The Interim

Well, I'm home. Tonight marks my fifth consecutive night in the same bed -- mine -- which is something I haven't done in a month and a half. I didn't finish posting from my trip until today because of other things going on. I hope you have enjoyed the first part of the saga. If my accounts have touched you in some way, let me remind you that I have never turned down remuneration. I accept cash, currency hedges, airline miles, eBay-able items, and I am one of the few places these days that will accept personal checks without making you write your DL or SS numbers on them.

The book is not yet totally closed on Australia and New Zealand. Look here in the next few days for an upcoming post with a summary of the trip, highlights and high-level takeaways, a "best of/worst of," and anything else I think might be of interest.

But... don't delete that bookmark! I leave again on April 21 to head east, so check back here then for the next episode. Where will David go? What will he do? What will he eat? And do Bedouins have A/C in their tents? Stay tuned for answers to those questions and more.

This world is a big place, and I'm always game to go explore.

The Day that Wasn’t

This post got its title from the fact that we crossed the International Date Line. That meant that we arrived in LAX five hours before we left.

We didn’t want to leave NZ, and NZ apparently didn’t want to let go of us. Our flight boarded about an hour and a half late and we didn’t leave the gate until two hours late. After waiting in the queue (yes, we were still in NZ so it was a queue) on the taxiway we started takeoff. About halfway down the runway the pilot aborted the takeoff and announced that a warning light had come on. Apparently it was telling the pilot that a door was ajar. We taxied back to the gate and sat in our seats for an extra hour while they fixed the problem and topped of our fuel. We were finally on our way. The flight was pretty uneventful after that. While standing in the back of the plane I was joined by a nice older lady who started to talk to me. It would have been fine except that the combination of her poor hearing, the noise from the plane, and her ears that probably hadn’t equalized with the internal pressure meant that she yelled when she spoke. The conversation went something like this: “PRETTY CROWDED, ISN’T IT?” Yes, ma’am, not much room. “IT CERTAINLY IS A LONG FLIGHT.” Yes, changing hemispheres still isn’t a piece of cake. I moved away to a different section of the plane not because I was antisocial but simply because I wanted the people around us to be able to sleep.

Because of the delay in Auckland we missed our connecting flight to Houston. Qantas rebooked us on a flight the following day, but William and I both wanted to get to Houston that night if at all possible. We went to the Qantas desk in LAX to see if they could change our booking. The lady started to look up flights to Houston and asked me, “What airlines fly to Houston?” Uh, I don’t know, it’s only the fourth largest city in the U.S. Pick an airline and you’re probably right. It’s not as if you work in the airline industry. Needless to say, that didn’t end too well.

Qantas put us up overnight in the Hilton and we were joined by a lot of other people from Qantas flights. At the hotel restaurant you could pretty accurately pick out who belonged there and who had been stranded by Qantas. When we got to our flight the next day they had overbooked it by eleven seats, so this time we voluntarily got bumped. We ended up in the Westin this time. After hostels and holiday parks we weren’t going to complain.

While trooping in and out of the airport I saw a Ferrari with a loud aftermarket exhaust system. Who puts an aftermarket exhaust system on a Ferrari? Seriously.

Day 29: Wednesday, March 19, Tuaranumai

We stayed the night in Tuaranumai at a holiday park. The next morning I went to the office and ended up in a long conversation with the owner. We talked about currencies and exchange rates, economics, NZ’s economy and industries, and politics primarily. Most of what I learned just echoed what I’ve already talked about somewhere, but the main point I took away is that this guy represented what I have heard is the typical Kiwi attitude toward politics: they’re all just about the same, so I’ll vote but I don’t expect it to make much difference and I won’t bother to follow what’s happening between election years. (I think I already said this, but everyone in Australia must vote by law, whereas NZ has voluntary voting and turnout rates of about 80%.)

The guy himself was also interesting. I wish I had a picture of him, but he was a short guy with a stocky build, bull neck, and a beer belly. He had a bodacious but well-trimmed mustache that came down past the sides of his mouth and the hair he had left was cut short. The tucked-in short sleeve open collared shirt that held in his gut was tucked into a pair of Wrangler-tight jean shorts that came to about mid-thigh, and at the very bottom he was wearing hiking boots with his tall black socks rolled back down over the tops.

I forgot to mention this before, but radio stations in NZ use both even and odd frequencies, i.e. both 99.2 and 104.3 FM.

This was our last day in NZ, so we just drove to Auckland, turned in the car, and got to the airport for our dinnertime flight.

It looks big until you are at 40,000 ft.

My final thought about NZ, unfortunately, was “YOU STINKIN’ SCAMMERS!” They charge a $25 per person exit fee. You can’t get through customs and to your flight without a stamp on your boarding pass saying you paid the $25 fee. I encountered this in the Philippines, though people had warned me. In other countries you show up and pay a “visa fee” – basically a fee to enter. I thought the Philippine deal was crafty, but I didn’t begrudge them too much because I was told in advance and frankly the Philippine economy is such that taxing travelers makes sense. NZ, however, gets no such second-world pass. That’s just low, Kiwis.

Day 28: Tuesday, March 18, Whanganui River

Click to enlarge. The boulders at the mouth of one cave were full of shells that had retained their color.

After having breakfast with our host family it took quite a while to get off – the whole saying goodbye thing took a long time. We had really enjoyed our time with them, though, so it wasn’t as if we were eager to leave. We spent the afternoon canoing on the Whanganui river; note that the town is Wanganui and the river is Whanganui. The river was very low, but it didn’t prevent the trip from being eventful. Several sets of small rapids gave John a thrill, and there were two caves to explore. My sister lost a flip flop – excuse me, “jandal” – in some thick mud. To get to and from the canoing location we had to drive two hours into a national park, half of which was on a one-lane gravel road.

