Road Trip Edition

Because of a sequence of both unfortunate and fortunate events, it turned out that for the last week of Jody's travels, I was able to take a road trip. I wanted to see a few of the North Island destinations that I had missed in my five months here, and I had limited time due to my imminent move south.

There were three accomplish-able things on that list: Cathedral Cove on the Coromandel Peninsula, Mount Maunganui, and Taranaki. Below you will see the journey, as it  happened, though I will not post this blog until it is complete:

Days 1 & 2:

First stop: Cathedral Cove.

The drive to Coromandel was uneventful, and ended with a beautiful walk down to the coast where I saw the remains of what once was a field of active volcanoes. Since that time, the water level has risen and the volcanoes have been covered, leaving beautiful structures behind.

More importantly, I discovered that not only have I been in Middle Earth, but I'm in NARNIA.

When I took a boat tour around the coast, several locations were pointed out to me that featured in Prince Caspian. GUYS. I FOUND NARNIA.

It wasn't until I left Coromandel that things started getting interesting.

The car and I are playing a fun game called "guess my speed." Here's how it works: randomly, without warning, the speedometer and the rev count will suddenly fall below zero and stop working. Turning the car off and waiting does nothing - it decides when it will work. So I've learned to be thankful for my manual transmission, in that I can listen for my speeds. If I stay in third, I won't get above 50 kilometers per hour without noticing it (that's in town). If I'm in fourth, I can count on maintaining 80 kph. And after that, I trust that the windy roads will keep my 100 kph in check in fifth gear.

And then when I get comfortable, I'll look down and suddenly they're working again! For no reason in particular. The one redeeming piece is that I've found I'm a much less aggressive driver when I don't know my speed. I just follow traffic.

Day 3

I made it to Mt Maunganui in Tauranga on the evening of day two. Still on the east coast, it's got a vast beach and what is generously named a "mount." On the morning of day three, I took a hike up the mount.

The ascent was nothing as rigorous as our climb of Mt Ngauruhoe, but it got the blood pumping for a great view. Better than the view, however, was the man I met at the summit (Facebook readers, I apologize you have seen this twice).

The man who took this picture claimed that photos should be taken at an angle, because that's what life is: it's not perfectly square. We chatted for all of five minutes, but in that time he predicted that I would "marry a man of the land," and though I could live in the city, I belonged in the countryside. I hadn't told him a thing about me besides that I was from Minnesota - nothing about living or working in DC. He told me that I had a "boisterous and outgoing personality" and that I was doing it all right. It brings a smile to my face every time I think about it, and it is for moments like those that I travel.

Days 4 & 5

One of the big driving days, I took off from the Bay of Plenty and headed southwest, back to the other coast for a trip to Taranaki. I was bound for South Taranaki, where my friend Jason had recently moved after I met him in Hawke's Bay. The good news is, my speedometer worked the whole way. The bad news is, I got lost. I texted Jason to tell him I was 80 kms away, but didn't pull into his drive until 2 hours later.

When I told him that I was going to climb Mt Egmont while he was working, he laughed, telling me that it was covered in snow.

This is very true. Down near the base the track wasn't too bad, but it didn't take long for the snow to appear.  So I couldn't climb to the summit - for that I would have needed alpine equipment. But I climbed as far as I could, which was actually not as far as I could go up, but whether or not I could get back down on the ice.

I got close enough for a satisfactory view. The clouds parted for this photo and momentary appreciation, and I turned back around.

After settling back in and showering, the most exciting part of my day occurred: an earthquake. I was sitting on the couch, and suddenly just felt really wobbly. Looking up I saw the TV swaying back and forth and felt like I had vertigo - or  was really drunk. I'm pretty sure at this point there was a running monologue:

"Is this an earthquake? I think this in an earthquake! Oh my god, I'm in an earthquake!"

It lasted all of 30 seconds and I jumped on to GeoNet, where the quake was already confirmed, with an epicenter east of Seddon on the South Island. I felt it 500 kilometers north. It was a 6.9 quake, and superficial damage was scattered across Wellington. Apparently that was one of two big quakes, while small ones and aftershocks hit south of here all weekend.

Day 6

 Woke up to discover that on a clear day, it's quite obvious you can't climb to the summit without the proper gear. I took a drive along the coast and enjoyed the view before heaving a fabulous dinner and guitar show with Celine, a woman I met months ago at a dressage show.

Days 7 & 8

Took it easy for my last day and had a casual walk on the coast before settling in for an afternoon of reading. I took advantage of being in the "Bread Capital" - Manaia - and bought ciabatta bread and scones to enjoy. Jason and I finished off our last night with beer and cider after I actually put some effort in and cooked tea for us, and I was off the next morning for Raglan.

