Notes from a small island
When my father was born in 1905 airplane flights were measured in portions of a mile and most families never ventured much further than the county in which they were born. If you had told my grandfather, a man of the 1890’s, but just two generations back from me, that his grandson would fly to the other side of the world for a vacation I don’t think he would have understood the concept. We left Lexington airport at a little after 5:00 on March 3rd and flew by way of Atlanta, Georgia to Los Angeles California arriving at 11:30 pm their time which was 2:30 am our time, just the beginning of our adjustments.. We checked into our hotel room about midnight. The next morning we left at 8am to go back to the airport where we boarded a plane that took us to Seoul, Korea 13 ½ hours later. We crossed the International Date Line meaning what had been March 4th was now the 5th when we landed in Korea. We were there for less than 2 hours, most of which was spent walking from the gate where our plane came in down to the gate where the next one would leave. The airport was incredibly large. We boarded another plane there and flew 11 ½ hours south along the Pacific landing in Auckland, New Zealand at 11:30 the next morning, March 6th. Brenda unfortunately had not counted on the day changing again after we had crossed the dateline and had booked our connecting flight for March 5th meaning we had missed it. We got another flight with the same time schedule from Auckland down to Dunedin where we were met by our friends Bill and Martha Schafer (who also had showed up the day before to meet the flight we weren’t on). They drove us to the house they are renting in the small beach town of Brighton just outside of Dunedin. Bill, a retired professor from Berea College in Kentucky, teaches part time at the university in Dunedin and for the 3 months that he lives here each winter the university pays for the rental on this lovely apartment with a balcony overlooking a small bay and the Pacific. We ate fish and chips (the best of that classic fare that I’ve ever had !) from a local shop that evening and tried to stay awake until we could go to bed a normal time. The next morning I awoke at 4:30 am local time (just as I do at home) and watched the first rays of sun breaking over the Pacific ocean, a sight that I had never seen before. Watching the sun come up in the east over the Pacific doesn’t actually look any different than the Atlantic, but somehow it feels like it should.. The beach down below the balcony here has quite a bit of traffic with people, dogs and horses making use of the clean white sand and large rock formations. . The bay extends in a large curve to both sides away from our view ending to the left in a large prominent rock which looks like a smaller version of Diamond Head in Hawaii (which I have never seen in person but Brenda remembers from her childhood). The area around here is surprisingly not built up very much to be as naturally beautiful and bordering the ocean as it is. The houses here are modest in character and some even look a bit run down. A local custom is the extensive use of corrugated steel as a building material, quite sensible really, but unusual to our eyes. Back in the US one would expect an area like this to be wall to wall high rises overlooking the ocean. This has the feel of something from the 1950’s in America before the expensive building boom really got started. The hills here are beautiful and green reminding me a bit of Ireland. The predominant culture here however appears to be Scottish mixed with the Maori native influence for a rather strange combination Old
World Celtic names and signage stand side by side with the Maori (most nearly Polynesian in character) words for places and things. Another interesting and discordant element is the frequent presence of old American cars from the early and mid 60’s which appear to be in show room condition driving around the streets further enhancing the notion that we have stepped back in time.
On Saturday morning Bill and Martha took us over to the Backroads Bikes, the motorcycle rental place, where we picked up our Suzuki 650 from proprietor Howard Weir. He runs this very professional operation from his home and garage on a residential street in Dunedin. He has several bikes on offer, mainly V-Stroms like we were provided and some 250 cc dual purpose bikes. This latter group would seem odd for a touring rental facility, certainly so in the States, but our travels over the next few weeks would prove that these machines would be extremely practical for a solo rider in this country. I followed the Schafer’s car back to the house through city traffic trying my best to remember to stay on the left and not to turn into the wrong side of the road intersections. The Suzuki is quite a bit different then the bikes I’m used to but it is fairly easy to adapt to and I think its going to work nicely. I park it in the garage at the apartment and we head out for a tour of downtown in their car.
I’ve had some difficulty finding internet service to keep in touch with the office (the curse of being self employed and trying to take extended time off) so we go to the local museum which has a café where I can get an internet connection. Unlike the free WIFI that you find in American quite often, there are only paid connections here. I sat in the café and caught up on work email while Bill, Martha and Brenda poked around the museum and had coffee at a nearby table.