Fortunately for us the water flowed uphill at one point.

The official speed limit? 100 kph. It meant that we had a late night. We rolled into a town about 9 pm looking for dinner and the only option was a hotel restaurant. The place was owned and staffed by an Indian family and the food was surprisingly good. Perhaps more surprising, however, were the big portions. Restaurants are a lot more expensive over here, but they also don’t give you as much. At a nice restaurant over here you would expect to get free bread or something like that before the meal, but that is nonexistent over here. Portions are smaller and sometimes we haven’t been full after our meal.

One great thing about Oz/NZ is that there are very few situations in which you tip, and all prices listed include GST (sales tax). In the U.S., a dish that costs $20 will really end up costing you about $25 after tax and tip. In NZ, a $20 dish costs you exactly $20.

Another great thing is that prices over here are almost always round numbers. Most things are priced to the dollar or half dollar. They don’t even have pennies over here. The only store in which I remember seeing prices end in .99 was in a souvenir shop whose primary customers are, of course, Americans. I use a credit card everywhere I can in the U.S. because I absolutely hate carrying around change. (I then pay said credit card off every month.) In NZ, you don’t really have to worry about that.

I've been told that if you want to tell whether someone is a Kiwi or Aussie you ask them to say "fish and chips." If it comes out like you expect it, the speaker is an Aussie. If it comes out as "fush an' chups," the speaker is a Kiwi. I didn't test anyone, but we did meet someone who pronounced "chicks" as "chucks."

The TV show Dancing with the Stars is a smash hit over here. I’m not sure why that show specifically is really popular. It’s heavily advertised, but I’m not sure which came first – the ads or the popularity.

Day 27: Monday: March 17, Hutt Valley

Notice the rock strata. Imagine this, but exaggerated, and you have the rock formations that paralleled a good portion of the Great Ocean Road back in Australia.

We woke up this morning and had plenty of time to get to our destination that night. We hadn’t purposefully went to any LOTR filming sites so far in New Zealand and we decided we couldn’t leave without having done our tourist duty and seeing a LOTR site. (I say “purposefully” because we found out that we had bungee jumped a hundred yards from one and wandered around a town on the edge of a ford where another scene was filmed. I’m sure there are others we saw without noticing them.) We went to a quarry that is the filming site of Minas Tirith and Helm’s Deep and went to a park where a scene from Pelennor Fields was filmed.

Today we also took our first rock to the windshield. It’s a constant danger since almost every day we have gone over a section of road in the process of being resurfaced. Trucks here have a metal mesh over the lower part of their windshield to protect them from rocks.

We also stopped at another used bookstore. This one was in a small town and was run by a large guy with a scruffy beard. Two men came through the store while we were there and sat down to chat it up with the proprietor. We have seen this in small towns across NZ.

A house from the beginning of the 20th century mounted with a dish from the beginning of the 21st.

That night we stayed with a family we had met through the Smiths. They live on a farm outside of Wanganui in a 100yo house. The dad works at a private school in Wanganui where Prince Edward spent part of his gap year (between high school and college) volunteer teaching. Perhaps the best part was the 6yo. He spoke like a little gentleman. Then again, anyone who speaks softly with a British accent automatically seems like a gentleman.

Our host was shy, but it didn't impede his curiosity.

Day 26: Sunday, March 16, Nelson

All of Picton. Picton is the jumping off point for the North vs. South Islands. This gives you a scale of how big towns are on the South Island.

Today we went to church at Nelson CRC. It was a medium-sized church by NZ standards and had 60 or so people. We once again saw the Smiths at church. After the service I talked for a while with a son who works on avionics in the NZ Air Force. I didn’t recognize the names of the new helicopters he said the NZAF is going to acquire and he said they are European. He repeated something that I had heard several other places but discounted, which is that NZ is in the doghouse with the U.S. after declaring its nuclear-free policy and consequently excluding U.S. ships and planes from NZ. He added that the NZAF had a deal to replace its aging Skyhawk airplanes with F-16s. They were, in Al’s words, “painted in NZ colors” when the Labour party came to power in an election and scrapped the deal. That was probably a US$1B+ deal that went down the tubes. NZ mothballed its Skyhawks anyway, and now NZ has no fighter aircraft. It only flies helicopters and fixed-wing transports and surveillance aircraft. The whole NZAF is only 2500 people, so I can excuse Kiwis for forgetting they have an AF.

I also asked him about his stereotype of Nelson. My eyes saw a movie-set town with flowers hanging from awnings, fountains in the roundabouts, and a beautiful beach and ocean beyond. However, they also saw a lot of teens through late 20’s loafing around on the streets or cruising the town in their souped-up cars. A row of bars took up one block of the edge of town. Al’s answer to my question is that “Nelson is the LA of New Zealand.” I should have asked him what he meant, but you can interpret it for yourself.

The Bluebridge Ferry swallowing RVs.

Afterward we drove to Picton and then took the ferry to the North Island, ending our night in a town called Upper Hutt (because of the Hutt Valley). I hope NZ truck drivers get paid well, because they deserve it. Their American counterparts can cruise in pretty straight lines over multilane freeways. Truck drivers here really have to work for their pay. I also noticed that there are no trucks here that are as long as our U.S. trucks. Instead, they are all short and articulated. I’m sure this is so that they can get around the sharp corners of the highways here.

Another trip to the grocery yielded a few more observations. They had a tiny package of cherries (I counted exactly 14) for $3.58 -- $22.99 per kilogram. I also saw “Texas muffins” in the bakery. There were lots of varieties and they were standard flavors, so I’m pretty sure they were labeled “Texas muffins” simply because they were big. As I looked for frozen vegetables I ran across the “Texas mix,” which includes corn, carrots, onion, peas, and red bell pepper (called red capsicum here).

