#23 NZ: February 3-28, 2007 Wrapping Up on the South Island
Dunedin (east coast of New Zealand's South Island)
Dunedin, a city we almost didn't visit because of
routing inefficiencies, was a highpoint for our South Island tour. The hilly university town of
120,000 people on the southeast coast had a welcome, lively energy and no doubt the
unusually fine weather colored our
experience.
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The Otago Museum--which was what pulled us into Dunedin--was well done and had
satisfying and sophisticated exhibits to
round out our New Zealand education. The next stop in Dunedin, the visit to the Royal Albatross Colony was
interesting, though felt overpriced at $30NZ each for a tightly controlled 30 minutes on the viewing
platform. But our early February visit to the colony was perfect for spotting several birds nesting on
their chicks--a special treat with birds that only make landfall to breed. And we were lucky as we
were the first in the stream of visitors for the day to actually see birds in
flight flashing their 10' wingspans.
The unexpected delight in Dunedin was the time spent with Elm
Wildlife Tours. They hauled us out to the Albatross Colony as part of the
package and then on to a
private conservation area they developed with the farmer who owns land
favored by the local wildlife. There we walked on the beach between the resting sea lions, got
up-close looks at yellow-eyed penguins from hides, and looked down on several
hundred fur seals with their pups.
Our tour leader, like most of their half-dozen guides, was a
master's level biology student. Sea lions were his area of study and he was
personable and generous with his knowledge. Of our half-dozen guided tour
experiences in New Zealand, this was the cheapest at $75NZ each and unlike all
the others, felt under-priced.
The Plight of Cyclists In New Zealand
Our Dunedin small group wildlife guide also happily answered all of our
questions, including clarifying that part of our misery on the road as
cyclists was because in New Zealand cars have the right-of-way over pedestrians
and cyclists. I asked our Elm Tours guide if there was momentum building in
the country for supporting cycling and he hardly understood the question. The
rising cost of petrol had increased biking in the cities for commuters, but he
thought there was no need for that in Dunedin. Within Dunedin as in several
other
cities, we did happen upon nice urban bike lanes but the mindset had not yet spilled over
onto the intercity riding.
And it was in Dunedin that we listened to the frustrations of several
British cyclo-tourists with biking in New Zealand. One energetic couple that had
done 2,000 miles in 2 months--about what we'd done in 3 months--was
hopping mad. The husband was intent on a letter writing campaign when he
returned home to complain of the mistreatment of cyclists on the road. About our
age and like us, with plenty of touring experience in other countries, they were
applauded at what they had experienced. We however consider the situation for cyclists in New Zealand as
hopeless and hearing that cars have the right-away over pedestrians just
confirmed the unsuitability of the culture for cycling.
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Sadder was talking with the British man traveling alone who
quickly abandoned his cycling trip in New Zealand. Only days into his 3 week
trip when we met him, "Defeated"
was on the tip of his tongue. He too felt the roads were just too dangerous for
cyclo-touring.
Wisely, he was changing his agenda and was using public
transportation to move about the country and biking only on back road day trips.
It was only about a week later when in inland Alexandra that the
last piece of information finally fell into place to explain why the culture in
New Zealand seems hopelessly unfriendly to bikes: injured parties have no legal
recourse against drivers that hit them. This lack of legal recourse is combined
with lack of legal rights: cars, not pedestrians or bikes, always have the right
of way except where specifically posted to the contrary. The result is a
"get out of my way" situation for anyone on the road not in a car or truck. The
lack of secondary roads in most of the country leaves bikes with no where to go but to be in this
legally tenuous position on the truck routes.
We felt the "on borrowed time" status from the beginning in New
Zealand--now we fully understood its origins.
The Otago Rail Trail
Many Kiwi's had urged us to venture inland on their new
Rail Trail--a route Map Man had considered and decided against. Neither our
general guide book nor our cycling book recommended the Trail and Bill's image of
fighting the notoriously strong head winds on never-ending gravel sounded grim.
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But the Kiwi's were universal in their enthusiasm, the
weather and wind forecasts were favorable, and the prospect of mixing it up with the
truckers on the roads was in itself repelling, so we decided to give the Trail a try. We had recently
abandoned our plans to ride north on the coast because of the truck traffic and
so the inland Rail Trail completely out of traffic was a good fit with Plan B.
The 135 mile long Otago Central Railway was built in an "on
again, off again" 40 year process that began in the late 1800's to connect the
hinterland sheep operations with coastal Dunedin. The rail line was to make up for the notoriously
poor roads. The line wasn't economical at that time and was
only kept alive by government restrictions on how far goods could be transported
by truck.
