Wellington to Auckland

July 28, 2008
Well, massive swells on a huge vessel are profoundly soporific. We yawned until our jaws practically unhinged and cat-napped on the arms of our chairs (except Zada, who was frantic to be out on deck to be buffeted by the gale force winds and splashed with sea spray from the immense waves breaking against the ship’s sides). We got into Wellington late and just crawled into our mallard-littered campground. It was raining – just as it did last time we were here for a couple of days.
Today, the weather was fine for the early morning – only very light intermittent drizzle. Even though we have to get to Tongariro today, which will be a big drive, we wanted to go back to Te Papa. Now that school is back in and it is a week day, we could get through the galleries much easier and see some things we missed.
Most notable of these was Bush City. This is a marvelous garden complex they have attached to the museum. Interpretive markers detail interesting facts about what Wellington was like before they built the city. They have a wonderful faux cave set-up with stalactites and panels showing the formation process. There is a pool and an artificial glow worm grotto also.
As you exit the gardens there is a huge “bottle biome” arrangement. I have tried this so many times (obviously on a much smaller scale) and mine always just kill the fish. This thing was incredible! There were four tiers of 2 liter bottles filled about ¼ of the way up with some sort of gravel/growing medium. The bottles had cut-aways on the sides for the plants. Each level of bottles was connected to the next by aquarium tubing and the bottom level’s bottles dripped directly into the large open aquarium. I went straight-away into teacher mode and began lecturing Zada on the system. We drew a small crowd of young locals who wanted to know if we were schoolteachers and began asking questions.
I am inspired to risk some more fish in the endeavor to build one of these again. Wish me (and the fish) luck.
After the museum it was back to the Beast for some more hours on the road. We are really reworking and pinching the schedule to accommodate the weather. The current forecast is that it will be pretty awful until we leave. Sad, if it happens, but we cannot complain at all. We have had extraordinary luck with so very many clear days. The real problem is that we left Bay of Islands, The Kauri coast and the Coromandel peninsula until last because it was a lot of beach-type activities and we thought the weather would be steadily warming and clearing. I don’t know where we got that idea, but it appealed to us and we made plans with it.
Our new plan was to race to see Tongariro, Ngauruhoe and Ruapehu as quick as possible before the next killer storm (scheduled for Wednesday) hits. The effects of this last storm were pretty dreadful and we saw several frozen sheep carcasses on the drive to Okahune. We made it safely to the carrot capitol of NZ (yes, they have a giant carrot here in a small park and we heartbreakingly just missed the annual carrot festival too!), and are all set to try a few small walks along the mountain drive early tomorrow before it starts raining.

July 29, 2008
Okay, so the people at the information center that sold us the Tongariro National Park walks guide COULD have told us that the car parks and trailheads to the waterfall trail and few other short day hikes are buried in snow from plowing the road. Yes, well, the hiking part was fairly unsatisfactory, but we could see the “Rimu Walk” and the waterfall from the “Mountain Scenic Drive”, which is what we ended up doing when we found we couldn’t pull over or access the trails.
Ah well, we had a most frightening (for me, Brad & Zada are apparently indifferent to ice covered hairpin turns at steep inclines with no guard rails or barriers of any kind) drive up to the ski area, where Brad and Zada played in the snow and I contemplated mortality.
We crept down the same horrible way we had gone up and made all speed for Rotorua. We wanted to visit the city museum and the Agrodome and the other things we missed when we flew through the first time (all these things have the benefit of being indoors and good thing too as it started to rain at about noon and shows no sign of ever stopping).
We made such excellent time that we went out to the Agrodome for the 2:30 “experience”. It was really good. They impart a huge amount of information about several of NZ’s most important industries in a very entertaining way. We became acquainted with the 19 commercial breeds of sheep and their various unique aspects and uses. I was stunned to learn that the dairy industry was actually NZ’s biggest – I really thought it was sheep. We saw sheepdogs work and learned about their breeding and training. We saw a sheep sheared and learned that a Kiwi holds the world’s record for this (729 sheep sheared by one extremely tired individual in a nine hour period). After the shearing, the different grades of wool were explained and then we saw the process continued with cleaned fleeces being sent through a 109 year old carding machine and then spun into yarn by hand on a spinning wheel.