Flip-flops are called jandals here.

When I first started driving in NZ I was confused by diamonds I saw painted on city streets. In Texas those would indicate an HOV lane, but everyone drives on them here. After a while I figured out that diamonds painted on the road indicate an upcoming “yield” situation. They are very common in cites because of the many pedestrian crossings.

If you have regular Big Mac cravings, McDonald's wants to reward you with a sticker. We have seen cars driving around with stickers that have the McDonald’s M and the words “Drive Thru VIP” underneath. These stickers are always in the lower corner of the front windshield on the driver’s side. We asked and found out that every month there is a special deal; if you go through a McD’s drive thru with this sticker you can get whatever the deal of the month is. It’s free advertising for McDonald’s and a good deal for the drivers, and I brought a couple back.

Here is a Maori phrase for you: ka mate koe i te kai hikareti = smoking kills. Maori and English are both official languages of the country, so government signs are frequently in both languages.

Day 25: Saturday, March 15, Nelson

This morning started early with the Nelson Saturday Market. Vendors set up tents in a parking lot to hawk their wares. I would say it was one of the better markets I have been to and had more upscale items than most. Popular items included homemade soaps, jade jewelry, fruits, vegetables, and jams. Some of the more interesting items included airplanes and helicopters made of cut up and bent beer cans, hippie-style clothes (sold by someone who obviously wore her own clothes), and a guy selling Americana. He said that he went to the U.S. once or twice a year, bought an old truck for resale in NZ, loaded it with shirts and other clothing from Wal-Mart and other cheap outlets, and shipped it back to the NZ. No one here knows they are from Wal-Mart because they aren’t familiar with WM’s house brand names. He also had a picture frame and other items made from Texas license plates; he gets those from junkyards and resells them here.

While in the market I had quite a shock. I was walking down a row when I thought I spotted a family we knew. I was so surprised that I just kept walking, then turned around to have a better look. Sure enough, a family that we had eaten with on the North Island in Palmerston North was there at the Nelson market (which is on the South Island). It was quite bizarre. It turns out that they were on a “house swap” vacation with some friends – each used the other’s house for a week so they each got a cheap vacation. Had I known that, I almost would have expected to see them at the market, but as it was I thought it was really strange. (It got stranger as the day went on.)

When I was finished in the market I wandered down an adjacent street. I saw a restaurant called the Lone Star and took a look at the menu. Fajitas for 2 were $58, a burrito was $25, and hamburgers came with a side of “buffalo chips.” I’m not sure if they just said that for the American ring, meant to imply that the French fries (chips) were big, or if they really meant it as a pun, but the idea of having a side of buffalo poop with my burger wasn’t a selling point.

My 40+ year old ex-electrical engineer hang glide instructor. How's that for a career change?

That afternoon I went hang gliding, which was one thing I had wanted to do. The guy who took me was an electrical engineer by training, but in 1989 someone had introduced him to hang gliding and he bought his hang glider two days after his first flight. He has been hang gliding ever since. He has an understandable dislike for wind farms. I also learned that NZ’s nuclear-free policy extends to nuclear-powered ships, not just those with nuclear weapons, and that the extensive pine tree forests that grow on hills here are planted by hand. (We thought that might be the case because these hills are so steep and that it would be hard to run any machines on them.) We went gliding from a hill overlooking Nelson, and I wish we could have picnicked at the top before coming down. It was a great view. The crest is bare because a logging company cleared it and they lease the land to local hang gliders and paragliders. The flight was great and I even got a chance to pilot it for a bit. We landed in an open sports field where a softball game was going on nearby. The instructor said that he once heard several “whoosh” sounds as he was coming in and learned after landing that someone was launching model rockets nearby.

I gotta get me one of these.

While we were out on the field we looked up to see the friends from the market walking across the field toward us. It turns out that one of their sons was playing in the softball game (baseball doesn’t exist here, so softball is both a guy and girl sport) and when they saw the hang gliders they decided to investigate since we had told them our plans.

The rest of the day was spent wandering around Nelson. One stop was the cathedral that overlooks the town. It was started in the 1930’s in the neo-gothic style, but building paused after the first level was complete. When building was going to resume in the 1950’s there was debate over whether to complete it according to the original plans or finish it off in a 50’s style. The result is a cathedral with great stained glass windows and interior buttresses in along the outside (I’m forgetting my architecture history vocabulary) but topped with a flat plaster ceiling that looks like something from a nice office building. The result isn’t too great.

As we walked in town afterward we heard a honk. We looked up in time to see our family friends driving past us, making it the third time that day we had seen them. We decided to eat at a place called Go Mexican for dinner; up to this point we had only had tacos we made ourselves and great burritos at The Burrito Company in Christchurch, so this was our first sampling of full NZ Mexican. The place looked clean and new, but the guy who helped us was Indian. The food turned out to be four of five stars (my only complaint was with the salsa) and the presentation was great. We ended up in a long conversation with the owner/waiter. It turns out that this Indian guy who cooked us Mexican food in New Zealand taught international cuisine at a culinary school in Milwaukee after living in El Salvador. He became a U.S. citizen about ten months ago, but since his family couldn’t get immigration papers they all decided to rendezvous in NZ. He married an American, but his mother-in-law teaches art in Perth, Australia. He was a very interesting guy and we enjoyed both the conversation and the food.

Day 24: Friday, March 14, Motueka

Can you see why Kiwis like to vacation here?

