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Mon, 23 Dec 2002
First, some news on the money front: at the rate I've been spending, I
can comfortably afford to stay through the end of March, as planned.
I've been keeping very close track of my finances. This is how they
break down for the first month:
Food $457
Transport $577
Phone $275
Mail $45
Internet $57
Laundry $26
Medical $143
Activities $63
Bed ($100)
All figures are in Kiwi dollars, so divide by two to get US dollars.
Transportation includes the bus, ferry and plane fare for my trip to
Christchurch, as well as local bus service in and around Auckland.
While I'm glad I did the Christchurch trip the way I did, the cost can
easily be brought down dramatically by booking a flight well in
advance. That would reduce the cost from $340 to about $150. Also,
the Phone costs include the purchase of a new pre-pay mobile phone
which I will be able to sell at the end of my trip and recoup about
$100. Finally, the medical costs represent three doctor's visits and
antibiotics, all for treatment of an ingrown toenail. I include them
to show the low cost of healthcare in NZ. I saved $100 by staying
with the Fords in Wellington and the Tuffleys in Christchurch.
My optimum spending was $600, with $1000 being the goal, and $1400 the
hard limit. This comes to $1543. Deducting the one-time medical
costs puts me right at my hard limit. When I then pull out the phone
costs and the lesson-learned travel costs, I feel that the rest of the
trip should be fine.
Now on to the news. I watched the LV Cup semifinals from my vantage
point, though there was one day where the weather was so bad (misty)
that I could not see a single boat. I've been working on adapting my
kitchen skills, a baked bsicuits as per Sarah's recipe twice. There
was one evening where I had decided to experiment a bit. I wanted to
make two dishes: brocolli on mashed potatoes, and carrots and yams in
butter with cinnamon. I had never made mashed potatoes or the carrots
and yams dish before. I had two pots going on the stove, one boiling
water and the other simmering the carrots. All of a sudden, Steven,
the hostel owner, storms in to the kitchen. He says it is urgent and
he must talk to me. He grabs my two pots off the stove. I run after
him thinking that maybe some important clients were coming to stay and
needed the kitchen or something. He makes me follow him upstairs over
the office to his family's apartment. Now I'm thinking he'll let me
finish making my dinner there. No. He sits me down at his dining
room table and tells me that he's going to feed me an authentic Korean
dinner (he's is from Korea). Oh yeah, and that he'll finish cooking
my dinner for me while I eat. I ended up staying there with him for
about three hours, eating and talking.
There was one day during the semifinals when there was too much wind
for racing. Instead, I walked through Alice
Eaves Reserve. This is an interesting place because it has some
of the last remaing Kauri trees. The Kauris are the NZ equivalent of
the west coast's sequoias and redwoods. The European settlers cut
them down left and right and since they are slow growing there are
very few left.
Sundays are good days at this hostel. Steven has a deal with a Dutch
tour company where they bring a busload of people to stay at the
hostel every week. Steven cooks them a big barbecue and they stay at
the hostel. The nice thing about it is that somehow Steven always
ends up cooking too much food. The extras go to us poor hostelers.
The free dinner is always welcome to the bean-counters here at Hal
Goes Abroad.
For the last day of the semifinals I was finally able to talk another
hosteler into watching with me. James is from the UK on a long
holiday. He drove us both out to Manly where we picked up a lunch of
fish-n-chips. Then he drove us out to my vantage point. Of course,
the wind was uncooperative, being too light. We sat and talked for
about 4 hours before there was barely enough breeze for a complete
joke of a race between Prada and OneWorld. It was an academic
exercise, since Prada was down 3-1 and needed to win two races to
force a sudden-death tiebreaker the next day. Since there was only
enough wind for one race, the result was irrelevant, with Prada being
eliminated either way. Prada did win the race, but conditions were so
light and shifty that it wasn't interesting to watch.
Next came the roadtrip
with Patti. I had met her on Waiheke a few weeks before and she was
the first person I had met here who understood the racing the same way
I did. Since there was a two day break between the semifinals and the
semifinal repechage, we decided to hit the road and see some of the
country. She had rented a car so we agreed to share those expenses.
