet steak, french fries (served with EVERYTHING here), and cheesecake. He’s a 10-handicap golfer, so we had a long conversation about golf.
Day 12 – Dec. 14 – Ahipara to Omopere, golf with Stefan and Mark
Exchanged addresses with Maureen and Peter and set off for the golf course, which was right next to the campground. We had to tee off in a hurry to get ahead of a tournament group, so we joined a twosome of men. Finally we get to play with somebody!!! Joining up with them resulted in today’s being a 10. The layout was a links course, with narrow, undulating, winding fairways, true greens. A brisk wind wrought havoc with our tee shots. Some of the fairways were completely covered with little 1-inch high sand piles made by black flies that filled the air. These little hills were so thick sometimes there were only 2-3 inches between them, thousands to a fairway. Those fairways had little grass on them. And then other fairways had no fly hills at all. Go figure.
The men we joined, Mark and Stefan, were delightful. Lots of light-hearted banter bounced around among us all. After our round, we sat out on the deck for about an hour and discussed the U.S. economy, politics, China, the Iraq war, Obama, golf, and about everything you can cover in an hour. When Stefan disappeared for a break, Mark told us that Stefan came over from England and paid the highest price for a house that has ever been sold in the Northland, right on the bay in Mangonui. ‘He’s a bazillionaire, probably the richest man in the Northland’, Mark told us. And one of the nicest I’ve ever met.
They told us that we’d seen almost everything the Northland has to offer, and their suggestion is to boogie on down to the South Island and spend the rest of our vacation down there. We still have a couple of things to see, but we’ve mostly seen everything the books say is important. We hopped in the car and headed south down the winding, narrow road at a good clip. Ended up in Omapere at the Copthorne Motel, one of a string of really nice motels in the bigger towns. After the rustic and primitive places we’ve been staying in the past week or so, it seems like the Ritz. Had dinner at the one restaurant that was open on Sunday night, with white linen tablecloths and menus that weren’t greasy. Truth is, I now prefer the laid-back and rustic to this sterile and brand-new place. But I could get used to nice things again.
Wednesday, December 10, 2008
Dec. 1 – Getting there
Flew Seattle to LA, hung around the airport for 3 hours, then hopped on the plane for the looooong leg to Fiji. The crew on the plane was so friendly and smiling and helpful, with flowers tucked behind one ear. Made me want to go live in Fiji if people there are so happy. It was a 747 and we had 3 seats between the 2 of us so we took turns lying down on the seats, heads on one another’s lap. We left on Monday and crossed the international date line into Wednesday, so we missed Tuesday altogether, and finally got there on at noon Wednesday, stiff and sleepy after 18 hours underway.
Day 1 – Dec. 3 - Auckland
Finally we saw the first sight of New Zealand, off in the distance. Just some islands at first, and cloud-enshrouded land. As we got closer we saw a jagged coastline, green fields, lots of trees, pastures, and the cars driving down the wrong side of the road. Glad to hit the ground in Auckland finally. Took a cab to the Freeman’s Lodge which we found on the internet. It advertised itself as a B&B but it’s more like just a B, since they charge $7 for a skimpy breakfast. It’s owned by an Indian couple who have 3 young children and a yappy, bouncy Lhasa Apso dog. Our room was barely large enough for us to stand in, once we put our golf clubs, 2 backpacks, and 3 large suitcases down. Bath is down the hall, we got one towel – no face towel or washrag. The bedstands have lamps to read by, if you can read by a 40-watt bulb. If you dropped a marble by the front door of the hotel, it would pick up speed until it was going 20 mph by the time it hit the back wall. There must have been a 1-foot differential in elevation from front to back, which made our door slam shut if we didn’t hold it open.
First thing I did was take a shower, but when I tried to plug in my hair dryer, discovered we’d brought the wrong kind of plug. I borrowed one from the owner, but when I plugged it into the socket in the bathroom, it fell out. Went to another bathroom, and it didn’t even have a plug. So I went to our room and made do with one that put me so far from the mirror that I had to ‘style’ my hair without a mirror. Oh, well, it’s so humid that my hair just went limp in 5 minutes anyway, so there goes any hope of having a good hair day for the next 3 months.
Staying here is like living in somebody else’s home, with children running around and screaming, dog barking, people coming and going up and down the hallway of all nationalities. Met Stephanie and Denny from Germany, a young couple who are spending 9 months traveling around the world. Mark from Eindhoven, Netherlands, on a month’s vacation here, who’d written a history book on the German invasion of Belgium during WWI (a real best-seller!), who smiled all the time, laughed a bit too loudly and was so aggressively friendly that maybe that’s why he’s traveling alone.
Day 2 – Dec. 4 - Auckland
Awoke in the night to a sound we’ve never heard before and couldn’t identify. About every 10 seconds, it would repeat, sort of doo-dah-doo-dah-doo-dah. It went on for a half-hour, then stopped. Went back to sleep, then half-hour later it woke us up again. We couldn’t figure out if it was coming from inside the hotel or outside, until Joe got up, stuck his head out of the window, which is easy to do since there are no screens, and heard it coming from outside. Closed the window and it shut most of it out. We thought maybe it was a traffic signal for the blind, but it wasn’t consistent enough and besides, there weren’t any traffic signals near the hotel. Finally I suggested it might be a bird. That’s my story and I’m stickin’ to it.
At 7:15 am the 2-year-old son yelled loudly, the dog barked, and that was the beginning of our first full day in New Zealand. Walked downstairs to the shower room, looked for a place to put my stuff, and found 2 hooks. However, there was no place to put things in the shower but on the floor. Oh, well. It’s a gorgeous day, perfect temperature. Good day to pick up our car.
Walked downtown for breakfast, only 15 minutes by foot. Ended up sitting next to a couple from Lyle, WA, down on the Columbia River. He works for a company that was just bought up by Boeing. Had a great chat, mostly about investment strategies.
Walking in the city is dangerous for us Amis. I nearly got run over 3 times today, once by a city bus that honked and slammed on his brakes or I’d be toast now. I have to remember to look to the right first, not the left!
The car company that we’d contacted via e-mail from Seattle was good to its word. They sent a car to pick us up and Bruce, the only employee, took us to the Devonport Car Company, where the owner, Derek, filled out all the paperwork, then took us on a half-hour tour of the area. Took us to the top of a volcano from which we could see all of Auckland and its gorgeous bays, islands, and 49 other volcanoes that comprise the town. Fortifications up there to keep the Japanese at bay during WWII.