On Friday we spent most of the day walking part of the Abel Tasman Coastal Track. It is one of the “Great Walks,” a set of NZ hikes (“tramps” here) that take several days and cover beautiful scenery. We just hiked a portion of it, but it took us past several beaches and a big tidal flat while the tide was out.

A duck walks past a log stranded on a tidal flat.

The barnacles on the rocks indicated the tide lines, but interspersed in the barnacles were thousands of tiny sea snails with beautiful blue shells. Each was no bigger than a poppy seed. There were also lots of mussels, and crabs skittered around on the sand.

Snails, both large and small.

That afternoon we drove to Nelson and ended up just lazing away the rest of the afternoon at our holiday park. I walked around a tidal flat with John and we also checked out a public BMX course. I talked about public skate parks before (they are ubiquitous), but this is the first public BMX course I have seen.

The road to Nelson followed the coast and was once again filled with windy switchbacks. It gave great views of the ocean. I clocked us on one stretch and we averaged 30 kph (about 20 mph). The posted speed limit is 100 kph.

Day 23: Thursday, March 13, Motueka

The weather was great for a day of kayaking, so I went sea kayaking for the first time. I enjoyed it, though I never felt really comfortable. A canoeing stroke seems more natural. I did learn about the “oh crap strap,” which is the cord you pull to release the seal on the skirt that seals the water out of the kayak. Max is a vegetarian who double-checks to be sure his eggs are free-range, his food is GMO-free, and his crops were grown in sustainable ways. He has been a rock climbing instructor in Canada, a white-water kayaking instructor here in NZ, and now a sea kayaking instructor. He lives out of his camperized minivan, he believes that tourism in NZ is unsustainable because the world is going to run out of oil very soon and thus no tourists will be able to travel here, and he scorns many butchered Kiwi pronunciations of Maori names. In short, he is a model for one Kiwi stereotype: young, in touch with nature, eco-conscious, and sensitive to native (Maori) culture.

We kayaked in the waters off Abel Tasman National Park. Abel Tasman is a very popular vacation spot for Kiwis, and I can see why. It has the infrastructure for an influx of visitors and it has miles and miles (perhaps I should say kilometers and kilometers) of sandy beaches, blue/green waters, and national parks open to hiking and camping. If I were a Kiwi and I were used to the landscapes common to NZ, I would probably come here for a vacation as well.

We made another playground discovery today. Our holiday park (more on that in a minute) had an “air trampoline” that is just a dome of tough plastic filled with air. Air pressure substitutes for springs. It is at least three times the size of a normal trampoline, and while you don’t get as much bounce the sloping sides make for some interesting ricochets.

There is at least one holiday park in any respectable NZ town. A holiday park is a mix of cabins, RV hookups, and camp sites – basically it can host you no matter how you are traveling. Most have some degree of playground equipment for kids and many have bikes you can borrow or rent. The holiday park we stayed in at Motueka had pedal-powered go carts; John got one and we drove around the holiday park. John came back and reported that an older lady had asked him, “Is that fun?” John’s tone as he related this implied that it was a stupid question. Of course it was fun! Very soon there were three or four other people also pedaling around the park on other push carts including the older lady, a punk/boarder guy in his 20’s, and a middle-aged man.

Day 22: Wednesday, March 12, Murchison

Man-eating wekas are known to lurk in hedgerows in wait of passing cars. Well...

Today was mostly spent driving. We stopped outside of Westport to see another seal colony. All of the colonies we have seen have little ponds formed by water splashing up on the rocks in which the little seals are always playing.

We went though Murchison and ended up staying for a couple of hours, mostly due to one place. We found a resale shop called Somebody’s Treasure, which was almost an estate sale shop. Included in the clutter were old telephones (hand crank telephone, anyone?), Kodak Brownie cameras, Wedgewood and china, and a spark plug with several screws glued to it to form the shape of a dragster. We spent most of our time looking through lots of old books. I would have bought some except that I don’t have a way to get them back to the states. There were also a lot (probably 75+) airline-sized bottles of liquors, most of which were really old. (Aged Scotch might be expensive, but when stuff is coagulating and falling to the bottom it’s probably a little too old.) Someone obviously collected them and then sold them or died.

Main Street Murchison. Any NZ town looks like this, and even downtown city streets have the adjoining logo-covered overhangs and classic small-town facades.

The South Island of NZ is very narrow and is about 250 km across at some points. The whole thing is so mountainous, though, that drive times are greatly extended. Some guys were talking about taking a trip to Mt. Cook from Greymouth; they could take a 1.5 day car trip or a 45 flight by private plane. We have only seen two police cars patrolling the intercity highways here on the South Island, and the terrain is probably part of the reason. The speed limit might be 100 kph, but there are few stretches where you can do that for any prolonged time. The windy roads naturally check speeders.

Day 21: Tuesday, March 11, Punakaiki

We arrived on a "bad" day and this water was still spraying up about three stories high.

Today we made another great drive and ended up in Punakaiki. We saw the Pancake Rocks and the accompanying blowholes there. No one knows exactly how the rocks formed, but they definitely look like stacked pancakes. The blowhole effect comes when water rushes into the enclosed spaces and the trapped air pushes back like a compressed balloon.

If you remember back to the beginning of my NZ posts I commented that lots of trucks and SUVs have snorkels for the engine. I assumed this was for driving through parts of NZ’s backcountry after big rains. It turns out I gave the Kiwis too much credit: when I asked someone if this was the case they laughed and scornfully said that the snorkels are just for show. I guess engine snorkels are the Kiwi equivalent of rims and grill guards on the Mercedes SUV that braves the wild suburban landscape.

