Upside Down in New Zealand - Travels 2005

February 2005

Hello everyone,

“Horse Poop, $1.50”, read the sign by the side of the road.  

A Sign That Says It All

Lorraine and I had just arrived in Kerikeri, in the heart of one of New Zealand’s principal tourist areas, the beautiful Bay of Islands, near the northern tip of the North Island, but this was a sign that could hardly escape our notice. We were to stay for five days in Kerikeri, at the Linton B&B. Tourism is unquestionably a very important industry in New Zealand, the second most important, I am sure. In 1960 only 36,000 tourists came to New Zealand. Last year, New Zealand, about one-fourth the size of British Columbia but with equivalent population at just under four million persons, played host to over two million tourists.  

But if one has any doubts as to what is their most important industry, that sign says it all. New Zealand is one big farm. Everywhere I have been since I arrived three weeks ago, it has been one continuous vista of farms, some with sheep, or cattle, or horses, sometimes deer, ostriches, or alpacas; others have hay or corn fields, while others are orchards or vineyards. Some of the farms are on rolling hills, others are more open range, but always they are pictures of pastoral beauty, unblighted by industrial plants anywhere, belching smoke or otherwise. Our hosts at the Linton B&B were Lynn and Tony, a retired ‘dry stock farmer’. (We would call a ‘dry stock’ farmer a rancher, whereas a ‘wet stock’ farm we call a dairy.)

Philippines - Travel 2005

Boracay Sunset

January 2005

Dear family and friends,

Hello everyone. This is the fourth winter in a row in which I have headed to the Southern Hemisphere as an escape from Vancouver/Savary winters. Again this year I will be recording some of my travel thoughts and experiences. These scribblings will, in turn, end up plugging your inboxes, even the inboxes of those of you that I haven't heard from in awhile. I hope they are of some interest. Anyway, as always, I spent a minimum amount of time planning my trip and I am ever late in booking flights. However, when I headed back to Savary in mid December, I noted some graffiti in the men's washroom at Earl's Cove. A series of astutely observant weathermen had recorded the following conditions:

Oct. 13 wet and foggy

Oct. 23 cold & scary

Nov. 3 wet

Nov. 6 raining

Nov. 24 snowing

Dec. 2 f***ing cold

Dec. 7 pissin' rain

Hey, I didn't just fall off a turnip truck. On reading that, particularly "cold and scary", I pretty much knew it was time to book my flights and get away. When I got to Savary, I did just that, booking a flight to New Zealand with a stop in Manila on the way there, and a stop in Kuala Lumpur on the way back. The general area, Southeast Asia, and New Zealand, were easy choices given I will have a chance to connect with Lorraine in Auckland for a few days on her way back from Australia. I have never been to New Zealand and it has crept up my list of places to go as it is unfailingly raved about by all who have visited there. Other details of my trip are to be decided as I go, but I hope to visit some of the eastern Indonesian islands and possibly Papua New Guinea.

Peru Postscript

Found in Dad's "Travel Report" folder, along with his other South American reports. Titled:

Tomatoes, potatoes, corn 

(although none of these are mentioned in the report) and ending 

Never finished always in need of repair.
Alpaca, vicuna, llama

We'll never know the full story, but here is the "never finished, always in need of repair" work-in-progress Peru report:


Dear family and friends,

As many of you know, I have now been home for more than two weeks but I feel obliged to send one more letter to finish the chronicle of my South American trip and not leave you thinking I am still strapped in the seat of a Cesna 172 and flying around over the Nazca Lines.

image borrowed from http://www.cuscocity.com/store/products/NAZCA-LINES-WORLD-MISTERY.html 

I Abhora Mancora

Dear family and friends,


My overnight bus bounced off the highway and came to a dusty halt in front of the police station in Casma, Peru. It was 6:15AM. There were a half dozen men lolling around in the early morning half-light, none in uniform. The driver and I got off the bus and he approached the most senior looking man and started talking to him in Spanish, explaining my predicament.


"Habla usted Ingles, senor?” I said, not wanting to be excluded from the conversation. ("Do you speak English?")


"Poco", he answered ("A little"), but I never did hear him use any.


Then in a torrent of Spanish, little of which I understood, but from which I did gather, I should wait a moment and he would get me to the bus terminal. And within minutes, almost as though it had all been scheduled in advance, I was in a car with three policemen and another young couple and we were off, headed back up the Panamerican Highway in the direction from which I had just come. The car was a 1975 Chevrolet Biscayne, faded, pealing paint, re-upholstered at least 15 years ago and in desperate need of another one. The muffler leaked, the shock absorbers were shot, but we rocketed off down the highway at 130 kph, just as it was getting gray light. The old Chevvy floated and weaved, the massive hood rippled and bounced as though it was about to fly off. No one spoke - the roar of the motor would have drowned it out anyway - the young woman in the back was weeping and wiping away tears. I have no idea what the problem was.