The restrictive transport rules were modified in favor of the trucking industry in the 1960's
and eliminated in the 1980's, ringing the death knell for this and other train
lines. Bill dropped his jaw at the sight of photos showing the line using steam
engines into the 1960's. A 37 mile segment of the line out of Dunedin has been retained as an historic
excursion train through the Taieri Gorge and the remainder of the line was
converted to a Rail Trail recreational path in the 1990's.
Not too surprisingly, we didn't think the route was in league
with
the 7 Wonders of the World as one Kiwi had described it, a reference point we'd
heard used before for New Zealand sights. Being out of traffic
was bliss, but the long, straight paths through expanses of pasture land the
first couple of days was out
and out boring. And the rough track was miserable going.
We looked at the inches
deep gravel, some of it the size of tangerines, and wondered what nut had
done the spec's for the trail. The riverbed-like surface may have made the farmers feel at
home, but it was a terrible
surface for cyclists. We thought back to Portland where there is such a
sensitivity to cyclists that even the grit spread on the roads when there is ice is selected
to be bike-friendly. And then there were well constructed though unpaved bike
routes we'd ridden in
Europe that hardly slowed us down at all. Clearly it's not that hard to use existing materials to help
out bikers, but somebody hadn't done their homework when designing this much touted trail.
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One riding day we'd seen several riders bloodied up with
their falls on the sharp, deep, big gravel and it wasn't an hour later that I
went down too. A moment of inattentiveness and I was bruised and bleeding. Bill
cleaned my wounds and was barely satisfied with closing the deepest 2 gashes
without stitches. But as usual, giving these classical cyclist's leg and arm
scrapes a good scrubbing right away ensured that they healed well.
The next day
it was tires that were the causalities of the terrible riding surface as we saw
several people fixing flats. Our beefy but worn-out tires hung in there and we
weren't among those taking time out for repairs. At one bend however we were cautioned to be careful as
a woman had just "gotten the wobbles" and flipped over a fence. Luckily for her
she flipped high enough to clear the barbed wire.
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As we grumbled, we were stunned to talk with a middle-aged
Kiwi man on a supported tour who was
loving his Rail Trail experience. He'd been to Portland, which he thought was
nice, but liked Seattle better because it looked more like his home of Auckland.
He'd done some hiking and easy biking in France and Spain and just didn't think
anything was as lovely as New Zealand and this New Zealand trail was lovely too. He and his
group were huffing and puffing up the 2-3% grades and were among the walking wounded,
but were delighted.
They, like most of the riders we saw, were on rented bikes with a company
shuttling their gear. His group was among those treated to lovely gourmet lunches
on china dishes on the trail, which no doubt helped to keep them purring. In
addition,
they had evening programs adding some pizzazz to their overall experience.
We saw a few other international visitors riding loaded bikes
but the bulk of the riders seemed like Kiwis taking in the Rail Trail as a classical "first timer's" New Zealand activity.
Most were in groups, most weren't carrying their gear, most had a tour leader,
and most had catered gourmet luncheons. And now that school was back in session
after the summer break, most were middle-aged and out of shape. It was a shame
that this was a first cyclo-touring experience for so many and yet it was on such
a grueling surface. It is the only place I know of in New Zealand where you can
ride a bike all day out of traffic and away from the steep grades--too bad they
didn't put a bike-friendly surface on the otherwise bike-friendly route.
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Mt Cook National Park
Traveling inland on the Rail Trail got us closer to checking-off Mt
Cook from our "must-see" list. We'd become a little skeptical about the
Kiwi assessment of "must-see's" and didn't schedule our usual 4 nights in the Mt Cook area to give
ourselves 3 chances at a good weather sight seeing day. The lodging problems and our mild
disenchantment put Mt Cook on a tight schedule: we were giving it a 1 full day and
a 2
night stay to deliver the "wow's."
The day we rode into Twizel, our layover town, the overcast
skies were foreboding. The forecast had been great for it and the next several days, but the
frustrated tourist info staff were to the point of doing brief comedy routines about the
forecast rather than sharing the updates.
The info staff did point out that for the $70NZ
cost of the round trip bus tickets to the park 30 miles away, we could rent a
car. Momentarily parallelized by the thought of driving on the wrong side of the
road, we decided to give it a try in this very rural area. Renting the car was on the "Kiwi Simple" plan with a minimum
of paperwork or formalities. Cash in advance, a signature, proof of a driver's license
and we were off--he didn't even take a credit card number as a guarantee.