One thing I really do like about NZ driving is the lack of stop signs. They are usually found in bigger towns, and even then they are very rare. Most intersections that would be four-way stops are roundabouts, and most other intersections just have “Give Way” (yield) signs. This puts more responsibility on drivers to double-check for traffic, but it means you don’t have to make those aggravating and mpg-killing stops at completely empty intersections.

Today we stopped at a jade store on the way out of town since Hokitika is the unofficial jade capital of NZ. After looking through the stores I was a little surprised. It wasn’t that much more expensive than the jade I saw in China several years ago. That tells me that either a) exchange rates are at play or b) the Chinese places were making a killing. I suspect the latter, because the places I went in China were very tourist-oriented. There you saw lines of people behind windows carving jade; here you could go into the back of the shop where three or four locals were shaping jade. The labor costs are certainly much higher here, so I would guess that the profit margins in China were very nice.

Bet you never had to dodge penguins on your trips.

Day 20: Monday, March 10, Franz Joseph Glacier

Glacier pictures are coming, so watch for an update to this post.

Today was an early morning. We hit Lake Matheson in the morning and we were certainly not alone. Lake Matheson is surrounded by trees and reeds, and the result is a glassy calm early in the morning until the wind disturbs the waters. Mt. Cook can be seen in the reflections, pictures of the lake show up in a lot of postcards. There were some hiccups in our morning routine so we got there a little later than we were aiming, but the view was still good. We also saw some Smurf-blue mushrooms.

The Fox and Franz Joseph glaciers are about 23 km apart on the western coast. We stayed near Fox, but the next day William and I climbed on Franz Joseph. They don’t allow anyone on the glacier without a guide, so we were in a group of 11 climbers plus a guide. Six of the 11 (including us) were Americans, which is the largest proportion of Americans I’ve encountered as far as I can remember. To get to the glacier we had to walk about 1.5 km along the rocky riverbed left by the glacier’s retreat. Until three months ago you simply walked around a bend in the river; three months ago the river (which is just the melted glacial water) changed course and makes this impractical.

In a natural ice cave on the glacier.

Now you climb over a hill and down the other side to continue your walk. In parts of the walk you just walked along creekbeds. When we got to the glacier we put on crampons (metal spikes for better grip on ice) and up we went. We saw lots of ice formations and colors associated with glaciers, but we also had a great time just jumping around on the glacier. Plus, let’s face it, stomping around on 200m-thick ice is always a novelty for two Texans.

Franz and Fox are two of only three glaciers that are surrounded by temperate rainforest. They are also unusual for their latitude; the equivalent latitude in the northern hemisphere is about the top of Ohio, I think. Fox Glacier was named for the first tourist to visit in 1872 if I am to believe the back of a postcard.

Looking into the valley from the glacier. TAMU MechE's, represent!

We followed SOP and used the restrooms before we headed out of Franz and on to Hokitika. The toilets were a tourist stop in themselves. We have encountered several automatic toilets, but this one takes the cake. There is a control panel outside with LEDs indicating whether the toilet is vacant, occupied, or out of service. A push of a button opens a elevator-style sliding door. After you walk in a voice tells you to push another button to close the door and electronically lock it. You get to listen to relaxing music in the background while you do your thing. If it involves toilet paper, push a button to dispense it; in one toilet it gave you exactly and only two squares per push. When you are done, pushing the button to unlock and open the door also flushes the toilet for you. You have to be sure that you are quick, because if you are in longer than ten minutes an alarm will sound and the door will open. (According to the toilet, it’s the “loiter alarm.”) The total effect is as if I stepped from a tiny, rough mountain town into the loo of the Enterprise.

Customized license plates are really popular here. The standard plate is five or six black block letters with nothing else. If you get a customized plate, however, you control not only the plate number/letter combo, but also any text above or below. One example was a plate that said something to the effect of “We love our NO1DAD for all he does.” The official plate is NO1DAD. Another common example is a license plate that advertises your business, like a plate NZRUBY that had a website underneath for its gemstone store.

Day 19: Sunday, March 9, Wanaka/Haast Pass

A creative sign at our hostel.

Today we went to church at a tiny Baptist church in Wanaka. When I say tiny, I mean that there were 14 permanent members and ten visitors from out of town. It was a friendly crowd, and like every church so far we talked to them over tea and snacks afterward. I met a guy from the UK who had been a camp counselor for a couple of summers in Connecticut when he was studying in England and moved to NZ back in 1994. We talked politics and it was a very interesting conversation. The guide book said that politics is a very common topic of conversation and that most all Kiwis talk politics. I would agree. However, I would add that Kiwis are more interested in U.S. politics than their own politics. I have had three political conversations in as many days (this guy, one of the hang glide instructors, and a lady selling pictures at the A&P). Every one started essentially the same way: “Where are you from?” “I’m from Texas.” “What do you think of the election?” I’ve found that everywhere I’ve gone people always follow American politics. However, I think Kiwis are the most interested (or at least upfront) of those I’ve met. This also includes non-native Kiwis. The hang glide guy was Swiss. After a conversation about the Democratic election I told him that Kiwi politics seemed to be interesting, too, and he replied that he didn’t follow them. (He has lived here four years.) Others have made similar comments.

If you look at a map of NZ you will see that a huge proportion of the land is national park land. I’m not exactly sure how it works, but apparently the government has granted land use leases to a lot of sheep farmers. I think they are prolonged leases – 50 yrs or so – and were mostly granted a long time ago. I saw a short film about a family of shepherds in the highlands who said the government won’t renew their land lease. One guy at church said that his son traded his highland land lease to the government for ownership near Wanaka and then sold his land ownership to a development company; he retired on the money. The government realized that a lot of people were doing this and so it retroactively restricted the use of land it sold in these swaps. That meant that people who hadn’t completed the sale of their new land suddenly saw the land’s value plummet due to government action, but they didn’t get any compensation from the government. It’s like the EPA declaring part of someone’s property to be restricted use because of the presence of an endangered species without compensating the owner for loss of use or value. The huge amount of publicly owned land and the restrictions on the use of new land might be a factor in housing/land prices.

