Extremestown

I didn't have a chance to wrap up NZ properly while we were in the Cooks.  I was super busy with snorkeling, scootering, and trying out various sarong tying methods.  But I'd be remiss if I didn't include a little ditty on Queenstown, which is one of the most picturesque cities we've visited on this trip.

Queenstown is made for tourists.  Extreme tourists.  I imagine the expression "been there, done that, bought the tee-shirt" originated there.  There are almost endless ways to get one's adrenaline fix in Q-town, including but not limited to: bungy jumping (both the world's oldest and, separately, the world's highest), paragliding, parasailing, jet boating, downhill mountain biking, glacier climbing, heli-hiking, heli-skiing, heli-rafting, heli-biking, white water rafting, black water kayaking, canyong swinging, zip lining, skydiving, hot air ballooning, ATVing or snowmobiling.  The list continues, but it would seem that if one can jump off it, be launched over it, or ride on it in a dangerous way, someone in Queenstown has created the experience.

by choice.

Ed and I aren't the extreeemmmmeeee sorts and neither of us counts adrenaline among our vices.  But Queenstown is rad, even for those who don't want to be video taped screaming at 9.8.  We spent our week wandering the small town, drinking local wine, and hiking in the surrounding mountains.  I rented a bike for an afternoon and followed the lake trails to a nearby town.  We rode the luge and ate delicious cheese and soaked up the amazeballs autumn weather.

mountains for walking

cheese for lunch

I don't have a conclusive wrap up here.  What I do have is a petit hangover and another picture of Toby.  Fin.

Northern New Zealand is RAD!

I'm just going to say it. New Zealand is awesome.  Awesomer than Australia, in fact.  Its just a little more sophisticated, a little less blowhard, more tasteful all around.  And the Lord of the Rings scenery just keeps giving.

Most everyone we spoke to pooped all over the North island and encouraged us to head our heinies south and as quickly as possible. But I'm going to go ahead and stand up for the North Island. Auckland is a beautiful city with cool neighborhoods, every kind of Asian food solidly executed, a gorgeous harbor, and friendly people. Waiheke island, about a ½ hour ferry ride from Auckland is bougie paradise. Having a gorgeous day, we hiked all over it and ate at a fancy resto in our hikies.  People happily chatted to us about the local brew, the weather, their dogs, and which beaches to hit up.  From where I'm standing, the rep for snottiness was unfounded. 

And then there's the northern tip. We went up to Paihia expecting to spend a couple of nights and ended up staying for 5. The lady at the Sunseeker Cottages was endlessly obliging when, each morning, I waddled up to the main house clutching my CapitalOne card to play with her German shepherd and extend our stay for another night.

Besides our awesome day in Russell and sailing in the Bay of Islands, we did a fair amount of driving.  We drove to Manganui to eat famous fish and chips (worth the hype) and visited the largest living Kauri tree.  We hiked by the coast and wandered the adorable shops in Paihia. We visited the grounds where the treaty between the Maori and the colonists was signed and saw the ancient war canoes the Maori used to attack the whities. 

World famous, says so right on the sign. 

bigasstreeandme

 attaque.

The South island is amazing, but when we go back to NZ (and we will), I would be hesitant to skip the north.  It has ever so much to offer.  NZ is at the top of our list of places we want to visit again, and for longer next time. The smaller, hipper, thinner version of Australia, the Kiwis got it going on.

WWOOFin.

This is a little overdue, but I'd be remiss if I didn't include the tale of one of the most bizarre weeks we've had on this trip. At my insistence, Ed and I spent a week “working” on an organic farm 30 minutes from Dunedin on the south island of NZ.

The week we spent with our hosts, a couple in their 60's (we'll call them Ann and James) who moved from the city 20 years back to take up a back-to-nature lifestyle was 50% strange, 20% awkward, 10% fun, and 10% other. We spent an exhaustive amount of time on the Worldwide Organization of Organic Farming's website, trying to identify folks that didn't look crazy and accommodation with them that didn't look ranky janky. We did our best to vet them, but she was an absolute nutter and the cottage we stayed in was filthy, vermin infested and unheated. 

On the shelf in the "kitchen" area of the cottage.  I'm guessing expired. 

We worked about 4 hours a day in exchange for our narsty room and, actually, quite delicious board. The lady of the house fancies herself a gourmand. She's a good cook and seems to enjoy having an excuse to overeat which her WWOOFers happily provide. Our days consisted of weeding, feeding the animals, clearing brush, and prepping for the weekly farmers market. Oh, and listening to James talk about what he was going to do and then taking naps in a rocker. 