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Three months of cycling on the left side of the road was a
definite help but I hadn't anticipated that almost everything inside the car would
be flipped around. My biggest problem was with the turn signals as the
windshield wipers lever was where I expected the blinkers to be and then the left and right
directional lever's function was reversed. The low traffic volume meant that using the
blinkers was more of a formality than actually informing any one and few would
notice the useless flicking of the wipers at intersections.
Thank goodness the 5-on-the floor shift pattern wasn't a
mirror image or upside down. A flash of panic swept over me as I realized that I
was going to be shifting with my left hand but it rallied and did surprisingly
well at its first attempts ever of manipulating a gear box. Shifting was
unexpectedly much easier than getting those blinkers going in a timely fashion.
The stunning morning skies helped though in that they reassured us that the outing was
going to be worth the trouble.
Having the car put some ease into our day and we were able to
both select a longer walk at the park and really savor the views, rather than
having the familiar conveyor-belt feeling of being on someone else's
transportation schedule. Blue skies, great visibility, and gentle winds made for
a delightful hiking experience. We were even treated to the sight of several
small avalanches a reassuring distance
away. The thundering sounds of avalanches were often only minutes apart, though
few were seen.
And unlike after our big hike on the Tongariro Crossing 2
months earlier, we actually were able to admire the mountains the next day as we
rode out of the area. We savored our picnic lunch with photogenic Mt Cook
as a backdrop and we immensely enjoyed extending the mountain view experience. The nearby gift shop had
a postcard stuck on the window with a sign stating that the postcard view was what the mountain
looked like from there when the weather was good, reminding us that we were among the lucky
ones to have been there on 2 good viewing days.
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Forever Wild Weather
Since most visitors to New Zealand are coming for outdoor
activities or panoramas like at Mt Cook, the weather is pivotal in coloring their experience.
But the weather is wild in New Zealand and that fact is underscored by the
language around it. In drizzly Oregon and Washington, our weather hopes are often for a "warm, clear,
sunny, or dry" day but in New Zealand, the Kiwi's and their meteorologist's hope
for "settled weather." And once the weather settles, you hope to be
among the lucky segments in the country getting "fine" weather. After over 3 months of unsettled weather, we finally
experienced it and "settled" seemed for most to be synonymous with "summer's finally
arrived."
What the settled weather actually looked like varied with where you were. In
coastal Christchurch where we were when the weather settled for several days, that "cracker of a day" meant cool, overcast mornings and
evenings sandwiching warm, sunny afternoons. Inland on the South Island, the
same system
brought hot, dry days and for less fortunate and more southern Invercargill,
everyone else's settled weather brought them endless cloudy, damp days in the
high 50's. It was the middle of the equivalent of the Northern Hemisphere's
August when the weather finally settled, underscoring a visiting
Japanese meteorologist's assessment of New Zealand as being in perpetual spring.
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For us, the long awaited settled weather meant relief from
the vicious winds that could pop up any day and the icy cold Antarctic winds
that had us layering on heavy clothes in places where we should have been
sweltering. Of course, we weren't sorry to miss the searing heat that is
possible when inland, but putting on the heavy mittens and long johns in what is
usually the notoriously hot spot of the country, Alexandra, had been quite
the disappointment.
Forever British
New Zealand's winters being less harsh than the winters in Europe was part of the marketing
campaign in the 1800's to lure Brit's to the new colony. It was true, New
Zealand doesn't get the harsh winters of Europe, but like us, the new arrivals
quickly cursed the fierce winds and forever unsettled weather. New Zealand's
modern weather
records include 16" of rain in 24 hours and 52 feet of rain in a
year in another location. And subsequent flooding and landslides from those kind
of rainfalls are still ordinary
occurrences in New Zealand like they were when the colonists arrived.
But despite what felt like a bit of connivery to the
colonists, they remained loyal to Britain. The celebration of National Lamb Day
on February 15th reminded us again of the factors that continued to cement their ties--a
much different path than was traveled by the US colonists. It was 125 years ago
from National Lamb Day in 2007 when the first refrigerated sailing ship headed off
from New Zealand on
its 100 day journey to Britain with frozen lamb carcasses. That first ship slipped out of the
country without fanfare or a photo as the fear of failure drove the sponsors to
keep a low profile. The first cargo arrived in fine condition and New Zealand only sold its lamb meat to Britain until the
1960's. Then
Britain began distancing itself from the Kiwi's because of warming up to trade agreements with
France and Germany that preceded the formation of the EU--a situation that
created economic chaos in New Zealand.