Enjoying a break and a good viewpoint above Monro Beach.

We then drove to Fox Glacier via Haast and Haast Pass. Along the way we came to a one-lane bridge about ¼ mile long. We have seen a lot of one-lane bridges, but none this long. It had two passing bays, which are essentially bulges in the bridge big enough for two cars to pass each other. The idea is that each pulls into their bay and then they can go on. However, there was a car on our side that obviously didn’t understand that because he was waiting for the bridge to be totally clear. A camper van was coming toward us and was about halfway across the bridge when a Mercedes comes roaring past us. He was obviously five or six cars back and decided that the driver at the front of the line didn’t know how the system was supposed to work and decided just to pass ahead to the front of the line. I agree with his assessment, but his style screamed “I drive a Mercedes so I can drive as I please.” The worst part of it all was that he waited way too long

A view down Monro Beach. It is secluded and a 45 minute walk from anywhere, so we had it to ourselves.

and thus encountered the camper van after it had passed the last passing bay. Everyone came to a halt with this Mercedes nose-to-nose with the camper van, which in turn had another car or two behind. Mercedes Man got out of his car and gesticulated at the camper; the camper driver just sat there and shrugged his shoulders. After a minute or two Mercedes Man admitted defeat and started backing his car up on the bridge. It became readily apparent that he was terrible at backing up, adding insult to injury. At one point he ran into the curb and had to pull forward in order to straighten out and continue. When he reached the end after his ignominious retreat he gave the camper van the finger as it moved past; we gave the camper van a big thumbs up as he went past.

Note the name. Someone had a sense of humor. This also gives you an example of a one lane bridge; the large arrow indicates right-of-way.

To give you an idea of how unpopulated this area is, Haast is considered a big town on the west coast highway. It has a population of 250 and one gas station.

Rocks and surf. A great combination.

Day 18: Saturday, March 8, Wanaka

It felt like this kind of day.

After a late morning we headed into town to the A&P. The first thing we went to were the sheep dog trials. It really is interesting to see the dogs in action. The man/dog combo must guide the sheep around or through several obstacles. The final test is that the sheep must be herded into a gated pen. Once the man touches and opens the gate he cannot let go, meaning that this last test is almost totally up to the dog. We then went to the main part of the A&P. An A&P is sort of their version of our livestock show. Lots of animal showing, carnival rides, vendor booths to sell everything from mops to boats, and entertainment on a couple of stages. They also had the Golden Lamb competition going on (which they call the “Glammies”); it’s a search for the best-tasting sheep in NZ. We got there at the perfect time because after the judges did their sampling they cut up the rest of each roast for the audience. I got to taste some of the best lamb in NZ, and boy was it good – all the meat was unseasoned, too.

Part of the view from Mount Iron looking into the Lake Wanaka valley.

When we left we hung out for a while at the edge of Lake Wanaka. It was a very nice day – windy and sunny. (There has been a significant wind almost every day we have been in these central South Island towns. I’m pretty sure it’s because all of the valleys act as funnels, just like in Milford Sound.) After that we hiked up to the top of a hill near the town that gave us a 360 view of the town, the lake on which it is situated, and the surrounding valleys. We finished the day with tacos back at the hostel. Surprisingly, the grocery had tortillas, salsa that wasn’t great but wasn’t just tomato sauce, and taco meat seasoning. It was great.

Our hostel here was small and not totally full – we stayed in Able Town, a short drive outside of Wanaka. The other residents included a Japanese girl traveling for an extended period by herself, the first one I’ve met doing so and one of the few Japanese I’ve seen in hostels; two Israeli girls who just finished their mandatory military service and were each traveling solo until meeting each other in Australia; and a trio of girls from some Asian nation who watched Desperate Housewives in their native language on a laptop over dinner. There was also a Dutch man who dislocated his ankle a couple of days ago; he and his wife decided to finish their trip anyway, and I wish them luck. Last but not least was a British couple. I wouldn’t have known they were a couple except that the man referred to his wife. The man was older (late 50’s?), well-traveled (he had climbed mountains on a number of continents), and very loquacious. Every time I ran into him a long conversation invariably ensued. He would launch into new topics unprodded, and if there was a lull in the conversation that would normally imply the end of a conversation he would stand there awkwardly until he realized you weren’t going to ask a question and continue the conversation. He talked to us while we at dinner and he stood next to the table, and he even had a “conversation” (read: monologue) with me while he was sitting on the toilet and I was brushing my teeth. I didn’t hear his wife utter a word the entire time I was there. (He talked about Yellowstone once and pronounced geysers like “geezers,” so I laughed inside when he said that Yellowstone was “full of geezers.”)

Something we picked up at the A&P had a chart showing the New Zealand dollar (NZD) vs. the USD. In 2002 the NZD was worth US$0.40; in the last three months or so it has gone from about US$0.78 to US$0.82. I hate Ben Bernacke and our spendthrift Congress.