On Wednesday the 18th, we started off driving south of Auckland and
then heading east towards Tauranga and Mt Manganui. Tauranga is
interesting because the Around Alone
race will be stopping there in late January and restarting on Feb 9.
I'd dearly love to be there for the restart, and I've volunteered to
help Brad Van Liew who is sailing on Tommy Hilfiger Freedom America.
He sailed Balance Bar to a 3rd place finish in the last Around Alone,
and I loved reading his emails and following his adventures.
The roadtrip ended inland in the town of Rotorua.
Rotorua is known for its sulphurous aroma. It also has some adrenalin
based activities, including zorbing. I tried the zorb at Medge's
suggestion. A zorb is a lot like a human-sized hamster ball. It
consists of two nested plastic spheres. There are access holes in
either side and the spheres are held together with hundreds of bungy
cords. Air is pumped into the void between the spheres. The inner
sphere has a harness. You get inside the zorb, strap yourself down,
and then they push the zorb onto a ramp going down a hill. You roll
and bounce flipping head-over-heels-over-head all the way down. I got
seriously motion sick, but was able to hold on to my breakfast, if
only barely. They are building a second track with two switchbacks
which I suspect I'll skip.
After the zorb, Patti wanted to visit a local winery which is making
blueberry wines. We had a small taste. Their liqueur wasn't bad, but
they still have a ways to go. We also visited Blue Lake and Green
Lake. Pretty, but nothing awe-inspiring. It might be that had the
day been nicer (less clouds) they would have been more dramatic.
Patti wanted to head south, so she drove me back to the town cente and
dropped me off. I walked through Kuirau Park, which has dozens of
bubbling mud pits, steaming fumeroles and generally cool stuff. I
also walked through Government Gardens and saw a war canoe (waka) and
the rose garden. It seems like every big town in NZ has a rose
garden, which suits me just fine. I tried to go into their main
museum, but it was $10 which I decided was more than I could afford.
Instead I went to watch the lawn bowling. I sat down and a man came
over. I started asking him how the game was played, and he explained
and we talked for a bit. His name was Doug. After his match was
completed, he invited me into the club for a beer! I met the guys and
watched the award ceremony. It turns out Doug's team was the 1st
place team. He got a $5 bill and a gift certificate to the
supermarket which sponsored the tournament.
That evening I took the bus back to Auckland and stayed at the
Auckland City YHA. The next morning I decided that I had to admit
defeat and buy a pack towel. This was the first "major" adjustment in
my travel and living plans. I just couldn't keep dragging around that
huge beach towel. It took up too much space in the backpack and dried
too slowly. I watched the opening repechage race between OneWorld and
Oracle on TV in the stadium at the Viaduct Basin. After the race I
took the local bus up to Orewa. The next day on my way back from
watching Oracle overcome OneWorld by 3 seconds from the vantage point,
I made my second adjustment by buying some tuperware in town. Now I
can cook bigger meals and store them as leftovers for another day.
That evening, at Steven's invitation, I joined him and his two sons at
the beach. It was my first swim out here and it felt great. After
swimming we watched a local man reeling in his longline. He was
fishing for snapper. He didn't get any, but he did get a stingray.
They tried to push it back out, but it was too tired and couldn't swim
and the tide kept washing it in. After it died, Steven and his son
brought it back to the hostel. Prior to running the hostel, Steven
had been a chef. He said he knew aspecial way to prepare the
stingray, so I hope I get to taste it later.
Sunday, I went down to Auckland first thing. I had arranged by email
to meet Melinda (the woman who was also in Picton lookiing at the
Edwin Fox) at the Auckland Maritime Museum. We spent about an hour
and a half there. I must say, I was not impressed with this museum.
Their collection was fairly broad, but lacked any depth at all. Items
were simply presented and labeled with a name, but there was no
background or story given for them. Anyway, Melinda had to go meet
some other friends and I wanted to watch the 3rd race of the
repechage, so we said goodbye. I went over to the stadium and was
just in time to watch Oracle win a decisive start over OneWorld.