The frozen meat business was one of many products that led to New Zealand long
being considered a distant, European farm and was a
major food supplier to Britain, especially during the World Wars. Other little
things keep reminding us of the strong ongoing ties to Britain, like the fact that there
are more bag pipe bands per capita in New Zealand than in Scotland.
Learning that New Zealanders long considered themselves the "Britons of
the South Seas" wasn't surprising but we were stunned that some early 20th
century Kiwi politicians
were positioning the country to head the yet to be formed South Sea Empire that
included a number of Pacific Islands, including Hawaii. (I wonder if the
Hawaiian's knew about that.)
New Zealanders were simultaneously content to remain tied to
Britain and yet wanted a separate, additional identity too.
Participation in the Great War was seen as a way to establish that identity
and it continued into WWII. We were stunned to read that two thirds of New
Zealand's men aged 18 to 45 served in WWII, with a high percentage being willing
Maori.
In New Zealand, as in Europe, we stopped to read the war
memorials as we quickly learned in Europe that the various treatments of the
memorials gave us additional insight into the host country's culture and gave us
a way to compare cultures. New Zealand's WWI memorials are unusual in that after
listing the men killed in action, the men who returned are listed with the same
honor, underscoring the value attached to demonstrating their loyalty to Britain.
TranzAlpine Scenic Railway
Our next big stop on the east coast was at Christchurch,
a city that promotes itself on billboards around the South Island as being the
most British city in New Zealand. It was from Christchurch that we would launch for our
last "punch on our New Zealand activities card" by taking
the TranzAlpine train from coast to coast over the Southern Alps. But it was
there that we discovered we'd received our first really erroneous tourist
information for our entire New Zealand visit.
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We'd been reassured weeks ago that no advance bookings were necessary for the
scenic train trip, especially since we'd take it on a week day. Confidently we waltzed into the
Christchurch train station on Sunday afternoon to buy our tickets for the next
morning only be told
that weekdays were their busiest days and that it was booked for
the next 4 days. But we had scheduled 3 full days in the city to pick the best
weather day for the journey once we arrived, not the needed 5 days. The newly
arrived settled weather was expected to be grand for the next
several days, magnifying our sense of lost opportunity.
We cashed in on our several months of experience with the
service sector in New
Zealand and in being in an English speaking country where we could easily access
information and 2 hours later, after a lot of scrambling, we had resurrected our
trip for the next day. Instead of making the standard once daily train round trip from Christchurch on the east coast
to Greymouth on the west coast and back again that day, we'd ride the shuttle bus to Greymouth
in the morning and take the train back to Christchurch in the afternoon.
The new compromise plan had several points in its favor.
First, there was the substantial price savings as the bus was priced as
transportation whereas the train was priced as a tourist event, resulting in the bus
being 1/3 of the cost of the train. And though they traveled similar routes,
they weren't exactly parallel, so our more complicated itinerary would possibly create very different
experiences over the Southern Alps.
The end of the day grumblings of a very disappointed man who
had done the round trip train ride the same day we traveled reinforced that our 'second best' plan was
likely the best plan of all. He complained that the train ride terrain wasn't at all alpine,
that it was not
very scenic, and that he had unfortunately done it twice. We on the other hand had had 2 very
different trips.
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If I was only going to go one direction, I'd
probably do the trip by bus as the overall experience was more dramatic than the
train. The sometimes very narrow, windy, up and down road gave a more
representative
experience of the mountainous terrain and 16% grade road through a gorge that the train
bypassed in a tunnel was stunning. The bus driver gave lots of commentary
along the way and stopped several times for photos. And unlike the train,
the bus crested the 2 high passes over the mountains rather than bypassing them.
The train cheated its passengers out of some stunning views
by spending miles in tunnels to avoid the highest points. But the more pleasing, up-close look of
the plains vegetation from the train on the west side was much more interesting than the roadside
view and the train did make a long traverse of a steeply carved river gorge. But
even with those features to redeem the train ride, the bus vantage point was
better overall.
As we had
guessed after having few options, our itinerary of taking the bus first and the train second
was a perfect match with our traveling endurance. The small bus's seats
were uncomfortable for the 5 hour ride and it became very jostling towards the
end as
the driver tried his best to make up for being a half hour behind schedule. We were glad to have done the more tiring
though more interesting ride in
the morning when we were fresher and feeling more adventurous. The smoother ride, bigger seats,
and vast windows on the train were perfect for the return trip for which there
was less excitement and anticipation to counter our growing fatigue.