The stage show pulled people onstage to learn to milk a cow, and to feed lambs. It was much more fun than we expected and we picked up a lot of good information and material for our NZ culture kits. It would never do to go home without any sort of contact with the creature that defines NZ in popular imagination.

July 30, 2008
Well, the forecast was wonderfully accurate for today. The rain lashed and the fierce winds buffeted the campervan all night. The unearthly howling somehow complementing the staggering rotten-egg odor (don’t forget, we are back in geo-thermal wonderland and marvelous as all that hot pool, geyserish sort of thing is, it really stinks) and both combining to ensure a not so restful night.
Ah well, we were up and out to the Rotorua Museum of Art and History. This is housed in a marvelous faux Tudor/ colonial building set in the grounds of the Government Gardens. The edifice is celebrating its centennial this year. It started life as a magnificent bath-house – along the lines of those in Hot Springs National Park’s Bath-house Row, but on a much grander scale. The bath-house industry represents the second incarnation of this area’s tourism drawing card. This same region was home to the celebrated “Pink” and “White” terraces – dubbed the “Eighth Wonder of the World” by Rudyard Kipling.
Well-to-do adventurous souls came from all over to view these marvels and roads and a healthy hotel and guiding industry grew to meet the needs of the travelers. All this came to an abrupt and horrible halt with the eruption of Tarawera in 1886. At least 120 people were killed as the mountain (sacred to the local tribes and the repository for their ancestors’ remains) rent itself in two, sending up enormous multi-kilometer jets of volcanic material. The entire area was devastated and the famed terraces were no more.
The museum has marvelous exhibits detailing the history and development of this area. It is a very small museum, but the exhibits are extremely well done, with lots of primary source material delivered in a variety of formats. The community has really supported this endeavor to preserve their local history and many donated photographs, anecdotal accounts, letters, postcards and photographs lend a real richness and human dimension to the displays.
The same loving attention and respect for personal history permeates the equally absorbing galleries devoted to the 28th Maori Battalion. These troops were legendary for their valor and insouciance in action during both World Wars. They paid a terrible price for their courage, with the death of one out of every six of their number. A number of personal effects and accounts and photographs of the soldiers line the walls of this exhibit.
All of this regard for “stories” (this museum’s logo says “where great stories begin…”) has really captured my interest in terms of writing project for my students. At Te Papa I saw a beautifully carved stick with a number of protruding notches. This was for recalling generations – incredibly there were 18 notches on this stick – the idea of being able to orally recount 18 generations of your family is absolutely flabbergasting to me. I love history and am a Southern woman into the bargain – I mean I thought I was pretty up on this genealogy thing, but apparently not. Anyhow, I want to use these incredible examples we’ve been collecting to inspire my students to begin collecting their own stories. I want them to make little Fimo Southwestern “storyteller” figures and to capture their own history in as many mediums as we can dream up.
The northern wing of the building is dedicated to its own heyday as a splendid bathhouse. The descriptions of “the cure” were all so gruesome to me that it quite put me off visiting any of the contemporary spas this neighborhood is buried in. We read about the variety of baths and treatments available to treat all sorts of unattractive ailments. I could not recover from the “Rachel Bath” concept – that and the “Priest Bath” seemed to be a group (gender separate) experience. So you pile two or three individuals all suffering some disgusting skin disease or whatever and put them in the same water to steep. MMMMM! Medicinal! Then there were the variety of electric treatments, radium infused waters and x-ray treatments. The cooling room was very elegantly appointed and had displayed some of the original “instruments” utilized in the treatments in glass cases. Lastly, we descended into the basement to view the mud baths. The highly corrosive nature of the thermal waters has made maintaining the place an impossibility since the day it opened. The basement area gives you a close up view of rusted plumbing, gaps in the walls and so on. The management thoughtfully provides hard hats for touring this portion.