Figuring the race would be textbook from there on out, I went to get
some lunch. On the way I heard some good music. There were six guys
with banjos and guitars singing sea chanties! These fellows called
themselves Maritime Crew and instead of watching the racing, I watched
them for three hours and sang the choruses. During their breaks I
pumped them for info about the Auckland folk music scene and
discovered that the Auckland Folk Festival is in late January. I'd
love to go to it, but Barry will be around then and I don't know what
he'd like to do yet. I bought two of their CDs and traded phone
numbers with them.
Yesterday was a fairly normal day. I took the bus out to Manly and
watched the last race of the repechage. Oracle won again, so now
OneWorld has been eliminated. This leaves Oracle to sail against
Alinghi in the LV Cup finals. I didn't get on the bus to go back
right away. Instead I walked to Pacific Plaza, the local mall. I
had heard that there was a cinema there and I wanted to know if they
would be open on the 25th, and if so what would be playing. No luck,
they are closed. Since the repechage ended early, I'm kind of at
loose ends and not entirely sure what to do before going to Sydney.
My choices are (1) hop a bus up north and see more sights, (2) stay in
Orewa and relax and cook/bake, or (3) go down to Auckland and check
out the many museums and sights there. I'm leaning towards number 3
right now, but we'll see.
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Mon, 09 Dec 2002
Pictures from previous posting:
Bus: AKL -> Wgtn
Te Papa
Wellington City and Sea
Ferry: Wgtn -> Picton
Christchurch Bontanic Gardens
First, some little tastes of New Zealand. My favorite TV commercial
is for an organic detergent to be used on the exterior surfaces of a
house. Their tag line: "It may not work over night, but it DOES
work!". I'm getting more and more fond of traffic circles. They
subjectively feel more efficient than traffic lights at
intersections. I'd be curious to see some hard data comparing the
different systems and how they scale to larger traffic loads.
Something we don't have back in America: three phase traffic lights.
Here in NZ they put these in at a small number of super-busy urban
intersections. Phase 1: motor traffic flows north/south. Phase 2:
motor traffic flows east/west. Phase 3: foot traffic flows in ALL
directions, including the two diagonals. Kinda weird, but kinda cool
at the same time.
On Wednesday 4 Dec I had started the day early and purchased a "Best
Attractions" bus pass, which would take me to several of the places I
wanted to go. The folks at the Info office told me to go right out
front and look for a black double decker bus. I dutifully did so, but
said bus was not forthcoming. After waiting by the way-cool huge
chess set and watching the bus stop for 15 minutes past the indicated
time, I went back in and asked the Info people what the deal was. It
turns out the company running the bus had taken the black double
decker out of service and replaced it with a red single decker. There
was a breakdown in communication somewhere and I never got told. Now
the funny thing about this Best Attractions pass is that it is only
valid on two consecutive days. That makes no sense to me. Why not
let me use it on two non-consecutive days? Why not let it expire
after a week? Sigh. So many more user-friendly ways to do things.
Anyway, I had the Info desk cancel the ticket and issue me a new one,
for the next day.
I went back out to the chess board and ran into Cem. Cem had been on
the same bus from Picton to Christchurch with me, and I had seen him
the day before also at the chess board, but we had never really
talked. This time I figured it was fate and went over and introduced
myself. We talked for a bit and then walked through the Arts Center,
which used to house one of Christchurch's two major universities.
When the university outgrew the facilities they built a new campus on
the outskirts of town and the city turned the old campus into the Arts
Center. There is an artsy movie theater, two stages for plays and
musicals (South Pacific was on) and lots of arts and crafts stores.
Cem (he's from Switzerland but his father was Turkish) and I spent a
couple of hours wandering around there. Then we went to a sports bar
called The Holy Grail where I bought us some beer and chips, thereby
"paying it forward" from when I was in Auckland and another hostel guy
bought me a beer. Over this beer and chips we both watched our first
professional cricket game, a friendly international between the Max
Blacks (of NZ) and the Indian side. Max Zone cricket is slightly
different from regular cricket in that there are two parts of the
pitch where if the ball goes in there the runs are doubled.