Now that the car is ours for 3 months, we have to re-learn how to drive on the left side of the road. To say that the trip back to the motel in big-city traffic was harrowing doesn’t begin to convey the terror I felt on several occasions.
When we finally did get back to the hotel, we parked it and we don’t plan to drive it again until we head out of town for good tomorrow!. Walked down to the museum, on Derek’s recommendation, and went into the ‘Volcano Room’. Sat on a sofa, and watched a realistic movie scenario of a new island being formed in the bay. Our sofa lurched and nearly tossed us onto the floor, scaring the Bejeezus out of us. Then steam started spewing out of the water, then lava and fire, then a black cloud, that expanded and rolled toward us, closer and closer and closer, bigger and bigger, until we knew we were going to die. Then it engulfed us and went black. My heart was racing as if it were really happening. It’s funny how your mind works when it KNOWS you’re going to die. First, abject terror, then resignation and, for me, the thought "I always wondered how I’d die."
The 2 islands comprising NZ sit astride 2 tectonic plates moving in opposite directions, hence all the volcanic activity down here.
Day 3 – Dec. 5 – Auckland to Wellsford
We finally drove away from the B&B, and nearly got killed in the process. We got 10 feet into the street and saw 2 cars coming straight at us from in front, and one from the left. The 2 in front parted and passed us, one on either side while we sat stopped and terrified, the one from the left just stopped, stopping traffic behind it. It was a cop. He let us in, since we were going the same way he was. He didn’t even stop us, and nobody honked. What polite people. I guess the cop knew what the score was by the big letters on the rear view window blaring ‘rental’ and since most people renting cars come from a country where they drive on the right, he figured it out. Who knows?
Seems weird to have it be so warm and know that it’s Christmas season. But it’s really good to be out of Seattle’s gloom, cold and rain and see the sun, blue skies and wear shorts and short-sleeves.
Drove –slowly and tentatively at first – along the coast towards Warkworth. Made several detours to get better views of the gorgeous coastline. There just weren’t any bad views, though. Everywhere you look is eye candy. At a town called Leigh we drove down to a wharf where boats take people out diving on the reefs. A girl drove up in a dinged-up truck, backed it to the end of the wharf, where a battered-looking boat that appeared to be made out of tinfoil pulled alongside. They tossed a bunch of tanks, fins, spears and other scuba gear on board, going out for a ‘fun dive’ for a change, planning to catch their dinner. She was from Vancouver, WA, is here for 6 months, broke, young, wholesome-looking, happy, doesn’t have a clue what she’ll do next but is enjoying every minute.
A small lad of about 10 was tossing a line into the water and caught 2 8-10-inch fish in the 15 minutes we were there, adding to the 4 he’d already caught, dumped them into a dry bucket, where they wheezed silently and futilely until they slowly expired. His dinner, he said.
At one beach where we stopped we heard an enormous ruckus – about 200 kids from an Auckland 7th grade were splashing, swimming, playing ball and chasing the ducks that live to some degree on handouts from tourists. Three busloads of testosterone and estrogen make an incredible roar when they’re all screaming at the same time. The ducks came running our way when we opened our trunk (that’s a boot in our country, Derek notified us), conditioned for a handout. We pinched off tiny bitsof our newly-bought bread, tossed ‘em to the loudest quackers, which they caught in mid-air. The one who reached it first scooped it up with the rest in hot pursuit, pecking and quacking. Sometimes a fight broke out between 2 who didn’t get it. If it was a big piece, 3 others would try to extract it – often successfully – from the throat of the owner. Reminded us of how Wall Street works.
According to the teachers of the screamers, they’re all high scholastic achievers., from affluent parents. "All nationalities?" I asked. "Lots from S. Africa, most from NZ, none from ‘the islands’ and no Maori". We’ve seen almost no Maori. They’re easy to distinguish from the paler English-looking Kiwis by their dark skin, stocky builds and Hawaiian-like facial features. Considering that this used to the their land, the ‘white man’, or European, has thoroughly taken it away from him. He’s left the place names alone for the most part – Mangakura, Pukapuka, Pukenui, Pohuehue, Te Pua. But the Scots have obviously been here – Loch Norrie, McLeod Bay, Glenberrie. And the Welsh – Brynderwyn, Braigh, Brynavon. And the Brits – Royal Heights, Parkhurst, Balmoral, Victoria Valley, Port Albert, Woolleys Bay.
The Maori alphabet’s ‘wh’ is pronounced like ‘f’, so Whatuwhiwhi sounds like Fatufifi. As one Kiwi told us, "Thet’s th’ woi th’ bleck best’ds wohnt us t’ soy eet’. Racist.
About 95% of the town names, at least in the Northland, are Maori – all very forgettale, since they don’t make any sense to me. I can remember Frenchman’s Swamp, but ask me in 2 weeks (or even 2 minutes) about Kaukapakapa or Pukekaroro or Rakautao and you’ll no doubt get a blank look from me.
We thought we’d find a place to stay in Leigh and spend tomorrow snorkeling. Couldn’t find a vacancy, though, so we continued on to Wellsford, where we scoped out a golf course we hope to play tomorrow. Found a real motel in Wellsford, with a huge bathroom,l huge bedroom, kitchenette with dishes, toaster, fridge and table for the same price as that dump in Auckland - $50 US. Room has a big deck off it, where I’m sitting as I write this. View is 5 miles at least, rolling pastures, lots of trees in the ravines that criss-cross it, a few cows and a railroad track about 200 feet away. Weird bird noises in Auckland, trains in Wellsford.
We’d read that the food wasn’t the reason people flew halfway around the world to get here. So we expected a lot of boiled cabbage, soggy beans, fried potatoes and limp toast. So we were ecstatic to find delicious sweet ‘n sour soup in a Chinese restaurant, tasty (though a bit tough) beef and garlicky potatoes in a local upscale place in Auckland. But tonight we found out how NZ got its reputation for mediocre fare – both of us ordered Bolognese pasta in an Italian dive in Wellsford. We stuffed it down but I’m not sure why except that we were bored. 95% noodles and one tablespoon of sauce that I think was good but I couldn’t ever get a large enough sample of it to really taste it.