Like the grumbling tourist we overheard, we too thought the
coast to coast trip was over-rated. It was pretty and it was a nice overview of
the land that we'd seen on our South Island stay, but its hard to say it would
have been worth the $130US we'd each spent had we done both legs by train. It
was however a thrill to cover so much terrain under blue skies of the
spell of settled weather--a first for our
3 and half months in New Zealand.
Christchurch
It was competition with the Salvation Army conference
attendees for lodging in Christchurch, by far the South Island's biggest city, that edged us farther from the center than was
comfortable for us. We were pleased to get a nice motel room for our 4 night stay,
but the too long-walk in for groceries and visiting the sights was a
disappointment. It had me reminiscing about smaller and more compact Dunedin
where the same activities took less time and effort.
Making the run on the TranzAlpine rail line was the main
event for our Christchurch visit and with that behind us, museum time was next
on the list. As we were winding down on our New Zealand stay, I had a
short list of topics I hoped Christchurch's museum would cover to answer some
lingering questions and it did a
superb job on 1, which was Antarctica.
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Antarctica had hardly been a lifetime fascination of mine,
but feeling those bone-chilling winds coming from thousands of miles away in
what should have been the dog-days of summer had piqued my interest. And while
we were in New Zealand, a few Antarctic icebergs had drifted by, though not where we
could see them. TV news stories and museum exhibits ensured that neither Antarctica
or Australia were ever far from our minds when in New Zealand even though they
were physically a long ways
away. We had plans to visit Australia but Antarctica would be the harder one to learn about once we left New
Zealand.
Luckily for me, Christchurch had been selected as the
launching point for several of the early 20th century polar explorers and their
stories and left over gear formed the nucleus for the museum exhibits.
Reading the tales of their trials on the frozen continent was interspersed with
great details on the weather, the ocean currents, and the geology--all things
that directly or indirectly affect New
Zealand. Antarctica, like New Zealand, was a part of the ancient super continent
Gondwanaland, so learning more about Antarctica helped to fill-out New Zealand's
story too. And the short spell of fine, settled weather made stepping out for
breaks from museum exhibits
into Christchurch's adjacent botanical garden a delightful treat.
Christchurch was the end point of our almost 4 month biking trip in New
Zealand and our way back to Auckland's airport would be by bus, ferry and then
a train ride north for most of the length of the North Island. Though the biking in New Zealand
hadn't been the stunning experience we'd hoped it would be, it's always sad to
wrap-up the biking part of our travels. When the bikes become urban luggage carts, the
pace quickens and the calendar and clock rule our lives. And knowing full well how quickly the
weather can become severe in New Zealand, we'd left plenty of time for delays
so as to keep on schedule the next week.
Dodging the Waves: Water, Muck & Seismic
Our travels have taught us that we create much of the
stress in our lives and in our quest to break that habit, we've learned to
build more ease into our schedule the last few days before flying to Portland. Generally the worry is human created obstacles, like labor strikes
in Italy, seemingly unknowable holidays in Spain and Greece, and ordinary
gridlock in transportation systems in other places. In New Zealand, it was clear
that the more likely threats to our schedule would come from the wild as New Zealand seems to be where
Mother Nature kicks up her heels in the biggest ways.
Back in November when we planned our return to Auckland from
Wellington by rail, we were most concerned about wind delays in crossing the
Cook Straits between Picton on the South Island and Wellington on the North
Island. The trip that used to take up to a week by sail should only take 3
hours, but Wellington seemed vulnerable to gale force winds almost any day of
the year. The
usual ferry delays are measured in hours but since the recent worst spell was a
3 day hiatus in service, we cautiously scheduled 4 nights in Wellington before
planning to catch an early morning train to Auckland.
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Scheduling an early ferry from Picton gave us several more
chances of catching a later ferry that day if there were delays, but the 3 extra
days to get to Wellington were serious insurance for making our train and then flight. And just to be
sure, we scheduled 2 nights in Auckland to give us an extra shot at making the
once daily, 12 hour train trip to our departure city. I often claim that when I'm right
about something that it is often for the wrong reason and
building in all of this buffer to our itinerary began looking like another
"right for the wrong reason" situation.