All in all a very enjoyable way to spend a day – especially a day where it rained sideways – all day long. We cannot complain. The news told us we had decided wisely by racing back up to Rotorua, the weather has been monstrously destructive elsewhere in NZ – flooding, roofs off, huge trees uprooted, tens of thousands without power. We are just wet. Back to the window/door open thing for a moment here. Okay, they are so very hardy they keep them all open in the cold and wind; surely they shut them in torrential downpours? No, you are wrong! Why would you close them? How would the dreadful plague of small birds render your café experience into an aviary experience if the door was shut? How can the onslaught of these flying, perpetually excreting beasts not bother anyone, but me? Okay, I am a bad person, I admit it. I hate birds. I especially hate birds indoors anywhere near my food and drink.
Enough ranting. After a very quick cup of coffee at the aviary/café we paddled back to the campground, roundly berating ourselves for forgetting to put on the stupid rain pants we dragged halfway around the world. Now we are all clean, warm and dryish (it is still raining sideways) and plotting our next move as the Coromandel Peninsula is still no. We might linger here, watching how far more entertaining other peoples elected bodies are. Seriously, compare the deadly dull sessions of our houses versus the wild carryings-on of the British, Australian and NZ parliaments.
More tomorrow, from wherever we end up.

July 31, 2008
Today was a huge driving day. We drove from Rotorua up to the Coromandel Peninsula. The weather continues to be terrible, but we have plotted a route that avoids any of the road closures. We are extremely fortunate that we have been able to keep out of the path of the worst of it. Several lovely places we just came through have been seriously battered by these awful storms.
We made it to Hahei beach and our campground has a fantastic position right on the beachfront. We went for a long explore up and down the beach and then settled in for an early evening of Uno, Pass the Pigs and a movie while yet another enormous storm blew up and rattled the windows.

August 1, 2008
Narnia and the North! Well, north anyways, even if not really Narnia. We had a wonderful walk out to the Cathedral Cove. The walk leads you through some lovely fern forest and we saw the curled up fronds that are one of the major NZ symbols, the koru, everywhere. It was the usual decadent fecundity – the very rocks seem to be green and growing here. After a side trip to Stingray Bay (the beach was still inaccessible, only the boulder field out of the reach of the tide) we arrived at Cathedral Cove.
It completely lives up to the hype. The beach is unbelievably beautiful, with glistening pink sands, the eponymous cathedral-like arch and a waterfall! The waterfall even casts spectacular rainbows, yes; it is an absurdly beautiful place. We ran here and there trying to take it all in. As if gorgeous isn’t enough, there were also several interesting fossil remains clearly visible in the cliff face. The limestone of the surrounding cliffs is eroding into fantastic shapes and obviously, the most fantastic feature is the enormous arch. It is a lot bigger than I expected – it is easily 70 feet long and probably 30 feet high. The echo factor was rigorously tested by Zada and is quite remarkable.
The arch acts as a frame for Te Hoho, a lovely pointed limestone pinnacle, now separated from the cliff face by 100 feet or more. The whole scene is deliriously beautiful. I could carry on in this vein for another 500 or 600 words, but Brad is nagging at me to hurry up and confirm the rental car details for our return.
After our return from Narnia, we hiked back up the trail and this time took the side path to visit Gemstone Bay. We found a huge boulder field, but not so many gemstones. If I haven’t driveled on about it in this posting yet, let me here mention the spectacularly beautiful color of the water. Colors, I should say as the shallower areas perfect aquamarine is dappled here and there with a radiant, deep Mediterranean blue. It is a horrible distraction when driving and the roads in this area look (as usual) like an EKG gone awry.