After dinner we still had a lot of daylight left, so we headed out to the public course where we plan to play tomorrow. A sign said it was men’s day tomorrow so maybe I won’t get to play. At 5 pm nobody answered the phone so we will have to wait until tomorrow to see if I can play, even if Joe can for sure. There were 2 cars in the parking lot at 6 pm (there are still nearly 3 hours of daylight left). As we drove in, Joe said, "there’s the driving range." A net with 1 mat. Groan. No chipping area. We chipped some balls onto what must be the 18th green, and putted a couple of times on the s l o o o o o w greens.
Day 4 – Dec. 6 - Wellsford to Whangerei
No trains in the night, slept like a log. Called the golf course for a tee time. They said they’re having a tournament, if we came ‘right now’, we could play in the tournament and be first to tee off. We hopped in the car and sped off. Jumped into our golf shoes, slung our bags on our backs, paid our $13.25 each, and headed for the 1st tee, shoes untied, hats askew, no suntan lotion on. Everybody else was already paired up so we went off on our own. First people on the course.
The course traverses hills and dales, surrounded by fat cows peacefully munching on belly-high grass who watched us curiously as we passed. We’d bought tiny 1-pound bags in Seattle just for this occasion, barely big enough to hold all our clubs, 3 balls and some tees. This was the maiden voyage for them. It was a piece of cake for me. At the end of 9 Joe stopped by the clubhouse and rented a ‘trundler’ to haul his clubs, a very rudimentary job, a straight pipe with an axle, 2 wheels, a curve at the end of the pipe for a handle, and a crosspiece to keep your clubs from falling off.
The holes criss-crossed one another, so we had to look up each fairway to see if anyone was teeing off and might bean us on the noggin. The one bunker I got in had a badger hole in it that looked like the badger had been in residence for about a month. The rake handle was broken in half and the tines were metal and so rusty they looked to be about 20 years old. Made us really appreciate our home course.
Well, I should have taken a bit more time before teeing off to put on suntan lotion. The ozone layer is much thinner down in this hemisphere, meaning that you get much more sun than at our latitude. My arms are lobster-colored and hurt. The back of my neck is red, too, so I’m now a true red-neck.
After we finished our round, we drove down to the coast and found a lovely beach, a cove really, where we pulled in. Coming and going through the sand were tractors, pulling boats on trailers from the parking lot to a launching area about ½ mile down the beach and back. Guess that’s the only way you can get a boat from your car’s trailer hitch into the water. Joe decided to go for a swim, but all I could think about was what my hair would look like if I joined him, so I headed out in the car (with trepidation) by myself to see if any of those gorgeous huge homes perched on the sides of the surrounding hills might rent us a room for the night. No such luck. But what views they all had!!! And guess what everybody had parked in the driveway – not a golf cart, but a tractor!!! Huge, rusty things, but if you have one yourself, you don’t have to hire one of the entrepreneurs who makes his living hauling tractor-less families’ boats to and from the water.
After leaving the beach, we wandered north into Whangerei. Because Wh is pronounced like F, this place is called Fahn-ga-RAY. It’s the largest city in Northland, north of Auckland, and has the first harbor sailors hit when they see New Zealand. We found a motel, checked in, and headed straight out for dinner, as Joe was at the end of his diabetic rope and needed to eat. The motel owner told us about a great place down by the marina that had great views of the boats. Right she was. For the first time we saw lamb on the menu, so I screwed up my courage and ordered it. Anytime I’ve ever eaten it before, it had such a strong taste that I decided I didn’t like it. "But NZ lamb is different, not so strong. You have to try it," say people here. So I bit the bullet, and soon lying on a plate in front of me were two legs of some poor lambie-pie, plopped down on top of some mashed potatoes and lying in a pool of gravy. I bit into it, rolled it around in my mouth and my eyes flew open in sheer delight. It was wonderful, and didn’t taste anything like the lamb I’ve eaten before. By the time I’d finished it, though, being so much food, I decided that I’ve now eaten lamb and I don’t need to do it again.
Being right next to the marina, with so many huge and beautiful sailboats and power boats, it was a given that many of the people eating at this good restaurant would be boat owners. Indeed, seated at a table next to us were 2 obviously American couples who were bragging about where they’d sailed – Bali, Mexico, Tahiti, you name it. They eventually parted and we ended up talking with them. They were from Seattle, live about 20 minutes from us, had been sailing for several months, and had no idea how long it would be before they went home. ‘When we get tired of sailing.’
Their friends were from Baltimore, had pre-retired 3 years ago and had been on the high seas ever since. Their income had been cut in half by the recession, so they might have to cut their practice retirement short and go back to work.
A lady from Scotland sitting at the next table was a ‘hand’ on a sailing vessel owned by a grumpy old man of whom she had grown enormously tired and she wanted to jump ship. Two young men who hired on at the last port of call had jumped ship when they landed at Auckland so she was the only hand left. And now she was ready to call it quits and get a ‘real job’ if she could just figure out what she wanted to do. She’s a lady who has been sailing all her life and still gets so seasick that she threatens to quit all the time. She has a captain’s license so she can actually captain her own boat but hires herself out to other people. I told her to quit and get another line of work that she’ll love. One that doesn’t make her puke every day.
So here we are sitting at a marina, talking with people I never in my life thought I’d be thrown with, and finding out that they just have boats instead of golf clubs but are basically just like us. One of them told us about Minerva Reef, a place in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. People sail there to get out of high seas and storms. It’s one of only 2 places in the world where a coral reef comes almost all the way up to the top of the water, a perfect circle, about a mile in diameter, where the water inside the circle is perfectly calm even if the seas are 20 feet high on the outside. It’s 60 feet deep and clear as a bell, so you can snorkel and dive inside while a storm might be raging all around you. Mariners come from many miles around to take advantage of its shelter.
Our accommodations just keep getting bigger and better. Tonight’s is the best yet. A huge bedroom, a kitchenette with microwave, fridge and hot plate. Big bathroom. And whereas we only got 1 towel each last night, tonight we each have a towel, face towel and washrag – a first.
Day 5 – Dec. 7 – Whangerei
Spent the day just driving around. A bunch of Maori kids were swinging from a rope and letting go into a pool of water just above a pretty falls. I took pictures of them and showed them to them, which made them just keep doing it over and over so they could see themselves ‘on the big screen’. When they got cold, they would lie full on their stomachs on the cement sidewalk, forcing people to go around them to get by, but warming themselves for another go at the cold water.