Our bike tour of the North Island had taken us past the 1953 memorial to the
train passengers who died in the lahar, or mountain mud flow, that undermined a
bridge minutes before the train was to pass over it. We knew then that our February train would be
crossing the rebuilt rail bridge. We inspected the lahar gates to close the road
to traffic when the next "big one" came and assumed the train also
benefited from an early warning system. Since then, we learned that the
authorities were on round the clock lahar watch as the conditions were ripe for
another sudden flow of muck down the mountainside and our travel date was within
the predicted window for the massive landslide.
We intensified our efforts to find updates on the lahar
threat to monitor its effect on our transit, though it wasn't easy to come by
that information. If wondering about the winds on the day we crossed The Straits
and joining in the lahar watch weren't enough, a week before our
flight from Auckland, the city had a series of 3 earthquakes, the largest being
a 4.5. The quakes weren't enough to inconvenience anyone, but their occurrence
just underscored New Zealand's extra sources of chaos to one's schedule. Earthquakes are a daily
affair in New Zealand, which is about the size of Colorado, but most don't make
the evening news.
10 Miles an Hour the Easy Way
Luck was with us as we crossed The Cook Straits 2 days before
the weather became unsettled and monster winds whipped over Wellington. Not
needing our 3
day buffer for foul weather on The Straits left us with some welcome city
sightseeing time in the capital. We'd tried and failed in France and in Wellington in
December to do a city tour on a Segway 2-wheeler and our extra time in
Wellington in February would give us a second chance. Of all of the "first
timer" activities we'd seen or tried in New Zealand, this was the only one that
had piqued my interest years ago. It was a surprise each time we saw them
advertised in a city and each time they had been unavailable for one odd reason or
another--it was never something we could maneuver around, like a lead-time
problem.
But everything worked like clockwork this time around and the
Segway adventure was ours. Ironically, this American made device delivered our
most delightful activity in New Zealand. Kayaking, rock climbing and other
outings had left us longing to do them again but with no desire to invest in the
equipment. However, within minutes on the Segway, we were both saying "I want one!"
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They were way-cool to ride and grab any opportunity you get
to take a spin on one. They are zippy and fun to operate: a tilt forward or back
with your torso controls your speed and front-back direction and a twirl with
your left hand allows you to make turn-on-a-dime 360's to the right or left. You glide around like you are floating on a cloud and the effortlessness of it
makes the mind run wild with possibilities.
Like any new activity, especially involving speed, they did
generate some sweaty palms, but it was worth the bit of stress. Our host ran us
through his well-practiced introductory routine at preset low speeds and then
upped the speed available and challenges as we gained confidence. Skiing
experience years ago and our thousands of miles of biking clearly added to our
comfort on them but he assured us any one can operate the electrical 'mobility
devices'.
Like in other cities where we'd seen them advertised, the Wellington
package was a city
sight seeing tour combined with a Segway adventure and so we were soon in the
midst of other tourists. We navigated through doorways, up steep hills, over
grassy fields, across broken pavement and down shallow curbs as we glided along 7-8 miles of pedestrian
areas. Even though twice daily tours are offered, our trio generated lots of
stares and plenty of grins. We felt a little bit like an advertisement for a
circus act as we cruised through the crowds but only had time for quick waves as
we concentrated on navigating our new toys. By the time our almost 3 hour outing
was over we were both tired and exhilarated and hoped to ride one again. I was
thrilled to check an item off my short list of "Things I hope to do someday."
Our 3 "just in case" days in Wellington were easily spent
with a half day for our Segway adventure; a full day strolling through the hilly
botanical garden with long stops for reading; and visits to 2 museums. Our
exercise level was dropping precipitously, but at least we were finishing up the
heavy books on New Zealand's geology, weather, and history that we didn't want
to drag home.
Shifting Paradigms
On one measure, that of reconnaissance, our trip to New
Zealand was a failure. We are in search of a place to winter-over during the
Northern Hemisphere's cold season: a place warm and dry enough that we
will be motivated to go out for daily bike rides without always being on the
move. A place where we might stay put for a week or a month and get to know an area better while escaping the cold, damp weather
of the Northern Hemisphere. Snow in Greece and cold, windy days in southern
Spain checked them off the candidate list and we had hoped that New Zealand
would be the winner. But we learned the hard way that New Zealand is too
vulnerable to severe, year-round storms and the small roads are too heavily
traveled by trucks for it to be a pleasant winter-over, biking venue for us.