I actually quite enjoyed the work. Weeding for hours on end was hypnotic I just had one fundamental problem with the arrangement that took me a few days hurdle. The farm is horribly mismanaged and a sickening money loser. Ann has “diversified” potential earnings and now the farm raises pigs, sheep & chickens, breeds Jack Russell Terriers, grows lettuces, fruit, saffron, edible flowers & nut trees, has 25 planted acres for logging, makes beer, cultivates honey, etc., etc., etc....... As you may have guessed, none of these ventures is profitable and continually investing in Ann's new ideas has forced her to keep working past retirement age and James to talk about working and also to take out a reverse mortgage on their home.

James is a certified builder. He and Ann both talk about the home they've lived in for 20 years as if they moved in last month. Out of 15 generously sized rooms only 4 or 5 are inhabitable. The rest are collapsing, unfinished (no insulation), have holes in the floors or walls, or are stacked with junk. The gorgeous, 100 year old home and cottage have fallen into ruinous squalor in the hands of these two. There are rats in the walls, animal feces on the rugs, and a cluster fly infestation in the bedrooms.  She's a candidate for hoarders without a doubt.  If it were our house we'd burn it down and take the insurance money.

Perhaps I would be less critical if Ann wasn't also a giant bitch. At first, I thought they were just wacky hippy anti-establishment farmers. That was until night number two, when I got into a dinner-long argument with the lady of the house. She began to lecture us on the massive conspiracy behind Western medicine – how Dr.'s push people toward unnecessary, risky surgery because it “makes them feel clever,” that the entire medical profession is already aware of what causes cancer but doesn't want to out the truth because it would diminish profits for the industry (plastic is the cause, in case you didn't know), and that even in life-threatening situations emergency room staff should consider holistic medicine before prescribing drugs. I held my tongue for about 15 minutes before I couldn't resist the bait any longer and then the joust began. 

Lest I paint too grim a picture there were some good moments. James is a lovely, if lazy Scottsman who's company we really enjoyed. When he could get a word in or wasn't being berated by Ann for his very existence he entertained us, ran interference, and taught us dirty Scottish folk songs. He played the accordion, was handy with a chainsaw and seemed genuinely saddened when we left.

The other best part was the puppy from the most recent litter that they were looking after while the new owner was on holiday.  Toby followed us from garden to garden, played in our cottage, and could be found in my arms anytime I wasn't holding a shovel or a hoe. Only 9 weeks old, he still had that puppy head smell of melting rubber and was happy exploring the world with his puppy teeth or sleeping on my lap. 

Oh, Toby.

We also really loved our day at the farmer's market which we spent half of wandering the other stalls and sampling the merch. We bought an outstanding pinot noir from the Otago Valley that we cracked open in our cottage that afternoon and Ed became expert at lighting roaring fires from wet lumber in our freezing cottage.

Given my urge all week to put together a proper business plan for the couple, and Ed's wont to get their business online and budgeted properly I'm not sure we're cut out to be farmers. But we did learn that we can sell the crap out of anything that grows if you put us behind a farmer's market table. We also confirmed our love of puppies. Oh, and that large pigs are really quite scary. 

 So. Effing. Big.

Insert pirate joke here.

Boating in Australia and New Zealand is incredibly popular and often the best way to see the sights.  Surrounded by water, the good people of Oceania have figured out how to incorporate boats into tourism, entertainment, and daily transport.  I've always loved being on boats, and we've been super jazzed to be afloat exponentially more than usual since being down here.

Our last night in Sydney, we stayed with the Brightons in Cronulla.  Barb is the big sis of one of my besties from SU.  We went out for a sail and a dip; wine, cheese, and sunset included.  It was awesome! Only Dave had the stones to dive in from the mast. Made us want a sailboat.  And to know how to sail a sailboat.

From Auckland, we took a day trip to Waiheke island and hiked all over it, often through private property, which the locals graciously endorse.  Its beautiful and WASPy and nautically themed.  Apparently there are also white sand beaches there, but we hoofed it to the south shore where there were ruins of old boats, an equestrian club, and plenty of strangers' dogs to accost. 

After Auckland, we headed north to the Bay of Islands.  We stayed in an amazing cottage (Sunseeker Cottages in Paihia, if ever you're in the 'hood) overlooking a valley and tooled around the area for a few days.  We saw a ton of stuff and really dug it up there, so perhaps that bit merits a separate post.  One of the days, we went out on the boat pictured below for a day-long sail around the islands.  We anchored in a bay for a swim, a hike to a bluff vista, and a picnic lunch on deck. 

Once on the South Island of NZ our first itinerary item was a trip to Milford Sound.  About 4 hours from Queenstown on the windy-est roads since Pai, we took the early boat out because we'd read there would be less traffic on the water.  We basically had the joint to ourselves.  It was a quiet and nature-filled few hours as we traveled through the sound and were reunited with our old buddy, the Tasman Sea. 

We'll likely only be land lubbers for a few more days before we head to the Cook Islands, where we'll be in and on water for almost a month.  We'll be taking a break from cultural exploration and replacing visits to temples and climbing up shit with snorkeling and competitive seafood eating.  Expect scintillating tales of tan lines from the South Pacific...