Several hours along a winding, curvy road took its toll on our heads, making us woozy and light-headed, but rewarded us with incredible views of the pounding surf and white curving beaches, deserted but for a few isolated beachcombers.
We’ve gotten into a pattern of eating breakfast in the room, making sandwiches for lunch, and eating out for dinner. Saves $$ and time, too.
Day 6 – Dec. 8 – Whangerei to Russell
Because the kids get out of school for the summer, and Christmas is just around the corner, the Kiwis are poised to leap into vacation mode and invade the same spots we plan to invade. So in the event that we end up in a place that is full to the brim of the traveling Kiwis, we stopped off at a sporting goods store in Whangerei before heading north and, in 5 minutes, bought a cheap tent, sleeping bags and foam pads, all for about $110 US. Now we’re not worried if we can’t find a place to spend the night, as we can just stop at a flat spot, toss our stuff on the ground, and we’re all set.
On our way north out of Whangerei, we passed signs indicating that if you walked past this point you were in danger from cyanide being used to kill possums. Now why in the world does the world want to get rid of possums? Don’t they like them splattered all over their roads?
Also saw our first clear cuts, where all the trees had been felled and hadn’t been re-planted, leaving bare hillsides open to erosion. I thought we and the Amazonians were the only ones who ravaged our land so rapaciously.
Today we were on a road that rivalled the ‘Road to Hana’ on Maui for the number of curves on it. Joe was driving and both of us got woozy after a couple of hours of twists and turns. But what made it bearable were the swoops around blind curves, and down into coves that were so beautiful it took your breath away. We simply had to stop and stare open-mouthed at the raw power and beauty of the sea. I took so many pictures that I was afraid I would run out of memory in my camera until Joe said he brought enough memory to take 35,000 pictures. So I snapped away with impunity.
We ended up in the quaint town originally named Rororareka (love those Maori names that nobody can remember for more than 3 seconds). It was known in the 1830’s as the Hellhole of the Pacific, due to the savage behavior of all the drunken whalers and sealers who stopped off here to let off steam after months at sea. This attracted the attention of missionaries from all over the world who swarmed here like flies to honey to try to save their sorry souls. When the maligned Maoris got in the middle of all this, tempers flared, somebody tossed a match and the whole town went up in smoke. When it was rebuilt, they called it Russell, and today it’s a sleepy little town until the tourists inundate it in the summer.
I saw a bus with 4 people sitting in it in the center of town (which has only 3 streets) and yelled to Joe, "Hey, let’s do the tour!" So we hopped on just as it was pulling out for a one-hour swing through the town and surrounding area, during which a very knowledgeable lady in her 70’s man-handled a 50-passenger bus through hairpin turns and up steep hills on roads so skinny I’d have been afraid to drive a VW bug. She took us on every road on the entire peninsula, pointing out, among many other things, the house where generations of the same family – the Bakers - had lived since the mid-1800’s, and it looked like the last generation to paint it or do any repairs lived in the 1800’s, too; and everything that had been collected by the family was still sitting on the porch that wrapped around the entire house. Today the youngest Baker still living in the house is 2, the oldest is 95. Wouldn’t you love to be a bird on a shoulder at their dinner table???
My eye was caught by a sign for a B&B sitting on the edge of the sea, so when we got back to town, we hurried back to see if they had any vacancies. They did, and showed it to us. We walked into an entire house, living room with fireplace, 2 sofas and coffee table, tv, piano; dining room; 2 bedrooms, kitchen, and spotless, modern bath with lots of towels, soap, and all sorts of little amenities as if a family already lived here. But the killer was the view! A 40-foot long porch 8 feet wide stretched the entire length of the ‘house’, completely enclosed, falling away nearly at your feet was a 100-foot high cliff below which were jagged rocks with waves crashing, a small crescent beach forming a cove only a few hundred yards across. We could only stand and stare and know that it had to cost more than we’d be willing to pay. So when we asked how much and she said $240 NZ, Joe said, "If you’ll make it $200, we’ll take it." She agreed and we unpacked in a flash.
We’ve now sampled the worst of New Zealand, with the dump in Auckland, and now we’ve stayed in a place that we saw listed in the book "Accommodations for the Discerning Traveler" that was lying on their coffee table. Life is good.
"There’s a nice hike to the top of that little volcano," our hostess told us, pointing to a peninsula jutting out into the sea not far away, and off we went in our hiking boots. After a half-hour of scrambling up and down really steep slopes, we came to a spot, about 100 feet above the water, where the land stopped and there was nothing but sea all the way to South America. Dolphins were racing a nearby tour boat and leaped completely out of the water, 3 at a time. We watched, mesmerized, for about 15 minutes as 15 or 20 of them cavorted and twisted and played right below us. Some kind of sea birds were flying about looking for dinner and when they spotted a fish below, they’d fold their wings and plunge headfirst, straight down into the water, coming up with a fish more often than not.
Day 7 – Dec. 9 - Russell
Slept like a log all night, with the sounds of the surf pounding outside lulling us to sleep. The owners of this gorgeous home, Ron and Maureen Redwood, came in just as we were putting the last of our stuff into the car preparatory to getting underway, and we spent an hour yakking and getting lots of good information on what there is to see around here. Then she said, ‘Why don’t you just stay on another night? I’ll charge you half-price for tonight." That means we’re paying only $75 a night for this incredible place! We took her up on it and headed out to play golf at Waitangi Golf Course. We wanted to find somebody to play with, but there just wasn’t anybody around. The few who were teeing off were foursomes, so we ended up playing by ourselves again. We’re disappointed, since we so enjoy all the people we’re meeting, and learn so much from them. But we talked with a very friendly man who was born and raised in this town, then spent his working years in the UK, then moved back here and is going to live out his days here. He gave us some good tips on other golf courses around here to play, so tomorrow we’ll prolly play Kerikeri.
