January 30 - February 6

The internet connection we have at this motel is sooooo slow that it would take us all night to download pictures with this blog, so this one is picture-less. Sorry.

Day 59 – Jan. 30 –Christchurch to Darfield

Today was overcast and cool, perfect for playing golf at the Christchurch golf course. Got paired up with a very nice young couple who brought their 8-year-old daughter, Molly, along. She had boundless energy and had a thing for sliding down the sides of bunkers on her butt into the sand, did it over and over again.

"Molly, you probably think I have an accent, but it’s YOU who has the accent, don’t you think?" I asked her. "No, you hev a rilly BEEG ekcent," she responded. Guess we do to them.

Went to see the movie that being hyped over here, "Revolutionary Road", with Leonardo di Caprio and Kate Winslett. Skip it unless you love to watch people screaming invectives at each other.

Don’t remember a thing about Darfield. We pulled into town after dark, got a motel and went to sleep.

Day 60 – Jan. 31 –Darfield to Maruia Springs

The memorable thing about Darfield was the strange breakfast I ate. I ordered Eggs Benedict, something they usually do really well over here. But this one was sitting on a HUGE mushroom, as well as some thick, crumbly bread, with only one egg on top of all that. To the side were a bunch of thinly-sliced pickled beets, and a baked tomato (Yuk!).

It was a gorgeous, perfect day. Drove through rolling hills stripped of their trees like so much of NZ, to make room for the 4-legged beasties, and off in the distance we saw some round gray bumps. On getting closer we saw that they were some huge boulders, just sitting on the top of a ridge. What in the world??? My geology training didn’t answer the question, so as we got closer, we realized that the entire countryside was littered with huge limestone boulders. At a pullout we joined about 50 other cars of curious people, and walked up to the boulders, about ¼ mile away. People were crawling all over them, rapelling off of them, jumping off of ‘em onto mats (Joe said they were practicing their mogul turns for the upcoming winter ski season). I wandered in and out of them, marvelling at the size of them, as large as houses and 3-story buildings.

At the top of Arthur Pass (a disappointment to me as the guide book raved about its beauty but it was just an ordinary pretty NZ sight to us and hardly high enough to warrant the term ‘pass’), we stopped for a break.. Instantly we were beseiged by several keas, those large parrots who are so mischievous. We gave them a couple of apricots that were on their last legs, but they took one bite, then headed for the rubber molding around our front windshield. One took a chunk out of it before we realized what he was doing. Now we’re among the hordes who think keas are a nuisance rather than some cute, funny little cousin of the parrot.

Remember the movie Man from Snowy River? I have seen it twice and it’s sort of one of those unforgettable movies for one particular scene – for me it’s when the hero gallops his horse (in slow motion, of course) straight down an embankment. We went flying over a tiny bridge with a placard announcing ‘Snowy River’. Slamming on the brakes, Joe stopped the car and backed up for a picture. There was also a road back to someplace by the same name, so naturally we had to go see where this Man was from. Couldn’t have been this place. It was nothing but a few houses, shabby and tiny wooden shacks, strung out along a few miles of winding track through trees. It didn’t look like it held any promise, so we gave up.

Joe loves to soak his bones in hot water so we pulled in at Maruia Springs, which boasted of hot pools. The only place there was the resort, built across the river from where the Maoris discovered the hot springs centuries ago, and today they pipe it across the small river into their pools. While he soaked, I wandered down along the river and re-connected with my soul there among the rocks and weeds and water, while the sun went down and turned everything gorgeous colors.

Day 61 – Feb. 1 – Maruia Springs to Kaikoura

Maruia Springs might be in a lovely setting, and have delightful hot water to warm your bones, but it is the sand fly capital of the world!!! We got eaten alive, and couldn’t wait to get out of there. They were all throughout the car when we drove away and we spent the next half-hour slapping and swatting, ending up with dead fly corpses all over the insides of the windows.
Today’s drive to Kaikoura is through some gorgeous country, with high mountains, and valleys whose floors are laced with streams so old they have many different stream beds, most abandoned but leaving behind a lot of pebbles and flat shelves high above the valley floor indicating where they’d been.

