Archive for February, 2009
Taupo – New Zealand
Greetings,
We find ourselves in Taupo now, having driven a short ways from Rotorua this morning.
This batch of images contains some colour (per request). The building with the red roof is an Edwardian bath house (now the museum of Rotorua). You can tour the grounds, a bit of the roof and even some of the ancient piping underneath. It was used as one of the first tourist attractions of its day in all of New Zealand calling Edwardian men and ladies to its baths for various restorative and aesthetic benefits. The pic of refracted light comes from within the roof of the structure.
Most of Rotorua is dotted with steaming vents from active and sulfurous holes. These extend to any property, be it public or private, and it is not unusual to see whitened rocks and steam issuing from the backyard of tiny wooden bungalows hither and yon. Those familiar with sulfurous vents and their issuance, will appreciate my inability to transfer their odorous delights to the reader…
Many forests are planted in NZ. Its possible to view ranges on ranges of high hills – mountains almost – all looking as though they’ve had their locks combed; like some slumbering giant with only its head cresting the soil, but having been coifed before sleep. I understand that pines and other introduced species here grown incredibly fast, and that many of the planted forests we’ve observed have actually already been harvested once or twice following initial reforestation.
Its late and I have an eight-hour hike tomorrow across the shoulder of a volcano. Must get in some rest for *that*.
Hello all, from Thames
We find ourselves back in Thames, New Zealand. We’ve spent the better part of a week in a bach (‘batch’, or cottage) at Hot Water beach. Can’t remember if I wrote of it before… However, there are some spots on the beach near some rocks where thermal undercurrents under the sand heat up water flowing through it, so you can dig a shallow pool for two or three people to relax in. Some areas have water well up[ in these pools that is scaldingly hot and certainly to be avoided (!). But a lovely thing to try anyway. We took the kids out a few days ago for a pony ride through the countryside. Carrie and I were given the leads for two small ponies and vaguely given some directions to walk through some fields and a bit of forest, and then waved off by the proprietor. All over NZ we've encountered situations in which you are assumed to know what you're getting into and given the rein to do so (no pun that day, included). Quite refreshing really, given the range of often insane precautions we Canadians put before ourselves back home in all walks of life. We walked down to Caledral Cove yesterday and had a wonderful swim in the surf. We sat on a tiny narrow-gauge railway line and tootled around like the tourists we are, through some forest and up a hill, but had a grand time.
In a day or two we are off south a bit (still North Island), in a loop to Waitomo (where we'll see glow worms in a cave), then Lake Taupo (where I hope to do the Tongarirto Alpine crossing hike), then over to Rotorua (where there's some other tourist stuff like mud pools and such), and wind uo back in Auckland seven days from now.
Carrie is rightfully anxious to post to her blog. Its been tricky getting images up in her blog, but we'll give it a real shot today.
Here are some more images from recent travels:
Pahia – New Zealand
Ok. First thing: I had always wondered where ‘Old Zealand’ was before coming down here. Turns out it was named by Abel Tasman (of Tasmania fame), who was Dutch. ‘Zee Land’ means something close to ‘Sea Land’, and as t was new to him at the time, he added ‘New’ to the front of the name. Thus, New Zealand (‘Zea-’ being an English morph of the Dutch word for ’sea’).
Its been a real eye-opener to find ourselves to Internet-free down here. Its made me realize that our lives back home (and perhaps Canada as a whole, by extension), are so hugely facilitated by ‘net access pretty much anywhere we go. Not so here. There’s WiFi in the hotel I’m writing this from, for example, but not in our room. Instead I am seated on two not-so-comfy chairs in the ‘conference centre’, in the dark.
We were able to post last from Jennifer’s office in Auckland, but was, like, a million years ago already. We’ve seen a bunch of stuff: camped at a beautiful spot at the very northern end of the North Island (Taputoputo), walked some hills above a glorious sea, played in some beautiful black sand, driven some intensely-stomach-churning forest roads, and so on.
We’re on our way back down south now to Auckland for a night before heading up the Coromandel coast to a ‘bach’ (“batch”), which is a rented cabin on a beach there called Hotwater beach. The riptides are such there that we won’t be doing and swimming, but the kids have been excited about digging warm sand holes in the beach since long before leaving home.
Carrie, Jen and Owen are keen to get on here and make their own posts or check email, so I’ll sign off now and post a few images from the days so far.
Auckland, Day 2
Ultra quick post.
We arrived yesterday at 0600 and went back to Jen’s place where we lounged, met Mag (who is wonderful), and then trundled off to Karekare beach. Those familiar with the film “The Piano” will know the place, as it was filmed there. Beautiful and somewhat rugged. We head off on a road trip next week and hope to see more rugged stuff