The course sits on a huge piece of property known as the Waitangi Treaty Grounds, 500 acres that is where the Treaty of Waitangi was signed in 1840. A rich Brit bought it in 1932 to keep it from falling into the hands of some rich Americans who wanted to use it as a base for deep-sea fishing. Now it commemorates the spot where the poor Maori signed a treaty with (or be killed by) the British. Here, in essence, is what they signed:
The Maori Chiefs give all rights and powers of all their territories to the Queen. They can keep their lands, estates, forests, fisheries, and anything else they own until the Queen decides she wants them. Then they have to sell them to her at a price her lackey sets.
Pretty good deal for the Queen, huh? No wonder she’s the richest woman in the world, next to J.K. Rowley, that is.
The Maoris had a pretty good life until the Europeans came. Then these usurpers chopped down all the kauri trees, which were the size of our redwoods and grew all over the north part of the north island. Now they’re just a handful left, and they’re protected by the government, in little tree parks. They killed almost all of the whales that the Maoris used for their food supply. They built houses and towns all over the place, displacing the Maoris. And then they killed a lot of the Maoris who didn’t like them doing this. Sound a lot like us and our Native Americans???
After such a full day, we’re now back at this idyllic setting, perched high on a cliff over the pounding surf below, sitting on the long porch gazing at the gulls fishing for their dinner and watching the sun go down. How could life get any better?
Flew Seattle to LA, hung around the airport for 3 hours, then hopped on the plane for the looooong leg to Fiji. The crew on the plane was so friendly and smiling and helpful, with flowers tucked behind one ear. Made me want to go live in Fiji if people there are so happy. It was a 747 and we had 3 seats between the 2 of us so we took turns lying down on the seats, heads on one another’s lap. We left on Monday and crossed the international date line into Wednesday, so we missed Tuesday altogether, and finally got there on at noon Wednesday, stiff and sleepy after 18 hours underway.
Day 1 – Dec. 3 - Auckland
Finally we saw the first sight of New Zealand, off in the distance. Just some islands at first, and cloud-enshrouded land. As we got closer we saw a jagged coastline, green fields, lots of trees, pastures, and the cars driving down the wrong side of the road. Glad to hit the ground in Auckland finally. Took a cab to the Freeman’s Lodge which we found on the internet. It advertised itself as a B&B but it’s more like just a B, since they charge $7 for a skimpy breakfast. It’s owned by an Indian couple who have 3 young children and a yappy, bouncy Lhasa Apso dog. Our room was barely large enough for us to stand in, once we put our golf clubs, 2 backpacks, and 3 large suitcases down. Bath is down the hall, we got one towel – no face towel or washrag. The bedstands have lamps to read by, if you can read by a 40-watt bulb. If you dropped a marble by the front door of the hotel, it would pick up speed until it was going 20 mph by the time it hit the back wall. There must have been a 1-foot differential in elevation from front to back, which made our door slam shut if we didn’t hold it open.
First thing I did was take a shower, but when I tried to plug in my hair dryer, discovered we’d brought the wrong kind of plug. I borrowed one from the owner, but when I plugged it into the socket in the bathroom, it fell out. Went to another bathroom, and it didn’t even have a plug. So I went to our room and made do with one that put me so far from the mirror that I had to ‘style’ my hair without a mirror. Oh, well, it’s so humid that my hair just went limp in 5 minutes anyway, so there goes any hope of having a good hair day for the next 3 months.
Staying here is like living in somebody else’s home, with children running around and screaming, dog barking, people coming and going up and down the hallway of all nationalities. Met Stephanie and Denny from Germany, a young couple who are spending 9 months traveling around the world. Mark from Eindhoven, Netherlands, on a month’s vacation here, who’d written a history book on the German invasion of Belgium during WWI (a real best-seller!), who smiled all the time, laughed a bit too loudly and was so aggressively friendly that maybe that’s why he’s traveling alone.
Day 2 – Dec. 4 - Auckland
Awoke in the night to a sound we’ve never heard before and couldn’t identify. About every 10 seconds, it would repeat, sort of doo-dah-doo-dah-doo-dah. It went on for a half-hour, then stopped. Went back to sleep, then half-hour later it woke us up again. We couldn’t figure out if it was coming from inside the hotel or outside, until Joe got up, stuck his head out of the window, which is easy to do since there are no screens, and heard it coming from outside. Closed the window and it shut most of it out. We thought maybe it was a traffic signal for the blind, but it wasn’t consistent enough and besides, there weren’t any traffic signals near the hotel. Finally I suggested it might be a bird. That’s my story and I’m stickin’ to it.
At 7:15 am the 2-year-old son yelled loudly, the dog barked, and that was the beginning of our first full day in New Zealand. Walked downstairs to the shower room, looked for a place to put my stuff, and found 2 hooks. However, there was no place to put things in the shower but on the floor. Oh, well. It’s a gorgeous day, perfect temperature. Good day to pick up our car.
Walked downtown for breakfast, only 15 minutes by foot. Ended up sitting next to a couple from Lyle, WA, down on the Columbia River. He works for a company that was just bought up by Boeing. Had a great chat, mostly about investment strategies.
Walking in the city is dangerous for us Amis. I nearly got run over 3 times today, once by a city bus that honked and slammed on his brakes or I’d be toast now. I have to remember to look to the right first, not the left!
The car company that we’d contacted via e-mail from Seattle was good to its word. They sent a car to pick us up and Bruce, the only employee, took us to the Devonport Car Company, where the owner, Derek, filled out all the paperwork, then took us on a half-hour tour of the area. Took us to the top of a volcano from which we could see all of Auckland and its gorgeous bays, islands, and 49 other volcanoes that comprise the town. Fortifications up there to keep the Japanese at bay during WWII.
Now that the car is ours for 3 months, we have to re-learn how to drive on the left side of the road. To say that the trip back to the motel in big-city traffic was harrowing doesn’t begin to convey the terror I felt on several occasions.
When we finally did get back to the hotel, we parked it and we don’t plan to drive it again until we head out of town for good tomorrow!. Walked down to the museum, on Derek’s recommendation, and went into the ‘Volcano Room’. Sat on a sofa, and watched a realistic movie scenario of a new island being formed in the bay. Our sofa lurched and nearly tossed us onto the floor, scaring the Bejeezus out of us. Then steam started spewing out of the water, then lava and fire, then a black cloud, that expanded and rolled toward us, closer and closer and closer, bigger and bigger, until we knew we were going to die. Then it engulfed us and went black. My heart was racing as if it were really happening. It’s funny how your mind works when it KNOWS you’re going to die. First, abject terror, then resignation and, for me, the thought "I always wondered how I’d die."
