Farewell, New Zealand!

Speaks for Itself

Artsy Waterfall

Cool Clock

Pied Shags

Pahia at Night

Store at Kerikeri Mission Station

Flowers on Fire

Mangrove Forest

Old-fashioned Printing Press

Tui Bird

King of the Kumara

Potato, Potata, Dargaville’s Gotta Lotta Kumara!

This will be my last post from New Zealand. I can’t believe I’m writing these words and that three months have passed so quickly! Tomorrow (June 3), we’re flying from Auckland (where we’ve spent the last two days) to Melbourne, Australia…well, at least I hope we’re flying to Melbourne. Due to an Air New Zealand schedule change made to our Los Angeles return flight (at the end of August), we’re unable to check in online for our flight tomorrow. I’m still not sure how the one affects the other, but perhaps Mr. Spock of Star Trek could explain it. All I got from the airline was the usual insincere apology. So, there may be a true adventure to report back to all you readers when I write my first post from Australia.

I want to leave you with a few impressions from our trip to Kiwi land. As you’ve probably figured out yourself from Herman’s photos, New Zealand is rich in scenic beauty and friendly, polite people. The most obvious proof of the population’s amiability can be witnessed on the road. If you move into the slow lane so a faster car can pass, the driver offers a wave of thanks. When you’re driving through a construction zone, it’s customary to wave at the guy (or gal) holding the slow/stop sign, and they almost always wave back.

We’ve seen people perform semi-dangerous passing stunts on the road, only to get a brief flash of headlights from the aggrieved driver in the opposite direction that he managed to avoid. In fact, Herman made a risky U-turn on what we thought was an empty street in Dunedin, coming into uncomfortably close contact with another car. The driver’s reaction? He rolled his window down and quietly said, “Remember, you need to check your side mirrors when driving on the left side of the road.” I think almost anywhere else in the world he would have been saying, “Learn how to drive, moron!” His polite, low-key behavior was most humbling.

Then there’s the language, or should I say, the dialect? The easiest example I can offer is the use of the word, breakfast, which sounds like “brikfust.” Yeah becomes “Yeea.” There are many more examples, but you get the idea.

At the end of my last post, I said that we were no longer heading north. Well, that was incorrect. We did briefly head south but then arced northward toward Whangarei, where we visited a really neat clock museum and saw the new “Solo” movie.

Then we took the long drive to Paihia, followed by a day trip to nearby Kerikeri to visit an old mission station, Herman’s walk through a mangrove forest the day after, and a ferry to Russell to visit the Pompallier Mission and Printery on our last day in Paihia. All in all, it was a peaceful, relaxing four days.

On May 30, we took the l-o-n-g road toward Orewa. On the way, we stopped to see the largest kauri tree in the country. It was so wide and truly an impressive site! Its age is estimated at about 2,000 years old. Fortunately, it’s still healthy despite a widespread tree disease threatening the kauris nationwide. While a few kauri trees are being planted, there seems to be little interest on the part of the government office in charge to give them a lot of attention. According to the person who was answering our questions, there is no economic advantage to their sustainability because of the length of time it takes for a kauri tree to reach maturity. By reaching maturity, he meant when the tree reaches an age to be “useful” to industry, which is what almost devastated it to begin with.

I’m trying to remember if I’ve mentioned this before, but most of my friends know that I really, really don’t like sweet potatoes or pumpkin (and please don’t write in the comments how much you love the stuff and that I’ve just not had a good experience with either vegetable, because my mind is firmly made up about it). Well, I guess the joke is on me because kumara, a type of sweet potato introduced to New Zealand by the Maori, and pumpkin are considered staples of the fall diet, though I have yet to meet anyone who will admit to liking the stuff. It’s so ubiquitous on menus that we’ve had to double-check with the waiters about the types of roasted vegetable used as side dishes. I’m telling you this because, on the way to Orewa, we passed through Dargaville, the home and capitol of the kumara. Potato, potata, Dargaville’s gotta lotta kumara!

So, that’s it, folks! Hopefully, there will be tales to tell from Australia, and if not, there’s always Herman’s photos. I’ll be in touch soon.