We encountered a wedding party on the way down to the cove as we made our way back – what an amazing place to be married! What devoted (and hardy) family they must have to haul the decorations, tables, chairs and food up and down that trail! It was a lovely hike, but there were several blowdowns and a few washed-out areas. Ah well, “the path of true love…”
Our next destination was the “Hot Water Beach”. This beach is sitting atop a magma intrusion approximately 2k beneath the surface. Reservoirs of water sit above the magma and bubble to the surface.
Everyone brings a spade and digs a little personal spa. Most people do anyway; we just made little footbaths and then ran squealing into the surf when it got too hot. The water is 60 degrees Celsius – which is too hot unless tempered with some of the icy ocean water. Getting into just the right spot took some serious jockeying.
We admired the sturdy Kiwi souls who braved the beach in their Speedos to sit in a self-dug pool – admired, but did not emulate. It is the middle of winter here and though the sun shone with its accustomed devastating brightness, it was not in any way warm.
After an enjoyable hour or so of parboiling we returned to the car and began to travel the slippery, winding road toward the Northland.

August 2, 2008
We drove out to Matakohe to visit the Kauri Museum. It is a very interesting place – lots of pioneer and settler history. They have some wonderful tableau set up showcasing the furnishings and appointments of mid 19th century upper-middle class society. The mannequins were modeled on local descendants of the people they were representing and they had a very nice collection of period clothes and personal accoutrements – splendid toilet sets, glove stretchers, bootlacers, button-hooks and so on. They had lace sample books, curling tongs and willow pattern china. Then it was onto the galleries devoted to the loggers and gum-diggers.
These were not quite so decorative and lovely, but still rich in detail and personal articles. Again we see the tremendous support these museums receive from local inhabitants, who so generously give their stories and family treasures.
The museum holds samples (huge gorgeous slabs actually) of every wood in New Zealand. The walls are covered in these glowing, polished planks. There are superb examples of woodworkers’ art from various periods – gorgeous inlaid tables, elaborately carved sideboards, intricately designed pianos and organs.
A distinctly unique gallery was the “Gum Room”. Kauri “gum” is the resin from the tree. It hardens into a beautiful, transparent golden colored nugget. These were prized by collectors and used for a variety of industrial purposes, such as linoleum making. This gallery holds what appears to be hundreds of these glowing golden hunks of hardened sap. There are elaborately crafted forms – a cathedral, a ship and so on and simple, highly polished blobs. Gum-digging seems to have been an even more horrible livelihood than logging.
Kauri trees are immense; it is hard to believe that so many were so cavalierly destroyed. The saw mill gallery made clear it wasn’t easy. The size of the saws they had to use to bring them down and then shape them for transport were incredible. A single section of Kauri log took 16 bullocks to haul – some portions (a single individual section) requiring 32 bullocks! The Northland used to be covered in these mighty giants, but today they exist only in one small 16 kilometer forest reserve. Actually, small patches of two or three trees are preserved in a couple of other places, but this is the only real concentration of them today.
Waipoua Forest was our next destination. The usual dramatic winding, weaving steep roads rendered that much more exciting by the recent (and ongoing) rain. The roadside is littered with slips and rockslides. Most of these are small or already tidied up (the NZ road works department is seriously on the ball with the wash-outs and rock piles). Some few were pretty serious, with huge, raw looking craters in the cliff side and the enormous pile of displaced material all over the place.
We oohed and ahhed and craned our necks to see to the tops along the drive and stopped for the trails to the “4 Sisters”, “the Father of the Forest” and “the Lord of the Forest”. These are seriously big trees. The last named, called Tane Mahouta, is over 51 meters high and the tallest living Kauri tree. As big as the trees we gaped at today seem, the loggers who all but wiped them out recorded trees almost twice as big (before they chopped them down to make Victorian sideboards and commodes).
The rain was REALLY coming down by now and the wind howling in a most threatening manner. As most of the streams and rivers we’d driven past earlier were all but out of their banks we got back on the road and headed for Paihia in the Bay of Islands area.