On Thursday I finally got to use my Best Attractions bus pass. I took
the bus out to the Antarctic Center. This is a tourist attraction
near where the US, Italy and New Zealand have their staging areas for
their Antarctic programs. It is supposed to promote the science done
there, but it really fell down on that score. For NZD $16 after the
YHA discount I was deeply disappointed, though I was thinking a lot
about a former co-worker from Brightmail (Mark) who did some research
on Antarctica. When I got to town I was met by Mrs Tuffley, who took
me back to Chez Tuffley for dinner. This was my chance to deliver the
presents their son Chris had entrusted to me back in Berkeley. I got
to meet both parents (Lesley and Peter) as well as sister Emily and
her SO Michael. All extremely cool people. If anyone in NZ needs a
Japanese translator/interpreter, let me know and I'll connect you with
Peter - he's first rate. I must have impressed them, since Lesley and
Peter asked me to stay with them instead of at the hostel for the rest
of my time in Christchurch. I accepted. Peter drove me back to the
YHA after dinner.
I checked out of the hostel first thing Friday morning and put my
backpack in a locker. I had about an hour before I need to use the
second half of my Best Attractions ticket, so I tried to find a cheap
flight from Christchurch to Auckland, but I didn't have any luck. I
caught the bus to Willowbank. Willowbank is a privately owned and
operated wildlife preserve. They have quite a few endangered species
and associated breeding programs, and they have a kiwi sighting
guarantee. As soon as you get inside you are immersed in a huge
variety of bird calls and animal sounds. I took tons of pictures.
And I did in fact see a live kiwi. When I first entered the kiwi
house it took some time for my eyes to adjust to the dark. I heard
some scratching in the first enclosure and thought how lucky I was to
see a kiwi within the first minute! Peering in I saw a couple of
small animals which didn't resemble the pictures of kiwis I had seen,
but since it was the kiwi house I figured they had to be kiwis.
Another few minutes and my skepticism grew. These didn't have the
distinctive long beaks of kiwis and they weren't waddling around on
their hind legs. Waitaminit - these animals are on four legs. They
were hedgehogs. I moved on to the next enclosure, Again, some
movement and faint sounds in the dark. But this time I was more open
minded about what I might see. This was ducks now. Hm. Where are
the kiwis? The third enclosure turned out to be what I wanted.
There, walking back and forth along the side wall was a kiwi, probing
the ground repetitively with its long beak. I stood and watched for
about 15 minutes. I was the only person in the kiwi house and it was
a little magical. I had lunch there at Willowbank and took the next
bus back to Christchurch. When I got there I watched the chess for
another hour. Then I called the Tuffleys and waited for Peter to
collect me and my backpack. I had another delightful dinner with
Lesley and Peter.
Saturday was a busy day. Up early and Peter took me on a drive
through the Port Hills south of Christchurch. Got a good view of
Lyttleton harbor and the monument where the first batch of women and
children settlers stopped after hiking up a steep hill from Lyttleton
and rested before going down the other side to Christchurch. Peter
had a delivery to make in Sumner and the Port Hills weren't far out of
the way. He took me back to town and dropped me off in Cathedral
Square at the chess set. I watched for a little while and then caught
the Akaroa Shuttle to, of all places, Akaroa. Akaroa was originally a
French settlement but they were a little too slow and very early on
the French settlers agreed to live under British rule, since the Maori
had recently signed the Treaty of Waitangi, essentially giving New
Zealand to the British crown. On the way there we stopped at Barry's
Bay Cheese Store where I tasted three very good cheeses and bought one
of them (Maarsden, a Swiss-like cheese, not as hard but very
flavorful). Akaroa was a cute little town with a French flavor. I
bought a small jar of strawberry rhubarb (one of my favorites) to say
"Thanks" to the Tuffleys. Akaroa has, like most towns in NZ, a
monument to commemorate their war dead. This was was set in a
beautiful rose garden and the gardener was at work. Since I'm trying
to become a better photographer, part of that is getting less shy
about asking people to pose. So I chatted up the gardener with the
plan of finding out which were his favorite roses and then I'd pose
him in front of them. His name was Terrance. He had been tending the
garden for seven years and when he first got into it, it had been
neglected for a long time and was in bad shape. This was how he kept
busy during his retirement. And what was his old job? He was the
mayor of Akaroa and the Banks Peninsula! I took the Akaroa Shuttle
back to Christchurch. Spent a couple of hours on the net paying some
bills and catching up on email. Had dinner in town. Then I went to
Christchurch's super-modern, computerized, GPS-updated bus station. I
took the local bus back to the Tuffleys house and let myself in. They
came home from a Christmas function they had been at a short while
after I got back.