Galapagos

Dear family and friends,

"Prickly pear cactus!  Prickly pear cactus!  My Gahd, I can't believe how much he talked about prickly pear cactus!  We've got millions of prickly pear cactus in Texas," Cecelia started in a whisper but ended with a near squeal to emphasize her dismay that Ruly, our naturalist tour leader, would spend so much time discussing something which is so uninterestingly common in her home state of Texas. 

Cecelia is from Port Aransas on the Gulf Coast, and was apparently unaware that our tour to the Galapagos Islands was intended for more than just folks from her home state.  Or alternately, she may not know that prickly pear cactus does not grow in Canada, England, Norway, and northern United States from whence the other nine of us on the tour come, or that this is a unique species of prickly pear cactus.  In her mid fifties with sun-bleached hair, brightly painted toe nails, and the grooming of someone desperate to look younger - but being resolutely betrayed by the sagging flab bubbling over her belt line - I am not quite sure why Cecelia decided to come to the Galapagos Islands.  With the urbanity of one who has seldom traveled outside Texas, I am quite certain that she has no knowledge that the Galapagos is the crucible of the Theory of Evolution, or as commonly known, Survival of the Fittest Through Natural Selection, as proposed by Charles Darwin in 1859.  Darwin spent less than one month in the islands in 1835, but his extraordinary ability for observation permitted him to identify many different endemic species - that is, they only occur here in the Galapagos - including 14 different species of finches, now known as Darwin finches.  It was his keen observations of how specialized the finches had become in adapting to their particular environment that propelled him to his conclusions of the evolution of species.

The Galapagos Islands, a group of some twenty islands and forty islets, lies 1,000 km off the coast of Ecuador with the equator running directly through it.  The Galapagos were my next stop after flying out of Santiago.  Then an enjoyable flight took me from Quito, the capital of Ecuador, to the airport located on Baltra Island from where I was whisked off to board the vessel Cruz del Sur for a five day/four night tour of the highlights of several islands. 

3 Interesting People

INTERESTING PEOPLE

One of the great things about travel is the interesting people one meets.  Most travelers, as opposed to tourists maybe, are very easy to meet and welcome the opportunity to talk about where they have been, where they are going, and to pass on suggestions for accommodation, tours, eating, etc.  Generally I find it easy to strike up a conversation with folks and I have met many.  But three I have met so far stand out. 

Austria Japan Walking

At the Chilean/Argentina border on the way back from my visit to Torres del Paines, a dusty, barren, out of the way, little spot with just a few houses and a couple of cafes, I couldn't help but notice a young guy striding up to the border control.  He was covered in dust and more than a little tattered looking.  As he walked by me I saw he had a sign on his backpack, something like 'Austria Japan Walking'.  Of course I had to talk to him.  I didn't get his name as we only spoke briefly, but this young guy started out in Vienna more than two years ago.  He has walked across Europe to Lisbon where he caught a flight to Ushuaia, and he is now walking through Chile (he will skip the northern desert), Peru, and Ecuador where he then flys to San Diego to walk to Vancouver.  from Vancouver he will fly to Japan to walk the length of it.  He was perky as hell and sure didn't appear to be bored, or discouraged, or in any way looking like he might quit before he completes his stroll.

Charley from Texas 

Another interesting guy was Charley, a Texas dirt farmer who, having just visited Antarctica, traveled along the same bus route as I did from Ushuaia to Punt Arenas and on to Puerto Natales.  Charley appeared to be in his mid fifties, had a sizeable paunch and a scruffy beard, he wore a baseball cap, checkered shirts, and well frayed pants.  He was traveling without a guidebook which makes me think he could not read, or certainly not well, and that he did acknowledge.  Charley looked less like a traveler than any one I have ever met, American or otherwise.  In fact, as I've traveled, Americans are generally conspicuous by their absence.  I have seen more here in South America than other places, but usually they are young people or those who travel somewhat upscale, certainly more upscale than Charley.  Charley spent his whole life happily living as a stereotypical Texan on his farm near the Mexican border.  September 11 changed all that.  He decided something was wrong with all he had been told and believed; he sold his farm and has set out to learn what the hell the world is all about.  More power to him.  I wish I had spent more time talking with Charley, as he is certainly unique for his peer group in wanting to learn more of the world and how America fits into it.

Nick the Biker

And then there is Nick.  As I was boarding the bus for Punt Arenas I noticed a bicycle and a bunch of well worn cycling gear being loaded on.  Nick Lenzmeier, mid thirties and out of San Francisco had just completed an incredible journey, cycling from Prudhoe Bay, Alaska to Ushuaia, a trip which took him 20 months and covered more than 33,000km.  He pedaled every inch of the way except for the Darrien Gap in Columbia, which is considered unsafe for armies, let alone individuals.  He was so unassuming about his achievment it was completely disarming.  Almost, 'ho hum, well that's over'.  He did admit that he delayed a couple of days in the city of Rio Grande just out of Ushuaia, as apparently do many other Pan-American cyclists, reluctant to finish, and to having felt somewhat melancholy when he did.  Nick has a great website with lots of excellent pictures if you want to read the whole saga, http://www.the-road-south.com/, about as modest of a name as he could have chosen for such a monumental ride.