Waitresses here have a penchant for losing our orders and today was the 5th time our order, for breakfast in Hanmer Springs, was lost. Our waitress, from Bend then Tanzania, felt bad enough about it that she let us choose something from their bakery case as apology.

Parked below the bridge we drove across on the way out of Hanmer Springs sat a jetboat. We’ve done so many things here but we’ve avoided the jetboat scene until now. The river here is stunningly beautiful, with high cliffs and gorgeous water. I wanted mostly to see the canyon the river flowed through, so we hopped aboard. I didn’t know how fast these things went, how much wind hit your face, so the first thing I did was take off my glasses to keep from having them flung off my face. Then I couldn’t see much. But it was a huge amount of fun! We flew over water so shallow the pebbles were almost sticking ot of the water. When we got to a wide spot in the river, the driver made a circling motion with his arm, the key for us to hold on tighter to the safety bar. Then he spun the boat around in a 180 by simply swapping ends, the tightest spin I’ve ever seen, while spraying water all over the rocks, or cows, whichever was at the edge of the river.

The countryside between Hanmer Springs and Kaikoura is very hilly, with the omnipresent sheep and cows pastures, very few towns or houses, lots of rivers with braided streams.

Kaikoura is a small town right on the coast, and we found a motel (our 2nd "Panorama") right on the water. It was one of the most expensive we’ve stayed in so far - $75 US. If the weather had cooperated, we would have had lovely views across a pretty bay to a mountain range on the other side. But it was windy and the clouds were so low as to obscure even the far side of the bay, let alone the mountains ringing it.

We are on a point of land, and the very tip of it, at the base of a very high cliff, is the home of a seal colony. They always pick the best views, it seems. We donned our windbreakers and headed off across the rocks that were exposed by the very low tide. We were looking mostly at our feet, to keep from falling in the many tide pools left behind when the tide receded, and suddenly there was a huge seal lying just a few feet away, sleeping with his back turned to us. Knowing how aggressive and fierce they can be if disturbed, we beat it back the way we’d come, and contented ourselves with feeding the seagulls our stale bread.

Day 62 – Feb. 2 – Kaikoura layover day

We’re counting down the days now, since we’re starting to realize this lovely vacation is really going to end one of these days. We have 23 more days on these paradisical islands, not nearly enough.

They have what they call crayfish, what we call lobster, and they sell them in restaurants for $45US for a whole one. You get the head, legs, tail and antennae all lying there staring at you.
They monitor the ultraviolet ray index and it’s in the paper every day. The range is 0 to 12, and today was a 13. Stay inside, they say.

The bath in our motel is 3’ x 4’, not including the shower. It’s one of the smallest yet.
Played golf at the local club - $15US – and it rained nearly the entire time. There was 1 car in the parking lot when we got there, and 2 when we left. Needless to say, we played alone yet again.

Day 63 – Feb. 3 – Kaikoura to Blenheim

After raining all day yesterday and all night, today dawned glorious – warm, sunny, calm – and we could, for the first time, see the Seaward Kaidoura Range, the one that’s been hiding behind a huge cloudbank for 2 days. Set out for the north end of the island, and on the way passed a huge seal colony. Below us on a large area of rocks were babies playing in a tide pool, while the very patient designated baby-sitter made sure they didn’t drown. Further out dozens of seals romped and played in the water, chased fish, fought for the same spot on the rock, and sunned themselves. We spent nearly an hour being amused by their antics before crawling back in the car.

In Blenheim, named for Winston Churchill’s HUGE family home in England, I suppose, we found a nice motel right across from a school. Kids were wandering around the grounds looking identical in uniforms complete with hats atop their heads. We drove out to the Marlborough golf course ($15US) where we had another round, in heat and lots of wind, all by ourselves on a deserted course.

This is a wine-growing area of NZ and all around are vineyards. They plant rose bushes at the ends of the rows of grapevines that grow near the main buildings seen by tourists, a nice and colorful touch when they’re all full of blooms as they are now.