That night we drove back into Dunedin to have dinner at a restaurant called The Luna. It is at the end of a bridge and perched on the side of the hill over looking the downtown part of the city and the harbor. While we were sitting there a gorgeous rainbow arced from the city up into the clouds. Our waitress turns out to be from Colorado, not the first of these ex-pat workers we’ll run into on our travels..
Sunday morning I got up at daylight and walked up in the hills above Brighton and on a few miles into the sheep farm area. With my back to the ocean I’m looking at rugged hills and farms that remind me of some of the hardscrabble places I’ve seen in the California hills or in Ireland. If I turn around with my back to the farms I’m looking out at the broad expanse of the Pacific ocean. The sun is rising and I realize that the next land mass I would contact if I went toward that rising sun would be West Africa.
While I’m walking I am stopped in my tracks by sounds I can only describe as “R2D2″ . It sounds like a collection of electronic whistles and bells generated by some sort of computer equipment. I later find out from Bill that these are Tui birds which are apparently great mimics and love to make a variety of sounds. Although Bill tells me they are fairly large birds I was unable to see any of them. They blend in very well.
Back at the house Brenda is going out for a walk on the beach which is about a hundred yards down from our front door. I take the Suzuki and travel about 25 miles South on the coast road just to get the feel of the bike before Brenda gets on the back with me. I have to keep reminding myself again to stay on the left. There is very little traffic and the road is fairly well paved. There are several places where there is a lot of gravel on the surface which causes me some concern with a rented motorcycle. I passed by the connector that goes over to Route 1, the main North-South road, just to see how much further down the coast road goes. I quickly find out when it turns in to gravel and goes up in to the hills. After trying the gravel road for a couple of miles, hoping that it was only temporary, I decide that I had best turn around and go back and take the connector that goes over the mountain. This road climbs in a series of curves up on to a ridge line where one can look down into what it appears to be glacial valleys with the sides lined in almost luminescent green grass. Again, California meets Ireland with a bit of eastern Kentucky thrown in for spice.
On Monday we took the Talerei Gorge Railway up into the mountains for a sightseeing trip. The mountains are incredibly highwith extremely steep rocky sides covered with square cut boulders interspersed by many, many white sheep. The sheep are clinging to the hillside and it appears they would fall off at any moment into the tumbled-rock valleys below.The train was a mixture of old time cars and newer coach cars with a snack car in the middle for passengers to get food and drinks along the way. The ride took about two hours up and slightly less than that back (since it was all down hill coming home). Most of the passengers were other New Zealanders or Australians and quite a few Japanese. All were extremely friendly people and interested in what was happening in America. The universal opinion was that America had finally come to its senses after a long, scary aberration in its politics. People would broach the subject carefully, asking us “how we felt” about the election and then upon hearing that we were Obama supporters, would break into broad grins with a palpable sigh of relief. Perhaps the tourist group is not a total sample, but we didn’t hear one single voice in support of the former regime.
One thing I noticed immediately on the train was the lack of any of the typical American babysitting safety regulations. I was able to walk car to car while the train was moving and stand outside on the decks between the cars which was a particularly interesting experience when the train went through long tunnels. There were no warning signs or safety latches or locks on the doors that closed when the train was in motion or any of those sorts of things. I’ve noticed that all over New Zealand now that I’ve come to be aware. This is a country that has from what I am told very little of a tort responsibility system. People are just expected to be adults and look out for themselves. I noticed even the sink in the bathroom had no overflow drain. It seems that we’re expected to know when the water’s too full and pull the plug.