The 2 islands comprising NZ sit astride 2 tectonic plates moving in opposite directions, hence all the volcanic activity down here.
Day 3 – Dec. 5 – Auckland to Wellsford
We finally drove away from the B&B, and nearly got killed in the process. We got 10 feet into the street and saw 2 cars coming straight at us from in front, and one from the left. The 2 in front parted and passed us, one on either side while we sat stopped and terrified, the one from the left just stopped, stopping traffic behind it. It was a cop. He let us in, since we were going the same way he was. He didn’t even stop us, and nobody honked. What polite people. I guess the cop knew what the score was by the big letters on the rear view window blaring ‘rental’ and since most people renting cars come from a country where they drive on the right, he figured it out. Who knows?
Seems weird to have it be so warm and know that it’s Christmas season. But it’s really good to be out of Seattle’s gloom, cold and rain and see the sun, blue skies and wear shorts and short-sleeves.
Drove –slowly and tentatively at first – along the coast towards Warkworth. Made several detours to get better views of the gorgeous coastline. There just weren’t any bad views, though. Everywhere you look is eye candy. At a town called Leigh we drove down to a wharf where boats take people out diving on the reefs. A girl drove up in a dinged-up truck, backed it to the end of the wharf, where a battered-looking boat that appeared to be made out of tinfoil pulled alongside. They tossed a bunch of tanks, fins, spears and other scuba gear on board, going out for a ‘fun dive’ for a change, planning to catch their dinner. She was from Vancouver, WA, is here for 6 months, broke, young, wholesome-looking, happy, doesn’t have a clue what she’ll do next but is enjoying every minute.
A small lad of about 10 was tossing a line into the water and caught 2 8-10-inch fish in the 15 minutes we were there, adding to the 4 he’d already caught, dumped them into a dry bucket, where they wheezed silently and futilely until they slowly expired. His dinner, he said.
At one beach where we stopped we heard an enormous ruckus – about 200 kids from an Auckland 7th grade were splashing, swimming, playing ball and chasing the ducks that live to some degree on handouts from tourists. Three busloads of testosterone and estrogen make an incredible roar when they’re all screaming at the same time. The ducks came running our way when we opened our trunk (that’s a boot in our country, Derek notified us), conditioned for a handout. We pinched off tiny bitsof our newly-bought bread, tossed ‘em to the loudest quackers, which they caught in mid-air. The one who reached it first scooped it up with the rest in hot pursuit, pecking and quacking. Sometimes a fight broke out between 2 who didn’t get it. If it was a big piece, 3 others would try to extract it – often successfully – from the throat of the owner. Reminded us of how Wall Street works.
According to the teachers of the screamers, they’re all high scholastic achievers., from affluent parents. "All nationalities?" I asked. "Lots from S. Africa, most from NZ, none from ‘the islands’ and no Maori". We’ve seen almost no Maori. They’re easy to distinguish from the paler English-looking Kiwis by their dark skin, stocky builds and Hawaiian-like facial features. Considering that this used to the their land, the ‘white man’, or European, has thoroughly taken it away from him. He’s left the place names alone for the most part – Mangakura, Pukapuka, Pukenui, Pohuehue, Te Pua. But the Scots have obviously been here – Loch Norrie, McLeod Bay, Glenberrie. And the Welsh – Brynderwyn, Braigh, Brynavon. And the Brits – Royal Heights, Parkhurst, Balmoral, Victoria Valley, Port Albert, Woolleys Bay.
The Maori alphabet’s ‘wh’ is pronounced like ‘f’, so Whatuwhiwhi sounds like Fatufifi. As one Kiwi told us, "Thet’s th’ woi th’ bleck best’ds wohnt us t’ soy eet’. Racist.
About 95% of the town names, at least in the Northland, are Maori – all very forgettale, since they don’t make any sense to me. I can remember Frenchman’s Swamp, but ask me in 2 weeks (or even 2 minutes) about Kaukapakapa or Pukekaroro or Rakautao and you’ll no doubt get a blank look from me.
We thought we’d find a place to stay in Leigh and spend tomorrow snorkeling. Couldn’t find a vacancy, though, so we continued on to Wellsford, where we scoped out a golf course we hope to play tomorrow. Found a real motel in Wellsford, with a huge bathroom,l huge bedroom, kitchenette with dishes, toaster, fridge and table for the same price as that dump in Auckland - $50 US. Room has a big deck off it, where I’m sitting as I write this. View is 5 miles at least, rolling pastures, lots of trees in the ravines that criss-cross it, a few cows and a railroad track about 200 feet away. Weird bird noises in Auckland, trains in Wellsford.
We’d read that the food wasn’t the reason people flew halfway around the world to get here. So we expected a lot of boiled cabbage, soggy beans, fried potatoes and limp toast. So we were ecstatic to find delicious sweet ‘n sour soup in a Chinese restaurant, tasty (though a bit tough) beef and garlicky potatoes in a local upscale place in Auckland. But tonight we found out how NZ got its reputation for mediocre fare – both of us ordered Bolognese pasta in an Italian dive in Wellsford. We stuffed it down but I’m not sure why except that we were bored. 95% noodles and one tablespoon of sauce that I think was good but I couldn’t ever get a large enough sample of it to really taste it.
After dinner we still had a lot of daylight left, so we headed out to the public course where we plan to play tomorrow. A sign said it was men’s day tomorrow so maybe I won’t get to play. At 5 pm nobody answered the phone so we will have to wait until tomorrow to see if I can play, even if Joe can for sure. There were 2 cars in the parking lot at 6 pm (there are still nearly 3 hours of daylight left). As we drove in, Joe said, "there’s the driving range." A net with 1 mat. Groan. No chipping area. We chipped some balls onto what must be the 18th green, and putted a couple of times on the s l o o o o o w greens.
Day 4 – Dec. 6 - Wellsford to Whangerei
No trains in the night, slept like a log. Called the golf course for a tee time. They said they’re having a tournament, if we came ‘right now’, we could play in the tournament and be first to tee off. We hopped in the car and sped off. Jumped into our golf shoes, slung our bags on our backs, paid our $13.25 each, and headed for the 1st tee, shoes untied, hats askew, no suntan lotion on. Everybody else was already paired up so we went off on our own. First people on the course.