August 3, 2008
We reached Paihia as the sky opened and began to destroy the earth. The wind was screaming like a thousand souls in torment and trying to tear the roofs from the buildings. Rain was falling like bullets and we simply could not face camping. It rains like that in Houston, not NZ. We caved in and got a hotel room. Zada was so happy. That bear loves few things like staying in a hotel. She was even happier when she discovered we had Sky TV and she could watch the rugby game. She has developed a bizarre passion for the incomprehensible game. She can watch enthusiastically while Brad and I sit there bewildered and asking, “Is that a penalty? Why?” “Can you kick people in the head? Is he throwing that guy in the air?”
We even tuned in in time to see the All Blacks perform the “Haka”. This is a traditional Maori war dance and it is done before every match. Zada was in heaven. She fell in love with the Haka in Rotorua, when we attended a Maori concert. Anyhow, just to make for a perfect evening, the All Blacks defeated the Wallabies (Australia’s National team).
This morning the sky was blue and the sun was shining. Pahia looked like postcard of a perfect resort town. Everything was gleaming and shining in the sun. It looked like a perfect day to see the famed Bay of Islands, so we booked spots on a cruise out to Cape Brett and the “Hole in the Rock”. The vessel was named “Dolphin Seeker” -auspicious, we thought, which just shows what you get for thinking.
The weather turned before we were even decently out of the harbor and continued to toy with us for the entire rest of the day. It would clear, the islands would bloom into life – rich green jewels, shining in the sparkling bay; without warning rain would fall, shrouding everything in grim gray. It was like the Wizard of Oz – you’re over the rainbow – glorious color, now you’re in Kansas. Why did Dorothy want to go back? Anyhow, these monkey tricks made the sea wild and rollicking – huge swells starting developing and our trip was limited to a cruise around the islands and an exploration of the interior of the bay.
We stopped off at Urupukapuka Island for an hour and enjoyed exploring the beach. This island was home to Zane Grey’s fishing camp in the 1920’s/30’s. We found several urchins, mussels and a couple of sea stars.
The area is really lovely, and I can just imagine what an incredible place it is for water sports when the weather is more reliable. Also, we saw only one gannet as opposed to the welter of frolicking dolphins, penguins and orcas disporting themselves so merrily on the brochure. Ah well. The ice cream in this town is amazing and that is a considerable consolation.
We drove down to Warkworth and were treated to the most spectacular rainbows ever – they stretched completely across the sky and were amazingly vibrant. You could actually see them on the ground and we were looking at the countryside through a prism. Rainbow cows, sheep, farmhouses and construction equipment – it was truly lovely.

August 4, 2008
Well, everything cannot work out as planned and this morning certainly didn’t. We hoped to take a glass-bottomed boat ride around Goat Island. Goat Island was one of the first marine reserves in NZ. The visibility is supposed to be up to 10 meters in ideal conditions and the area is home to a staggering variety of sea life. Obviously, a glass bottom boat should be fantastic here (diving or snorkeling would have been even better, but you put on a bathing suit when it is 7 or 8 degrees Celsius). Incredibly, we drove around Leigh – and every other hamlet in the area – for more than an hour and could not find the place. Its ad said, “Located near Leigh”. Somehow, that just wasn’t enough for us and after an hour we gave up – it had started to rain again anyway.
We drowned our sorrows in honey at the “Honey Centre” in Warkworth. Honey is yet another one of NZ’s big agricultural industries. Their Manuka honey is wonderfully delicious and supposedly has numerous health and medicinal benefits. We watched thousands of bees industriously labor as we feasted on honey treats – their café makes honey everything on earth and it is all divine.
The attendant shop carried a line of everything you can possibly make out of anything associated with bees and a large line of the popular “Buzzy Bee” toys and paraphernalia. They have a huge sampling table where you can compare Manuka, wildflower, clover and Rewarewa honey.
After this it was off to Auckland, where we must clean up the “Beast” and generally begin to pull ourselves together for our return.