On another measure, that of a traveler, our trip to New
Zealand was a success. One of the main drivers for traveling is discovery,
though what is being discovered varies. One may be in search of the calm from an
overdue rest, the self discovery deepened by being jolted out of routines, or
the discovery of a broader understanding of others or the world at large. New
Zealand definitely delivered in terms of shifting my paradigms and deepening my
understanding on many levels. Here are some of my myths that have been
rearranged for me by visiting New Zealand:
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On the most superficial level, I now understand that the
similarities between Australia and New Zealand stop at them being neighbors in
the Southern Hemisphere and both having been British colonies. The sizes of
their land masses, their geography, their climates, and all the subsequent
natural history are wildly different. It's not a pairing like the US and Canada
and it's only taken visiting one the 2 countries to
see their vast differences.
And a forever slippery bit of the earth's early history--that
of the break-up of Gondwanaland--is now firmly in my grasp. It used to be a
vague starting point for a continuum of continental movement and tectonic plate
theory, now its
transformations provide explanations for less theoretical things that I have seen for myself.
The pressures from competition were always driving forces in
what I studied about evolution and in New Zealand I looked at the evolutionary
process from the other direction--from the extreme lack of competition because
of the lack of predators. Many of New Zealand's oddities like giant species and
flightless birds evolved because of the complete absence of pressures on their
daily lives from predators.
Being in New Zealand gave me a greater appreciation of the
accomplishments of the ancient Polynesian mariners. There is just nothing like
being at a historical place to deepen the understanding of events. It's one
thing to sit in the US and look at the far corner of a map and say "They sailed
from over there to over there." It's all so remote that it has little meaning.
But sitting in New Zealand and looking at a map and saying "They sailed from
there to here" adds substance to the image. And one can more deeply internalize
the significance of it all when in addition to the map you are seeing life-sized
replica boats and their marine charts of ocean swells made from sticks and
shells.
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Exposure to the ongoing struggle between the descendents of
the Maori and the European settlers gives me a new way to comprehend the issues
surrounding the integration of non-metal cultures into the post-industrial
world. I certainly have no answers, but I understand the problem in a
deeper way since learning about the drama playing out in New Zealand for the last
150 years.
And then there is the correction of misinformation that has
occurred from being in New Zealand. I used to think of penguins and I thought "ice". Well, not any more. In New Zealand the little guys waddle across the road at
night to sleep underneath somebody's house or in the bushes. And I've gotten straightened out about
how different the Arctic and Antarctic are in terms of size, temperatures and
their global effects--a confusion similar to that from inferring too much from the
pairing of Australia and New Zealand. And on a more practical level, I've learned that it is
possible to boil pasta in a deep-fryer pan filled with water.
Chance Meetings
We had a glorious day visiting the Mt Cook area and were
thrilled to stumble into exceptionally fine weather for seeing the sights in
that area. We
were especially pleased as it was our second to last
weather dependent outing, and we felt lucky to have actually seen so many major
sights during this unusually cold, wet
summer in New Zealand. Being at the Mt Cook visitors center also allowed us to close
a small, somber chapter in our New Zealand experiences: we confirmed that one of
the 2 Japanese climbers that died in an accident on Mt Cook in January was
indeed the young woman we had spoken with shortly before the tragedy.
It was one of dozens of casual traveler's conversations with
strangers; a brief swapping of "Where we've been, where we're going." We had
noticed the climbing helmets in the back of her car and she shared her
anticipated 3 week stay at Mt Cook Village. Her mother was traveling with
her and they had spent the night in the adjacent motel room out in the middle of
nowhere on the west coast. A loose bond was formed, that of being adventure
tourists laying over in the same isolated place in a foreign country though for very different
reasons. We were both heading to Mt Cook but they would arrive weeks before us.
They honked and waved as they drove past us the morning we all departed the
motel.
We'd heard about the freak accident on the TV news and rung
what details we could from the newspaper account. Her age, the timing of the
accident, the rendezvousing with climbing friends traveling from Japan all fit
with it being her but we didn't know her name.
I had hoped when we visited Mt Cook that there would be a
posting in the visitor's center to tell us more, but there was no mention
anywhere of the accident. Fortunately, a young Kiwi staff member who was also a
climber obliged us by comparing known information with us and the stories
matched--the unlucky climber was most likely the woman we had met. It was sad to
know it was her but it was better than to be left wondering forever.
It was one of those odds experiences we all have, one of
those little brushes with death that remind us that it is never far away from
any of us. It was also a reminder of how our lives ripple far beyond what we
imagine. There is no way that her mother whom we met will know that those 2
graying American cyclists were marking the passing of her daughter in their own
way. There is no way that her family will know that the memory of their daughter
will be permanently woven into the fiber of our New Zealand memories. Her smile
will flash on the screen in my head whenever Mt Cook is mentioned and they'll
have no idea.