Sunday was another early day. The InterCity bus left Christchurch at
7:15am. Peter very kindly drove me in to town. I bought my ticket
and got on the bus. At the first stop (Kaikoura) I phoned
InterIslander, the ferry company. I asked about the 1:30pm sailing
and the person told me that they don't sell tickets the same day as a
sailing, but that the computer said it was only half booked and I'd
have no trouble getting a ticket. Can you see the foreshadowing here?
Got to Picton on time, strolled into the ferry building and up to the
ticket desk. Asked for a ticket on the 1:30 boat. It was sold out.
Not only that - it was sold out a week ago! Oy. So I asked for a
ticket on the next ferry. Which was at 7pm. Double oy. Ok, I took
the ticket, which was on the Lynx, or "fast" ferry. The Lynx only
takes 1.5 hours instead of 3.25 hours to make the crossing. I thought
to myself that that was actually kind of cool. I'd be able to say I'd
been on both kinds of boats. Plus, I now had 5 hours to explore
Picton that I didn't expect to have.
So, I walked up and down Picton's main street. On the way back I
noticed a small museum and a large boat in a drydock. This was the
Edwin Fox. It claimed to be the ninth oldest ship in the world. I
went in and struck up a conversation with the man behind the desk. My
first question: "Which are the 8 older ships?" He gave me the list
and I was impressed. I pitched a dollar in the donation box and
started walking through the museum. I very quickly became deeply
impressed. The Edwin Fox was built mostly of teak in 1853 in
Calcutta, India. She served about 30 years carrying every kind of
cargo, including English prisoners bound for Botany Bay, Australia.
She was laid up in 1883 and turned into a freezer hulk in Picton
Harbor. Then when they built a cold house on land she was used to
store coal to power the cold house. Eventually they phased out the
coal and she was abandoned. The museum had pictures of her at each
stage and watching this proud old vessel slowly get torn apart to make
room for the compressors and other equipment really pulled at my
heartstrings. Finally the Edwin Fox Preservation Society was formed
and she was purchased as-in and in-place for 1 shilling. The society
had no money, so she was towed around the corner and beached until
funds could be found to restore her. Eventually money was found, but
it was decided that she had more value preserved than restored. A
drydock was built in Picton and she was refloated and moved there.
The boat is open to the public and I went on board. The pictures speak
for themselves. Afterward I went back to the front desk and I was so
moved that I donated NZD $20 right then and there. The man at the
desk (John Sullivan) said that for that money I could join the
society, so I did. There was something about this boat that really
touched me. I was extremely happy I'd been bumped off the 1:30 ferry.
As I left the museum I saw a woman admiring the boat. I started
talking with her, and it turns out she's from Maryland and was
involved with Living Classrooms in the Inner Harbor. We talked about
the Chesapeake a bit, and I offered to show her around Auckland and to
explore the Auckland Maritime Museum with her when she gets up that
way. Oh, and Mr Sullivan says there are sea chanties to be sung in
association with the AMM, so I'll have to check that out.
Anyway, at about 5:30 I went back to the ferry building to check-in
for the 7pm sailing. But the Lynx hadn't left Wellington - the Cook
Straight was too rough. At 6pm they formally canceled the ferry and
asked for people to line up to get stand-by status on the 9:30pm
ferry. I was third in line, and was assigned #141. Uh, ok. I guess
there were 138 folks from the 1:30 who didn't want to pay the extra
money to go on the Lynx. Alas, InterIslander was very stingy with
info. The woman at the ticket desk couldn't tell me how many places
were on the boat, nor how many tickets had been sold. I had no way to
guess if I'd get on the late ferry, and I had not made a reservation
for a bed in Picton. After trying to get info out of a few other
InterIslander people who were uniformly not helpful, an older
gentleman came out from the baggage area and told me what I needed to
know: 350 seats on the boat, 260 sold. My odds looked bad. Then he
told me about Sounds Air which operates from an office just down the
street. I went down there and was able to get the last seat on their
last flight. And for only $10 more than the Lynx. I will avoid
InterIslander if at all possible in the future. I was deeply
unimpressed with their ability to communicate timely info to their
customers.