Housing prices are another story here. Prices are astronomical. One person said that it’s a big problem because school grads can’t afford any housing. We got an ad for a realtor as we walked into the A&P that they wanted you to fill out if you were interested in looking for a home in the Wanaka area. It asked you to circle the price range you were interested in and the lowest price range was NZ$500K-600K. That might have been simply because they don’t want to serve anyone below that range, but I doubt it. We have seen signs in realty windows for empty lots starting at $295K, and most houses are in the $700K+ range. I’m sure there are a lot of components (including the cost of shipping materials in this rugged country), but one frequently cited reason is foreigners with strong currencies buying NZ real estate that, while pricy for Kiwis, is cheap for foreigners with a good exchange rate. It also seems odd because these towns are tiny. The largest town we’ve been in since leaving Christchurch (pop. 300K, on the eastern coast) has been about 3500. If the demand is driving prices I would have expected to see rapidly growing towns and lots of construction, but I haven’t.

'Nuff said.

Day 17: Friday, March 7, Queenstown

Switchbacks above Queenstown.

Today was a failed exciting day. We left Te Anau (where we stayed after Milford Sound) and drove back to Queenstown in the morning, stopping a couple of places along the way. I was supposed to go hang gliding, but when we went up to the take-off point the winds had changed and they canceled. The upshot is that we got a great view off Coronet Peak into Queenstown and the surrounding areas for free. In my van were a French couple; a Chilean who was the champion at some paragliding competition recently; and Japanese, Swiss, and German/Australian guides.

The drive to Wanaka went up a switchback that gave us a view over Queenstown. At the top was a property listed by Sotheby’s International. We had difficulty finding a place to stay in Wanaka and when we arrived we learned why: Wanaka’s Agricultural and Pastoral (A&P) show was going on. It’s the second biggest A&P in the country according to a brochure I read.

We also got some more groceries, which makes this a good time to talk about cereal. Cereal, the staple of the American breakfast, hasn’t had quite the same success over here. The biggest types of cereal seem to be varieties of muesli and Weet-Bix. Muesli seems like uncooked oatmeal, and Weet-Bix (which I saw in Britain) is a wafer of bran that dissolves into mush upon contact with milk. It’s so big here that one grocery simply listed “Weet-Bix” on the end of the aisle instead of “cereal.” Cereal is NZ$6-9 a box unless you go with the $2 Ricies (Rice Crispies). Apples go for NZ$4-6 per kg (about 2.2 pounds). We cooked spaghetti one night and used venison instead of beef because it was actually cheaper. (We have seen lots of deer farms along the way.) Milk is about NZ$6/gallon (NZ$3.25 or so for two liters and about 3.75 liters in a gallon). A McDonald’s strawberry milkshake is NZ$2 for a small to NZ$3.20 for a large.

Camper van art. Backpacker hangouts are veritable art car parades.

Just like in Australia, one of the most popular ways to travel around here is to rent a camper van. There are large campers like the kind we’re used to in the U.S., but there are many more “minicampers.” They are minivans converted into campers by taking out the rear seats and replacing them with some storage room, a bed for two, and other amenities depending on what camper you get. There are a number of brands. One is called Wicked Campers. They are easily distinguished by their paint jobs; it looks like they went to local gangs and said, “Hey, spray paint whatever you want so long as it includes a pithy quote and a graphic,” because they really look like they were graffitied. They remind me of the jeepneys that were a big form of transportation around Manila, though I like the jeepneys a lot more.

The end of sunset over Te Anau's boardwalk.

Day16: Thursday, March 6, Milford Sound

Milford Sound looking back toward the bay.

On Thursday we went down to Milford Sound and cruised the sound – which, I learned, is technically a fjord and not a sound.

The drive down took five hours, but almost half of that was spent on the last 112 km (what would normally be just over an hour). The sound is a tourist attraction because you have long inlets of water flanked by towering mountains; the road winds along and over these mountains. There were a number of one-lane bridges, which we had seen before (you just yield and take turns), but there were also stretches of road where it narrowed such that they got rid of the lane divider. That was sort of a free-for-all.

Australia's maritime flag has a red background, but apparently NZ doesn't have a different maritime flag.

The sound itself was nice, but I didn’t find it stunningly beautiful. (If you read the quotes from the cruise brochures you would think I must be defective in some way.) It was just tall, steep hills overgrown with scrubs, mosses, and trees clinging to pockets of soil. It was like a lot of valleys we have driven through here in NZ except we were on water. I do, however, think it was impressive and imposing. Pictures of the mountains are interesting, but without any scale they are only that. If you see one with a boat in it, you realize that the two-story boat is a like an ocean tuna next to a whale – the big dwarfed by the massive. The sun shining on the hills heats them, which in turn heats the air standing on the mountains. This hot air rises and draws cold air in from the sound’s mouth. Because it is so long (so lots of hot air needs replacing) and so narrow (so there is little space for the air to flow) they have gale-force “afternoon breezes.” At one point I walked along the side of the boat tilted forward about 30 degrees, and at another point I got pinned against the railing by a gust. I can’t remember being in natural winds that fast – only when sticking my head out of a car window… or when jetboating. We saw one waterfall that seemed to lose half of its water at one point to wind.

I should add that we went on a clear day. Milford Sound gets rain about 180 days/year, and everyone said that we should go rain or shine. On a clear day you get our view, and on a rainy day the sides of the mountains turn into thousands of small waterfalls. Also, Milford Sound is home to a lot of sea life that is usually only found in deeper waters. The fresh water from the rains and the river forms a layer over the salt water; the fresh water is also dark because of nutrients and tannins it picks up along the way. The result is that very little light gets to the salt water layer, and thus deep water creatures feel at home. Unfortunately we didn’t see Moby Dick.

Three of our travel companions.

Near the mouth of the ford we were escorted by six or seven bottlenose dolphins, which was rare according to the person providing commentary. It really was fun to watch them swim right under the bow and jump around. One or two swam on their side for a while; we later learned that they do this to look up at us. I also learned that they swim just in front of the bow of boats in order to ride the pressure wave created by the boat, which makes a lot of sense. I knew it happened, but I had never heard an explanation.