The course traverses hills and dales, surrounded by fat cows peacefully munching on belly-high grass who watched us curiously as we passed. We’d bought tiny 1-pound bags in Seattle just for this occasion, barely big enough to hold all our clubs, 3 balls and some tees. This was the maiden voyage for them. It was a piece of cake for me. At the end of 9 Joe stopped by the clubhouse and rented a ‘trundler’ to haul his clubs, a very rudimentary job, a straight pipe with an axle, 2 wheels, a curve at the end of the pipe for a handle, and a crosspiece to keep your clubs from falling off.
The holes criss-crossed one another, so we had to look up each fairway to see if anyone was teeing off and might bean us on the noggin. The one bunker I got in had a badger hole in it that looked like the badger had been in residence for about a month. The rake handle was broken in half and the tines were metal and so rusty they looked to be about 20 years old. Made us really appreciate our home course.
Well, I should have taken a bit more time before teeing off to put on suntan lotion. The ozone layer is much thinner down in this hemisphere, meaning that you get much more sun than at our latitude. My arms are lobster-colored and hurt. The back of my neck is red, too, so I’m now a true red-neck.
After we finished our round, we drove down to the coast and found a lovely beach, a cove really, where we pulled in. Coming and going through the sand were tractors, pulling boats on trailers from the parking lot to a launching area about ½ mile down the beach and back. Guess that’s the only way you can get a boat from your car’s trailer hitch into the water. Joe decided to go for a swim, but all I could think about was what my hair would look like if I joined him, so I headed out in the car (with trepidation) by myself to see if any of those gorgeous huge homes perched on the sides of the surrounding hills might rent us a room for the night. No such luck. But what views they all had!!! And guess what everybody had parked in the driveway – not a golf cart, but a tractor!!! Huge, rusty things, but if you have one yourself, you don’t have to hire one of the entrepreneurs who makes his living hauling tractor-less families’ boats to and from the water.
After leaving the beach, we wandered north into Whangerei. Because Wh is pronounced like F, this place is called Fahn-ga-RAY. It’s the largest city in Northland, north of Auckland, and has the first harbor sailors hit when they see New Zealand. We found a motel, checked in, and headed straight out for dinner, as Joe was at the end of his diabetic rope and needed to eat. The motel owner told us about a great place down by the marina that had great views of the boats. Right she was. For the first time we saw lamb on the menu, so I screwed up my courage and ordered it. Anytime I’ve ever eaten it before, it had such a strong taste that I decided I didn’t like it. "But NZ lamb is different, not so strong. You have to try it," say people here. So I bit the bullet, and soon lying on a plate in front of me were two legs of some poor lambie-pie, plopped down on top of some mashed potatoes and lying in a pool of gravy. I bit into it, rolled it around in my mouth and my eyes flew open in sheer delight. It was wonderful, and didn’t taste anything like the lamb I’ve eaten before. By the time I’d finished it, though, being so much food, I decided that I’ve now eaten lamb and I don’t need to do it again.
Being right next to the marina, with so many huge and beautiful sailboats and power boats, it was a given that many of the people eating at this good restaurant would be boat owners. Indeed, seated at a table next to us were 2 obviously American couples who were bragging about where they’d sailed – Bali, Mexico, Tahiti, you name it. They eventually parted and we ended up talking with them. They were from Seattle, live about 20 minutes from us, had been sailing for several months, and had no idea how long it would be before they went home. ‘When we get tired of sailing.’
Their friends were from Baltimore, had pre-retired 3 years ago and had been on the high seas ever since. Their income had been cut in half by the recession, so they might have to cut their practice retirement short and go back to work.
A lady from Scotland sitting at the next table was a ‘hand’ on a sailing vessel owned by a grumpy old man of whom she had grown enormously tired and she wanted to jump ship. Two young men who hired on at the last port of call had jumped ship when they landed at Auckland so she was the only hand left. And now she was ready to call it quits and get a ‘real job’ if she could just figure out what she wanted to do. She’s a lady who has been sailing all her life and still gets so seasick that she threatens to quit all the time. She has a captain’s license so she can actually captain her own boat but hires herself out to other people. I told her to quit and get another line of work that she’ll love. One that doesn’t make her puke every day.
So here we are sitting at a marina, talking with people I never in my life thought I’d be thrown with, and finding out that they just have boats instead of golf clubs but are basically just like us. One of them told us about Minerva Reef, a place in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. People sail there to get out of high seas and storms. It’s one of only 2 places in the world where a coral reef comes almost all the way up to the top of the water, a perfect circle, about a mile in diameter, where the water inside the circle is perfectly calm even if the seas are 20 feet high on the outside. It’s 60 feet deep and clear as a bell, so you can snorkel and dive inside while a storm might be raging all around you. Mariners come from many miles around to take advantage of its shelter.
Our accommodations just keep getting bigger and better. Tonight’s is the best yet. A huge bedroom, a kitchenette with microwave, fridge and hot plate. Big bathroom. And whereas we only got 1 towel each last night, tonight we each have a towel, face towel and washrag – a first.
Day 5 – Dec. 7 – Whangerei
Spent the day just driving around. A bunch of Maori kids were swinging from a rope and letting go into a pool of water just above a pretty falls. I took pictures of them and showed them to them, which made them just keep doing it over and over so they could see themselves ‘on the big screen’. When they got cold, they would lie full on their stomachs on the cement sidewalk, forcing people to go around them to get by, but warming themselves for another go at the cold water.
Several hours along a winding, curvy road took its toll on our heads, making us woozy and light-headed, but rewarded us with incredible views of the pounding surf and white curving beaches, deserted but for a few isolated beachcombers.
We’ve gotten into a pattern of eating breakfast in the room, making sandwiches for lunch, and eating out for dinner. Saves $$ and time, too.
Day 6 – Dec. 8 – Whangerei to Russell
Because the kids get out of school for the summer, and Christmas is just around the corner, the Kiwis are poised to leap into vacation mode and invade the same spots we plan to invade. So in the event that we end up in a place that is full to the brim of the traveling Kiwis, we stopped off at a sporting goods store in Whangerei before heading north and, in 5 minutes, bought a cheap tent, sleeping bags and foam pads, all for about $110 US. Now we’re not worried if we can’t find a place to spend the night, as we can just stop at a flat spot, toss our stuff on the ground, and we’re all set.