Other Memories
Despite the sad loss of the 2 Japanese climbers, we will remember
New Zealand and the Kiwi's for excelling in offering outdoor activity packages
and we will cherish the memories of ours. We had a number of "firsts" while in
New Zealand. We had our first walk down into a recent volcanic crater near Rotorua;
our first walk with crampons in the crevasses of a glacier; our first outdoor
rock climbing experience; our first Segway ride; and Bill had his first kayaking experience. We also will
remember the opportunity to do the one-way Tongariro Crossing on the North
Island with its stunning views of old volcanic activity.
The things we'll miss when we leave New Zealand: the nice,
laid-back yet competent people; the interesting vegetation mixes; the wonderfully
comfortable
motel rooms with kitchens; the ready availability of inexpensive washing
machines at the motels; Vogel's Toast-Sized Pumpkin Seed with Mixed Grains bread from the
grocery store and those yummy, 250g Whittaker's 62% Cacao Bittersweet chocolate
bars.
Our New Zealand Chocolate Diet
One harsh reality when we return home will be giving up
our New Zealand chocolate binge. Our weight-loss campaign of last summer was a success and
through the upsets of routine changes in going home and then traveling to New
Zealand, we were pleased to have kept the pounds off. The embarrassing surprise
was that our consumption of chocolate doubled to tripled while in New Zealand.
It was a combination of factors that lead to this, with temptation being
a major one. In Europe, our favorite brands of bittersweet chocolate came in convenient
100 gram bars, or about 3 oz. We'd split 1 compact bar for dessert at lunch and
have a satisfying and yet moderate amount--and no leftovers.
In New Zealand, the local bittersweet brand we settled on
came in monstrous 250 gram bars, always leaving a temptingly open package in the
lunch box. And we could only buy this particular chocolate every few weeks, so
we quickly learned to stockpile it by the pounds.
When we've had a hard riding day, we are accustomed to
making up the missing calories by heavily indulging in fresh fruits and vegetables,
but they weren't so handy in New Zealand. The quality, variety, and freshness
tended to be low and the prices were high, all of which kept our inventory low.
In addition to that, we often couldn't buy food daily and the bulk, weight, and perishability of produce meant that our standard fresh snacks were in short supply. As
a result, dipping into the chocolate inventory became the obvious and easy way to make up the
needed calories.
The good news was that those grid-like patterns in the
chocolate bars made it easy for us to count calories, so even though we were
making up our calorie shortages on nutritionally empty calories, at least there was no confusion about
the extent of the indulgence. Ending our riding in Christchurch 10 days before
flying home meant that our need for extra calories evaporated early
and we had to be firm with ourselves to taper back down to our usual chocolate ration even before we left New Zealand.
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What Now? February 28, 2007
The very rough and jarring 13 hour train ride from
Wellington to Auckland scooted through the precarious lahar area without a
hiccup. One diesel engine fizzled just out of Wellington and overheating of the tracks
in the high country furthered slowed us, but we made it into Auckland only an
hour behind schedule. After a surprisingly tiring day for a first-world train
ride, we were glad to still
have our extra day in Auckland to recover before heading out for the rigors of
air travel, including a 9 hour lay over in LA.
We are currently in our 24 hour air travel interval to return home where we'll be re-outfitting
for cyclo-touring season #7. We have tickets for Frankfurt on May 10 and Bill
has another adventure roughed out for us. We are thinking about leaving our
bikes where we touch down, in Frankfurt, and then going north by train to sleep
off jet lag in Copenhagen for a week or 10 days. Rested and clear-headed, we'll head out
on our bikes from Frankfurt in late May.
Our brief visit back home last October didn't leave us time for
visiting with friends, so we are looking forward to catching up with everyone on
this round.
I've developed a bulging cyst in my left calf that looks like it will
have to be professionally removed, so that is likely to slow me down (and make
me cranky) for a few
weeks. Bill's overhaul plans are for the bikes and not his body, and they are in
line for major maintenance work: new tires, new drive trains, new brake
levelers, and some other odds and ends. Bill is also hoping all of our
electronics will hold together for another year, making fewer hassles for him
this time around. Once again, our laptop will have to be mailed off for repairs,
which is always a major inconvenience.
I don't anticipate updating our webpage until after we are on
the road again in May, so you won't be hearing from us until then. You are
always welcome to email and if you need a cyclo-touring hit, we have a half
dozen new SideTrips on the webpage to entertain you.
Love,
Barb