Because we’re going across the Cook Strait to get back to the North Island tomorrow, we hopped on the internet to book a passage. Turns out there are 2 web sites, one official and one not so official. We went to the not-so-official one and nearly bought tickets. Just for fun, Joe checked the other, official, site and found the tickets were $75US cheaper. What a rip-off!! And most people would pay the higher price and never be the wiser.

Day 64 – Feb. 4 – Blenheim to Wellington

Being pretty anal about not wanting to miss our ferry, we got there about 2 hours early. We were so early that the gatekeeper told us we were too early for our ferry, but the one leaving in a few minutes had space on it, so we drove right on without more than a 5-minute wait in line. What a coup!

It was cool and a slight wind was blowing, and I had concerns about getting seasick. But the ship slid through the waves with hardly a blip and I never felt a moment of queasiness. It was cold and windy on deck and it was raining so we couldn’t see a thing out the windows. Joe and I spent most of the time reading and playing gin rummy.

We got into Wellington in mid-afternoon, and, because we’ve been out in the countryside for so long, away from traffic and congestion, the rush hour traffic drove us mad and we headed for the coastal town of Seatoun, thinking we might find a nice, quiet motel on the coast. But there was not a single place anyone could spend the night for several miles along the coast, only single-family homes. By the time we had driven the entire coastline, we were back in downtown Wellington, so we just headed for the first place we saw with a vacancy – the Museum Hotel right across the street from the famous Wellington Museum. I REALLY wanted to go to the museum, because Phar Lap’s bones are there. A room in a place like this would be at least $300US a night, right in the middle of town, with modern, beautiful rooms. But we got it for $95US.

It’s good to be back on the North Island, even though it means that the end of this most wonderful vacation is in view. The daughter and son-in-law of our good German friends, Inge and Axel Rexhausen – Claudia and Thomas Recker – live here and we made plans to meet for breakfast. They’re here from Germany for 3 years so Claudia can get her college degree and a different type of job back in Germany when she returns.

We wandered the streets of Wellington for a couple of hours, getting a good feel for the city and its different personalities. Dinner in a Turkish restaurant, a recommendation by a local, wonderful shish kebabs, followed by scrumptious ice cream from a gelato stand. Haven’t seen anything like that on either island, except maybe in Auckland.

Day 65 – Feb. 5 – Wellington layover day

Claudia and Thomas have a huge apartment about 3 blocks from our hotel, so we walked up there around 10 am, got the tour of their digs, then went next door to a restaurant she claimed to have delicious breakfasts (it did). Then we went our separate ways, to meet up with Claudia again at dinnertime.

We didn’t know it before coming to town, but this weekend is the equivalent of our Super Bowl. Everybody in the whole two islands comes here for rugby games called Sevens, because only 7 instead of the usual 15 (?) play against one another. So the atmosphere has taken on the flavor of Mardi Gras. People are walking down the street in all manner of getups. Two couples looked like 4 playing cards, all 7’s, heart, club, spade, and diamond, taking up the whole sidewalk. One guy jogged by with only socks on his feet, no shoes.

Many people get around here on skateboards, and I was astonished to see a man in a 3-piece suit, polished wing-tip type shoes, briefcase in hand, whisking in and out of the sidewalk traffic on one. Other people hum along on Segues, those mysterious machines that were going to transform the world several years ago, but are mostly used by city cops to get around their beats now.

Weather doesn’t get any better anywhere than it is here today: blue skies, no clouds, very slight breeze, perfect temperature for shorts. Everybody is outside today. The waterfront is the hub of the city, clean, spacious, looking out over the entire bay across to the other side. Ferries sail in and out, cruise ships, and penguins chase fish at incredible speeds right under the many footbridges that span the harbor. The water is as clear as gin so you can see the penguin and the fish as easily as if they were in the air.