We took off on Tuesday, March 10th (that’s Monday the 9th, back home if you’re keeping track) from Brighton a few miles south of Dunedin. We went down the coast road but in much different condition then I had experienced only 2 days earlier. This morning there was a hard wind off the beach gusting as high as 40 mph blowing rain across us and the road surface. We proceeded on down to Taleri Mouth and went up into the hills headed towards Route 1. The spectacular views I had seen on Sunday were now largely covered by cloud in the mist of rain. When we reached Route 1 at Milton we elected that instead of going down to the coast road again to follow the Catlins, as we had planned, we would head north away from the shore where the weather at least appeared to be somewhat better. We headed Northwest on Route 8 through Waitihuna and up to Alexandra and Clyde. The rain stopped, but came back in scattered showers, and at various times we had a bit of sun. The temperature however had dropped down in the 40’s. The road meandered through mountains then up on to hilly plains and down into valleys. At times I thought it looked a bit like Virginia and other times we were in brown hills covered with sparse vegetation which looked very much again like northern California or the high desert country of eastern Washington. There were sheep farms everywhere with wooly herds that sometimes would raise their heads in unison to watch us go by, then immediately go back to processing grass into meat and fiber.. We stopped for gas at Alexandria in a station that was also a motorcycle shop in the middle of town. I told the proprietor what an unusual thing that would be in the States at this point, though it had been common back in the 50’s and 60’s. He was an enthusiastic biker of the Old School, having both street and dirt bikes in his shop and being equally passionate about both. He told me that organized dirt rides were relatively common in NZ and that rental of an offroad machine would be possible. I’ll keep that in mind for our next trip.
It was only a short ride from Alexandria to Clyde, the old Victorian era mining town where we would spend the night. It was early in the afternoon but Brenda found the town to be quite charming and she wanted some time to explore the yarn shop there. We found lunch at what may be the world’s best café. It was an old Bank of New Zealand building converted into an eatery run by a very lively woman who seemed ready for anything that life might throw at her. We were running low on cash so I asked her if there was a cash point (ATM) in town and she said no but she would just give me money out of the till. I asked if they accepted Visa and she laughed and said “we take anything you’ve got, we’ve no pride at all”. The range of food on offer was amazing for so small a facility in so small town. I would expect maybe ½ this wide a selection in Chevy Chase in Lexington. All of the food was interesting and at least judging from what we actually selected, excellent. Next door was a restored Victorian era hotel that was now renting out rooms as a sort of B&B. They were booked for the night except for what once had been the servant’s quarters on the back of the hotel which did not have its own indoor facilities. Instead there were two external wash rooms, one right outside the door of this room which the proprietor said we could have to ourselves. This being pretty much the only place to stay in town we accepted. We walked around the town, which didn’t take long, and Brenda went in to the yarn shop to fulfil that mission. We took the historic walking tour which essentially was just looking at the old buildings down Main Street following a printed map which had a short explanation what they had contributed to the town. The old newspaper office, now a private residence, looked exactly like something one would have seen in an old western movie or perhaps even Gunsmoke.
That night we walked up the street to the Old Post Office Restaurant (exactly what it sounds like it is) where then again we were amazed by the selection on the menu. Neither of us is entirely certain what it was we got since we ordered something that sounded interesting but which didn’t entirely explain its contents. For dessert I ordered what I have been told is the New Zealand “national dessert”, a “Pavlova” which turned out to be a dish containing a smaller dish with ice cream, perhaps one scoop. In the center of the main dish was a mound of meringue, though not the variety found on lemon cream pies. This was a hardened concoction, sort of like cream Christmas candy or the inside of a Blue Monday bar. It was interesting but not something I would go out of my way to order again.
The next morning, after breakfast at the B&B, we headed north from Clyde. I had intended to take the road directly over to Arrowtown, an old mining village which has now morphed into a shopping and eating tourist destination. However I took the wrong turn and ended up on Route 8 headed North east along side a beautiful glacial lake. We decided that since we didn’t have a particular schedule or destination we would just keep going to see where this gorgeous road went. It ended up at the little town of Wanka which had been on our list to go to anyway. From Wanka there was a sign pointing back down to Arrowtown so we followed the signs. Little did we know that we were going up into what is called the Crown Range, across the top of Mt. Cardrona.. The road kept going up and climbing switch backs and at one point turned to gravel where some repairs were being made. The temperature kept getting colder and I could feel my ears popping just as they do when ascending in an airplane. Finally we reached what appeared to be the peak of the road even though the mountain was still a bit higher above us. We pulled into an overlook because at that point we were riding in snow. We realized we were above the snow line in the white caps on the mountains we had seen all around us. While standing in the car park next to the bike slapping are hands together to try to get them warm again, an airliner -sized commercial airplane flew by the peak at eye level with us and headed on down the valley.