Sounds Air, on the other hand was fabulous. The driver of the shuttle
from the office to the airport was David Woodley, I believe. He's the
owner of the airline and is also one of SAIL magazine's NZ
correspondents, focusing on megayachts visiting for the America's Cup.
He is also a sailing instructor, and knows Rich and Anthony back at
OCSC! Anyway, there were six of us on the plane, including the pilot.
The plane was a single-prop. When the pilot walked us over to the
plane he asked who wanted to sit where. My hand shot up and I yelled
out "shotgun!" Shortly after we cleared the ground and got over the
first trees and hill, the guy in the middle seat (Boaz from Israel, he
and I had gotten to know each other while waiting for the flight and
he asked a lot of good questions about the America's Cup) reached over
and tapped me on the shoulder. He said (shouting over the engine):
"Look at the fuel gage!" I did, and it was pretty much on empty. At
this point, there was nothing I could do, so I took a few pictures and
figured the pilot knew his business. We made it across to Wellington
in 25 minutes and didn't run out of gas, so I guess it turned out
alright. I took a shuttle bus into the city center, got on the cable
car and then walked down to Mark and Bria's house. We chatted for
about half an hour and then they showed me to my room and I fell right
asleep.
The plan was for Bria to drive me down to the train station where I
would catch the InterCity bus to Auckland, but something came up (I
don't know what) and Mark, Bria and Alex all ran out the door 5
minutes before I was packed. I wrote them a thank-you note and let
myself out. I hiked up to the cable car, rode it down, and then
walked over to the train station where I got the bus to Auckland.
This time the eleven hours on the bus was less tolerable. I dozed and
listened to music and read Thoreau, but by the end of the day I was
pretty frazzled. Fortunately, I had arranged with Jackie to pick me
up and drive me back to Orewa, meaning I had a friendly face waiting
for me and I didn't have to hassle with the local bus. I talked the
whole way up telling Jackie about all of my adventures. When we got
to the hostel, I saw another familiar face in the lounge. It was
Patti from Waiheke! It was quite the homecoming. I checked-in with
the office and dropped my stuff in the dorm. I chatted with Jackie
for about an hour, and then with Patti for about two. Patti and I had
to cover all the Louis Vuitton Cup happenings and she had some very
cool Bay of Islands stories to encourage me to explore up that way.
I had botched my plans. Monday was supposed to be a race day and I
had booked my bus trip for that day. I was going to miss the first
day of racing during the LV Cup semi finals. However, the weather
gods took pity on me, the dedicated fan and blew up a real howler,
causing racing to be canceled. For those who are counting, that now
makes four days of racing canceled, exactly overlapping with the four
days I was not able to watch (the first three were while I was finding
my vantage point). Kinda spooky, but there ya go. I seem to be
getting quite lucky on this score. That said, I will be more careful
about my plans in the future.
Which finally brings us up to today. Patti left for Auckland this
morning and I went to watch the races from the vantage point. 16
knots of winds and a beautiful day. Alas, Oracle from San Francisco
lost to Alinghi. Fortunately, the boat speed seemed comparable and
Oracle didn't lose by getting cleaned out during the start. There was
a right-hand shift which favored Alinghi during the first beat and
that was all she wrote. Coutts sailed a flawless race. The other
race (Prada vs OneWorld) was a right mess, with broken gear and all
kinds of lead changes.
Well, it's 8:30pm and I need to get a bite to eat. Catch you all
later!
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Wed, 04 Dec 2002
On the 27th I repeated my bus trip to the vantage point and again
watched TDC lose to OneWorld. Rather frustrating. I spent the
evening in conversation with a young Swiss man also staying in the
hostel. It is interesting talking with people from around the world
about their viewpoints. I wrote three postcards that night.