Helicopters land right on the docks after taking people aloft for an aerial view of Wellington. Pontoon planes land and glide up to the wharf. Teenage boys were climbing atop the railings and doing cannonballs into the harbor water to see if they could splash water high enough to get the tourists wet. We wondered if kids in the US could get away with that and figured the cops would run ‘em off. But here they even provide showers so they can wash off the salt water when they’re finished. Kids were drawing pictures all over the sidewalks with chalk. Grandfathers down to ten-year-olds were casting lines into the water to catch their dinners.

This is a very liveable city, and if I had to live in a big NZ city, this would probably be a good one. It’s so easy to get around in, especially the downtown area, everything is within walking distance. The weather is good, except when it’s windy, and it can get VERY windy here. In fact, it’s known as Windy Wellington, for the wind comes pouring between the north and the south islands here, and the seas can get monstrous.

In fact, in 1968 a ferry called the Wahine, hauling passengers and vehicles, was caught in a storm as it entered the harbor, not far from safety, lost power and crashed onto the rocks. It was one of the worst marine disasters in NZ history. In one of the museums we wandered into today, there was a huge exhibit devoted to its fascinating but sad story.

The other museum in which we spent a good part of the day was right across the street from the Museum Hotel, where we’re staying. The Te Papa Museum, NZ’s best. The main reason I wanted to visit it was because Phar Lap’s skeleton is there. We made a beeline for it and there were the bones of NZ’s most famous horse in a glass case. He was a VERY large horse, seemingly twice as big as my little palomino quarter horse I had as a kid. I took pictures of it, before I saw signs saying no cameras. Oh, well…

We met Claudia in one of her favorite restaurants – a Malaysian/curry diner – and had a delicious meal, sharing bites. Afterwards we wandered the streets as the sun went down and watched the people getting crazy and loud in preparation for the Sevens games. We passed one guy who looked like he’d just landed from an alien planet, dressed weirdly, with a wild look in his eyes, babbling to nobody about something. "Must be high on something," I said. We conjectured what drug he might be on, as if any of us knows anything about what the kids on the street are using, and some guy in his twenties sidled up to us and said, "Oh, no, nobody uses those party pills any more. Too dangerous. Today we use something that’s really high in caffeine." So there you have it.

When we told the hotel receptionist that we’d like to stay one more night, she just laughed. "You probably can’t find a room for the next 2 nights within 100 miles of Wellington. The Sevens, you know." So we’re off tomorrow for points north, whether we like it or not.

Day 66 – Feb. 6 – Wellington to Otaki

Our friends with whom we’d played golf our first time through Wellington told us about a nice little golf course in the town of Wainuiomata, so we headed for there when we checked out of our hotel. It is over a mountain range and on the other side of the harbor from Wellington, really out of the way. Joined up with another couple, John and Kat, for a fun round.

Turns out that not only is the Sevens international competition going on in Wellington, but there’s some huge dog show somewhere around here, plus stock car races in Hamilton. So the hotel lady wasn’t kidding when she said we’d have trouble finding a room. Because we have never spent more than a few minutes looking for a vacant place to stay, we didn’t take her very seriously. So about 5 pm we started looking for a place to light for the night. First town was full, so was the second. Then we started getting nervous. Then we started following every sign for a B&B, no matter how far off the road, and we got sent on some wild-goose chases, looking for B&B’s that no longer exist but nobody’s bothered to take the sign off the highway.

We drove for 4 hours, until it was getting dark. We were headed for the town of Levin eventually, because that’s where Adrian Doig lives. He’s the man who hopped onto our blog when he was looking for a trundler to buy and the search engine sent him to our site. He invited us to play golf with him if we ever got to Levin, so we fired up the e-mail and set a date for a match tomorrow. Well, we didn’t really expect to pull into Levin a day early, but here we are almost there. The town just before Levin was totally full, but there was a campground that didn’t say No Vacancy, so in we pulled.

"I was just getting ready to put up the No Vacancy sign", the owner said. "But I’ve got one small site, big enough for a small tent, if you want it." "We’ll take it, don’t even need to see it." So we pitched our tent next to a couple of twenty-something guys from Dresden, spoke a bit of German with them, and ate the leftovers of their dinner, a horrible, lukewarm mess of noodles, red peppers, and thin spaghetti sauce.