On our way north out of Whangerei, we passed signs indicating that if you walked past this point you were in danger from cyanide being used to kill possums. Now why in the world does the world want to get rid of possums? Don’t they like them splattered all over their roads?
Also saw our first clear cuts, where all the trees had been felled and hadn’t been re-planted, leaving bare hillsides open to erosion. I thought we and the Amazonians were the only ones who ravaged our land so rapaciously.
Today we were on a road that rivalled the ‘Road to Hana’ on Maui for the number of curves on it. Joe was driving and both of us got woozy after a couple of hours of twists and turns. But what made it bearable were the swoops around blind curves, and down into coves that were so beautiful it took your breath away. We simply had to stop and stare open-mouthed at the raw power and beauty of the sea. I took so many pictures that I was afraid I would run out of memory in my camera until Joe said he brought enough memory to take 35,000 pictures. So I snapped away with impunity.
We ended up in the quaint town originally named Rororareka (love those Maori names that nobody can remember for more than 3 seconds). It was known in the 1830’s as the Hellhole of the Pacific, due to the savage behavior of all the drunken whalers and sealers who stopped off here to let off steam after months at sea. This attracted the attention of missionaries from all over the world who swarmed here like flies to honey to try to save their sorry souls. When the maligned Maoris got in the middle of all this, tempers flared, somebody tossed a match and the whole town went up in smoke. When it was rebuilt, they called it Russell, and today it’s a sleepy little town until the tourists inundate it in the summer.
I saw a bus with 4 people sitting in it in the center of town (which has only 3 streets) and yelled to Joe, "Hey, let’s do the tour!" So we hopped on just as it was pulling out for a one-hour swing through the town and surrounding area, during which a very knowledgeable lady in her 70’s man-handled a 50-passenger bus through hairpin turns and up steep hills on roads so skinny I’d have been afraid to drive a VW bug. She took us on every road on the entire peninsula, pointing out, among many other things, the house where generations of the same family – the Bakers - had lived since the mid-1800’s, and it looked like the last generation to paint it or do any repairs lived in the 1800’s, too; and everything that had been collected by the family was still sitting on the porch that wrapped around the entire house. Today the youngest Baker still living in the house is 2, the oldest is 95. Wouldn’t you love to be a bird on a shoulder at their dinner table???
My eye was caught by a sign for a B&B sitting on the edge of the sea, so when we got back to town, we hurried back to see if they had any vacancies. They did, and showed it to us. We walked into an entire house, living room with fireplace, 2 sofas and coffee table, tv, piano; dining room; 2 bedrooms, kitchen, and spotless, modern bath with lots of towels, soap, and all sorts of little amenities as if a family already lived here. But the killer was the view! A 40-foot long porch 8 feet wide stretched the entire length of the ‘house’, completely enclosed, falling away nearly at your feet was a 100-foot high cliff below which were jagged rocks with waves crashing, a small crescent beach forming a cove only a few hundred yards across. We could only stand and stare and know that it had to cost more than we’d be willing to pay. So when we asked how much and she said $240 NZ, Joe said, "If you’ll make it $200, we’ll take it." She agreed and we unpacked in a flash.
We’ve now sampled the worst of New Zealand, with the dump in Auckland, and now we’ve stayed in a place that we saw listed in the book "Accommodations for the Discerning Traveler" that was lying on their coffee table. Life is good.
"There’s a nice hike to the top of that little volcano," our hostess told us, pointing to a peninsula jutting out into the sea not far away, and off we went in our hiking boots. After a half-hour of scrambling up and down really steep slopes, we came to a spot, about 100 feet above the water, where the land stopped and there was nothing but sea all the way to South America. Dolphins were racing a nearby tour boat and leaped completely out of the water, 3 at a time. We watched, mesmerized, for about 15 minutes as 15 or 20 of them cavorted and twisted and played right below us. Some kind of sea birds were flying about looking for dinner and when they spotted a fish below, they’d fold their wings and plunge headfirst, straight down into the water, coming up with a fish more often than not.
Day 7 – Dec. 9 - Russell
Slept like a log all night, with the sounds of the surf pounding outside lulling us to sleep. The owners of this gorgeous home, Ron and Maureen Redwood, came in just as we were putting the last of our stuff into the car preparatory to getting underway, and we spent an hour yakking and getting lots of good information on what there is to see around here. Then she said, ‘Why don’t you just stay on another night? I’ll charge you half-price for tonight." That means we’re paying only $75 a night for this incredible place! We took her up on it and headed out to play golf at Waitangi Golf Course. We wanted to find somebody to play with, but there just wasn’t anybody around. The few who were teeing off were foursomes, so we ended up playing by ourselves again. We’re disappointed, since we so enjoy all the people we’re meeting, and learn so much from them. But we talked with a very friendly man who was born and raised in this town, then spent his working years in the UK, then moved back here and is going to live out his days here. He gave us some good tips on other golf courses around here to play, so tomorrow we’ll prolly play Kerikeri.
The course sits on a huge piece of property known as the Waitangi Treaty Grounds, 500 acres that is where the Treaty of Waitangi was signed in 1840. A rich Brit bought it in 1932 to keep it from falling into the hands of some rich Americans who wanted to use it as a base for deep-sea fishing. Now it commemorates the spot where the poor Maori signed a treaty with (or be killed by) the British. Here, in essence, is what they signed:
The Maori Chiefs give all rights and powers of all their territories to the Queen. They can keep their lands, estates, forests, fisheries, and anything else they own until the Queen decides she wants them. Then they have to sell them to her at a price her lackey sets.
Pretty good deal for the Queen, huh? No wonder she’s the richest woman in the world, next to J.K. Rowley, that is.
The Maoris had a pretty good life until the Europeans came. Then these usurpers chopped down all the kauri trees, which were the size of our redwoods and grew all over the north part of the north island. Now they’re just a handful left, and they’re protected by the government, in little tree parks. They killed almost all of the whales that the Maoris used for their food supply. They built houses and towns all over the place, displacing the Maoris. And then they killed a lot of the Maoris who didn’t like them doing this. Sound a lot like us and our Native Americans???
After such a full day, we’re now back at this idyllic setting, perched high on a cliff over the pounding surf below, sitting on the long porch gazing at the gulls fishing for their dinner and watching the sun go down. How could life get any better?
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