This was only my 2nd Thanksgiving away from home in my life. The last
time I was in Monterey, CA and it was very hard. This one was also
difficult, but I kept busy enough that I didn't really stop and think
about it almost until bedtime. I took the bus out to the vantage
point, but there was a snag. Some dog had left a larger "present" for
me right where I had been sitting the day before. I really didn't
want to spend 4 hours sitting next to it. Luckily, a passerby told me
about another reserve further down the road. I walked down there and
watched the races from there. The view wasn't as good, but it didn't
smell at all. That evening I had a conversation with the owner of the
hostel, a very nice Korean man. He wanted to tell me all about his
adult life story of owning sushi restaurants and entrepreneurship.
He is actually quite inspirational.
On Friday morning I broke down and bought a GSM phone. It works on a
Pre Pay system, which means I don't get a monthly bill. Instead you
can buy a card which has a silver lottery-style scratch off area. You
call a central number and punch in the number revealed after
scratching and then - POOF - you can make calls. It isn't cheap
though. I'm not sure why, but telecoms here in NZ feel very expensive
to me. Anyway, I decided to get the phone because I had met a few
people who I wanted to keep in touch with and texting seems to be the
way people do that around here.
After buying the phone I went back out to the vantage point, which
didn't smell bad any more, though Team Dennis Conner sure did. They
trailed the entire race and then touched the 5th mark with their
chute. Sigh. I wrote three more postcards that night.
Saturday morning was fun. Jackie, a newly minted web designer who was
in the same dorm as me, drove me down to Auckland, saving me $8 in bus
fare and a very early start. She dropped me off right at the
InterCity bus station. I'm still not accustomed to this
drive-on-the-left thing they do here, but it is coming slowly. I
think back to my bike trip in Ireland with Birdie and how easy it was
then. Is it because I'm older, or because I'm not actively on the
roads every day? Who knows. I took a nap as we left Auckland since
it was just suburbs going by and they look the same everywhere. When
I woke up I saw something I didn't expect at all: naked hills. Upon
closer inspection it was clear that logging had be done recently. I
had no idea that NZ had a logging industry. We spent at least an hour
going through carefully planted forests interspersed with that awful
gut-wrenching view of cut down landscapes. Eventually we ended up in
the town of Taupo, which was holding its annual 160km bike race. When
the bus pulled in to the station we had 20 minutes "comfort break". I
sprinted down to the lakefront to get a picture of the first
snow-capped mountain I had seen in NZ. Then I ran back and made it to
the bus with 2 minutes to spare. Taupo was a pretty town and I put it
on my list of places to come back to later. Pulling out of Taupo was
dramatic. There's a stretch of motorway called Desert Rd and then
right out of nowhere there's a mini Grand Canyon, with a stream and
eroded layers of rock and everything. Very cool. The bus driver
popped in a video when we were 2 hours from Wellington: Spiderman. It
was a little distracting from the scenery, but it was a long bus ride,
so the entertainment did help. Total time from Auckland to
Wellington: 11 hours. I called Jane's friend Mark when I got off the
bus and he came and picked me up and took me back to his house. Wow -
what a house. Very posh. He was actually attending a party with his
wife elsewhere, so he gave me a key and took off. New Zealanders take
their hospitality very seriously. I freshened up a bit and went off
to find the cable car. Wellington has a lot of similarities to San
Francisco. Though the cable car is really more of a funicular, since
it only goes up and down one small section. I did find it, though it
was about to close, so I rode it down and right back to the top. I
had wanted to go out and find a pub, but that was not to be. Once I
got back to Mark's house, I started to unpack a little. Shortly, Mark
and his wife Bria (like Brian without the -n) came home and we shared
a bottle a NZ red wine - very nice, actually.
On Sunday morning I had a small bite to eat with Bria and then she
drove me down to the waterfront, dropping me off at Te Papa. Te Papa
is the national museum of New Zealand and is an amazing place. I
spent several hours, and didn't even begin to do it justice. It
really is a first-class museum and anyone in the part of the world must
go see it. I cannot say enough nice things about Te Papa. I will
come back to Wellington and revisit Te Papa when I've got more time.