The view down the valley near the end of the day.

We were on the last cruise of the day, which meant we had two options. Option one was to sprint to the car and start driving back so that we weren’t stuck behind tour buses on the windy roads. The other option was to eat dinner there at the sound and let the traffic clear out before we headed back. We decided to hang around and were rewarded with some great views of the sun descending behind the rim of the sound; we also had the place to ourselves, so it was nice and peaceful. William overheard someone in the restaurant ask how much gas it took to get back to Te Anau (the closest gas stop) – they were evidently worried about their gas situation. On the drive back we stopped at regular intervals along the way to get out and admire the surroundings, and consequently we passed that couple about four times on the way back. They must have decided that they were going to conserve gas by driving no faster than 65 kph (about 40 mph).

Note my spiffy "I'm a tourist!" t-shirt from Australia.

We also had our first battle with sand flies. I don’t think there are any mosquitoes in New Zealand (or they haven’t found us yet), but the sand flies stand in for them. These gnat-sized buggers aren’t as subtle as mosquitoes; you definitely feel it when they bite you. They are like mosquitoes in their ability to find you somehow, so the longer you are in one place the more sand flies you will have flying in a cloud around you. After each stop we spent the next five minutes on the road killing the sand flies that had hitched a ride. I was an ace after two stops.

The motel we stayed in that night had a façade that made it look like a gold rush town. Instead of staying in room four, you stayed in “Bill’s Dry Goods.” Fun idea, but I didn’t think the place was that great.

Day 15: Wednesday, March 5, Arrowtown/Queenstown

This day was spent in Queenstown, though we are staying in Arrowtown. Arrowtown is about 19km away and living is a lot cheaper there. Morning chills and rain didn’t bode well, so we had a relaxed morning and did some looking ahead. Things cleared up about mid-day and we ventured out.

Queenstown is on the map because it is an adrenaline mecca. One person said that Queenstown is great “if you have deep pockets,” and they are right. I knew before the trip that this is where I would blow a wad. (I haven’t been eating PB&J for lunch this entire trip for nothing.) First up was jetboating. The boat is basically powered by two massive waterpumps that suck up from the bottom and shoot out the back. None of the engine protrudes down below, so at full speed it draws only three or four inches. The contact point with the water when going full speed is about 2/3 of the way back – this is also the pivot point for the craft. There is no keel (it’s flat-bottomed to help have a low draft). The net result is a boat that can skim at high speeds over very shallow and rocky glacial rivers and drives like a car that is constantly sliding. The driver could quickly pivot the wheel, spin the nose close to a rock face or make it stick out over rocks, and then pivot back before the boat starts to move in the new direction. Before we got to the river we had to cross part of the lake. The wind was blowing quite steadily and hard and turning up some waves that I would guess were three feet tall. The combination of speeding across the waves and the naturally high wind produced face-distorting winds. It reminded me of going across the Indian Ocean to Phi Phi Island a couple of years ago, but much milder.

After that we noodled up the main Queenstown street. It’s lined with souvenir shops, but it also has an assortment of upscale women’s clothing stores. I guess Queenstown attracts more than just wild 20-somethings.

I would like to think this was a graceful swan dive.

On the way back where we were staying William and I went bungee jumping. The first commercial jump was off a bridge outside of town, and that’s where we headed. This also happens to be the 20^th anniversary of the first commercial bungee. I figure that the primary fall (not counting rebounds) cost about $32 per second, making it the most expensive time of my life that I can remember.

[I wrote the above while in the communal kitchen of our holiday park. Somehow a cat had gotten in and was exploring the kitchen. The power cord to the laptop suddenly started moving off the table and I found the cat pawing the cord from the floor.]

Bungee jumping was a lot different from skydiving, yet similar in some ways. The waiver was just the back of a page and required one signature, whereas my skydiving waiver had me sign a million times and must have required a whole tree to print. I got there, they weighed me, I walked out to the platform, they tied up my feet, and I jumped all in the space of 5-10 minutes. When I went skydiving there was at least an hour and a half of paperwork, suiting up, waiting, instructions, flight up to altitude, and then the jump and the descent down. (Not to mention the fact that I jumped the third day I went out there because weather canceled the first two.) I also found myself instinctively trying to spread my legs for control (like you do in skydiving) and wanting to look forward and down, which isn’t possible once the cord goes into tension and hangs you upside down. When I hit the bottom I twisted around to get my bearings and I’m sure I looked like a worm wriggling on a fishing line.

After that it was back home. The place we were staying had a little playground consisting of a teeter totter, a swing set, a rope climbing tower, and this. The “Supernova” just looks like a flat washer made of plastic tilted at an angle of 20 degrees or so. It sits on bearings so that it can spin. If the people playing on it aren’t balanced, it begins to spin. It sounds simple and it is simple, but it is also a ton of fun. (When I’m forty I’m going to have a secret hangout with a Ripstick, a good rope swing, and one of these.) I figure I spent about four hours on it between the two nights I was there. John also got a refresher lecture about centripetal force and center of mass. (The original lecture came while using a friend’s Ripstick.) A few little kids joined us, including an 8yo from Australia named James. For some reason he attached to me. If I went swinging, he went swinging. I didn’t mind it, but I wasn’t sure what sparked it. We talked about a lot of things, one of them being food – his mom was a chef. I asked him if they ever ate macaroni and cheese (as a recent college grad, I had noticed an acute lack of mac & cheese in the grocery). He said he had never heard of it. I guess that leaves Aussie/Kiwi uni students with ramen as their only cheap food supply. (Actually, I’m sure they have their own cheap substitute, but it probably involves Nutella and therefore I’m not interested.)