We left the overlook and started down the switch backs which looked almost exactly like the aerial photos I have seen of the Stelvio pass in the Italian Alps. It would have been a great fun road for a motorcycle had it not been covered in rain and occasionally snow with a high cross wind making it somewhat difficult to control the bike. We were greatly relieved when we finally got below the snow line and things evened out a bit. I’d like to have another go at this pass in better weather. From there we dropped into the valley and went in to Arrowtown, parked the bike and went in search of someplace warm to eat. The streets of Arrow Town are something like Bar Harbor or some other similar little shopping tourist destination, lined with shops selling “adventure gear” and souvenirs that, although often made in China, would commemorate one’s visit to NZ. We found a nice restaurant where I had pumpkin kumara soup and a thai currey while Brenda contented herself with a salad. We browsed through some of the stores but didn’t find anything that we couldn’t live without so we pressed on South West to go through Queenstown. Queenstown is a much larger Gatlinburg- like tourist destination, (famous lately for being one of the staging areas for the Lord of the Rings movie crews) but we didn’t stop there. Our map showed the road going up beside another glacial lake to the town of Glenorchy and apparently from there on around the lake and over to Kinloch. The road to Glenorchy was beautiful with the pristine postcard -looking lake and white capped mountains on one side and more similar mountains on the other. When we got to Glenorchy however we stopped for something to eat and were told by the waitresses at The Glenorchy hotel and Foxy’s Café (all one institution) that Glenorchy was the end of the line. There is a gravel road that goes around the lake to Kinloch but as they put it, to go on from there I would have to be a bird or a mountain goat. Being neither I decided we would spend the night.
As the sun was going down we were getting colder. There was a wool shop in a one room cabin across the road from our hotel (“hotel” being a title and not a description) where we went to buy sweaters.
In New Zealand, the people several years ago introducing a new animal to the ecosystem with the intention of building a fur trade by commercially raising these beast. The animal is called a possum but bears no resemblance to the similarly name creature in the US. This possum has a thick round body, more like a Koala and a head that looks remarkably like the Star Wars character Yoda. It has a round face with 2 prominent triangular- shaped ears sticking straight out from its head and large eyes staring straight front of it. The possum’s fur is almost unique being apparently the only other fur besides polar bear known to have hollow fibers for insulation. It is extremely soft. Unfortunately the possum’s appetite is not soft and once the creatures were introduced to the local ecosystem they of course did not stay in captivity and began breeding themselves into a frenzy out in the wild. According to Bill Schafer, a grown up possum which weighs maybe 20 pounds can strip the foliage off a tree in a single day. These creatures, cute though they may be, have become a major ecological problem in New Zealand and there are now paid individuals who hunt and trap them in an effort to control the population. We saw several which had been hit as road kill.
The fur however is a commercial success and many stores sell items made of merino wool and possum fur which makes a very fine garment which apparently does not ball or pill like straight wool. I bought a sweater which was 60% merino and 40% possum fur and can vouch for the fact that it is both soft and warm. Brenda bought a “shrug” which she tells me is a style of sweater.
We stopped in at the backpackers bar across the road from our hotel to sample the atmosphere of a New Zealand’s bar. Inside it was, like every other establishment in New Zealand, smoke free which is always a pleasant surprise. Sports TV was on, as it is in the states, but this particular program was showing cricket finals. It is a game that apparently one must have grown up with to understand. We watched for quite a while but really weren’t able to make much sense of it. The beer selection was heavy on New Zealand’s largest brewery, Speights which must be similar to Budweiser in the states. The beer didn’t really have much taste and a lot of carbonation. We made our way back across our room, an 8×10 cell with a bed that had seen its best days sometime in the early 1990’s.
The next morning we stopped in the restaurant at the same establishment and had New Zealand’s version of a “full cooked” breakfast which included fried bread topped with baked beans, scrambled eggs, a fried tomato (which I promptly gave to Brenda), fried mushrooms, a large sausage, several pieces of what they call “streaky bacon” which we would call ham, and toast. Coffee over here is not just coffee and in fact one can’t really order what we normally would refer to as a cup of coffee. One must order either a “flat white” which is similar to a cappuccino and it’s a black coffee with a froth of foam milk on top, a “long black” which is a shot of very strong coffee in the bottom of a cup served with a small pot of hot water on the side, or a “short black” which is the same thing with a smaller pot of water or an “espresso”. If necessary one can come up with what they call “filter coffee” which is similar to a press pot coffee in the states.