Next, I cruised through the Wellington City & Sea Museum, which wasn't
quite worth the $5 entry fee, but was ok. It was very
Wellington-centric, which was to be expected, though I didn't really
get into their local sports heroes. Some of the maritime stuff was
quite good. I took the cable car back up to Mark and Bria's
neighborhood. Took a shortcut through the Botanic Gardens down to
their house, though it wasn't very gardeny. In fact, they had a
sequoia, and as I came up to it I thought to myself: "That looks a lot
like it should be in CA, imagine parallel evolution like that so many
miles away!" Then I saw the tag on it explaining it was from CA.
Anyway, I met Bria and she took me to the supermarket. To show my
gratitude I wanted to cook them (Mark, Bria and their son Alex)
dinner. I made a salad, home-made ravioli and pasta sauce, and a
fruit cobbler for desert. Alex is 12 or 13 and is really into
cooking, especially a la The Naked Chef. I had fun teaching how to
make pasta dough and he enjoyed making the cobbler.
Monday morning and another early start. Bria dropped me off in front
of the Lynx, which is a fast ferry to the south island. Of course,
the Lynx wasn't sailing until 3pm which was no good. So I hiked with
my pack over to the train station where I caught a free shuttle bus
with like 50 other backpackers to the regular InterIslander ferry
building. I bought a ticket and checked my backpack, just like at the
airport. The ferry takes about 3 hours to cross Cook Straight to get
to Picton, while the Lynx would have only taken 1.5 hours, giving me
some time to explore Picton. That will have to wait for another day.
The ferry was huge - it had three passenger decks, one deck for cars
and another deck for TRAINS! I had never seen that before. It was
about one and a half football fields long, and had its own movie
theater, though movie tickets were extra. The movie playing was: K-19
The Widowmaker. I thought that was an odd choice for a boat going
across a tricky patch of water, but what do I know. The InterCity
buses start right at the ferry building, so after collecting my
backpack it was easy to get on the right bus. It took about 4 hours
to get from Picton to Christchurch. During the ferry and bus ride I
read "The Vintner's Luck" by Elizabeth Knox (who it seems is in Bria's
book club - I told her about "Spartina" by John Casey as a book idea)
which Bria had loaned me - it was quite enthralling. The south island
is quite pretty. We went along the coast for a stretch - there were
these razor-like rocks going some distance from shore which made me
promise myself I'd never sail around here without good charts and a
GPS. When I finally got to Christchurch, I checked in to my hostel
and called Mrs Tuffley. Her son Chris had given me some books to
deliver for his parents' birthday presents. I made plans to have
dinner with them Thursday.
Tuesday morning and it was time to do laundry again. While my stuff
was in the washer, I ran out and scored some corn flakes and milk to
last me for breakfast for a few days. Once everything was dry and
folded and set out for the day. First off was the Botanic Gardens,
which were delightful. On the way there I went through Victoria Park
and walked a little way next to the beautiful and scenic and serene
Avon River, which you can go punting on, just like in Venice. Anyway,
You would not believe the rose garden they have. It was huge and it
just took my breath away. Thousands and thousands of roses all
blooming. Roses in every shape and color. It was almost too much. I
tried to take some good pictures, but I don't think they can capture
the overwhelming feeling of being completely surrounded by so many
flowers. Just incredible. Next door to the Gardens is the Canterbury
Museum. This is another good one which some nice natural history
focusing on early Maori culture, the now extinct moa (a huge
flightless bird) and early European settlers. I was only able to do
half before admitting defeat due to fatigue. I will come back later
since I've got almost a week in here Christchurch. On the way back to
the hostel I found Cathedral Square (not hard really - it is the
epicenter of Christchurch). However, they have the coolest thing
there - a huge chess set. The pieces are about 2 to 3 feet high and
people just stand around and play. I watched a couple of games and
then couldn't resist getting involved. :-) I won both my games.
Still to come: Hal learns about the bus system and forms some
conclusions about the city of Christchurch. Plus: Hal visits
Antarctica. But these won't get detailed until early next week when
I'm back in Orewa. Stay tuned!
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