The car and I played the "guess my speed" game for awhile, and I listened to my 3 CDs on repeat until I pulled into the drive.

Post Road Trip (Today)

This morning I drove into Auckland and picked Jody up from the airport. We've been debriefing from her 5 week journey and my 5 week farm stay. It's been great having somebody else in the house again! Additionally, she came bearing gifts from America. Excuse me while I go gorge on chocolate.

A Good Cuppa

Never underestimate the power of a good cup of coffee. Now, I know coffee drinkers everywhere have been saying this since their first cup in the 6th grade. I myself started in the 10th grade, and I'm proud to admit it's habit that comes with addiction headaches if I stop. In truth, I've given it up for lengths of time, but realized that there was absolutely no point. Coffee makes my world better.

I never quite understood how true that was until I reached New Zealand.

Certainly, I had experienced it in undergrad. During undergraduate finals, I drank enough coffee to give me horrendous stomach aches while studying for 12 hours straight in the library. The 24 hour Starbucks on the first floor was both a blessing and a curse.

I also knew that without two cups of percolated Folgers in Montana, I would quickly shrink into the fetal position. Granted, those two cups came after waking up at 4:45 AM and riding for two hours to wrangle the horses. Then we could talk about the hunting season, where the alarm went off at 3:15 AM, and then there was barely enough coffee in the world to keep me going until 8 PM that night.

Back to New Zealand, where I never anticipated that coffee would be such an issue. When I first approached a cafe I went up to the counter with confidence - all I wanted was a drip coffee. It was always a relief to be standing in line at Starbucks or Caribou and know that your order would never confuse the barista. Just a simple large coffee.

The reverse happened in NZ. I was terribly confused by the fact that a drip coffee could not be obtained. It's just not available. Anywhere. So you have to choose between a short black, long black, flat white, or latte. They all cost barely under $5.00 a piece.

Obviously that's not ideal. In a country where they only put milk in coffee, I wasn't thrilled about getting a short black (essentially an Americano), but there's an exorbitant amount of steamed milk in a flat white and latte. What's a girl to do?

I turned to the alternative, and here my real troubles started. The varieties of instant coffee were beyond my wildest imagination. Unfortunately, they all have one draw back: they taste like instant coffee. The next best thing was a french press, or plunger, and it has saved my sanity.

I went through every brand of plunger coffee available, and I played with the measurements until I finally had a satisfying cup. But what really topped it off was the accoutrements. While working potatoes one of my co-workers turned to me and asked:

"I've always wanted to ask an American this: is it true that you put cream in your coffee?"

I smiled my affirmation, cocking my head to the right and escaping to my day dream of pouring half and half into a cup of black coffee.  It sealed the deal.

I found cream in the supermarket, added some skim milk, and voila: the half and half of my dreams.

Now every morning it warms my hands, makes my heart smile, and kicks my ass into gear.

The fact that I could write an entire blog post about coffee is probably sentiment enough. So here's a bit of actual information about my life:

After drinking my coffee, I meander outside into the occasional sunshine to feed the mares and fillies. In total there are twelve horses and one pony on the property, but only the pony and the stallion live indoors. My daily activities include feeding the horses, cleaning the stables, riding or lunging the stallion, and treating the ailments that all of these animals have collected. Beyond that I play my recently purchased guitar (play is a generous word), wander through the town of Raglan, walk along the beach, and play with the puppy.

While the last few weeks have been slow, I haven't minded the quiet and the calm. In a few days time I'll be packing the car up for a mini road trip (puppy included), where I'll hit a few of the North Island destinations I have yet to see.

In August a new chapter will start, when I make my way to the South Island to work on a dairy rearing calves.

In other factual news, I'm losing my best-friend-and-travel-buddy Sara, who is bound for the States in a couple weeks time. We haven't been together for the past month or so, but knowing that she's out of the country, and out of NZ cell phone range, will be saddening. Hopefully I'll be meeting up with her again in a few months when she returns, but only time will tell.

Now then, my coffee is gone and there are some hungry horses to attend! Drink on, my caffeinated comrades!

It's a Conspiracy

It’s been a little over four months since I moved to New Zealand, and now that I’ve met countless people, I feel the need to share a rather alarming observation. Now, I admit that I didn’t come upon this on my own; Sara, my best friend and travel buddy extraordinaire, stumbled into it with me, as she does most things.

Let me bring you back to the second month of our stay, when we arrived in Waipukurau. A friend, let’s call him Tommy, was driving us around one day and we were running the gamut on topics. American politics (he was proud to know we had a Congress) led to Obama, led to George W. Bush, which inevitably led to the Iraq War until we ended up on September 11^th. I find it’s not uncommon to talk about the subject with foreigners – while devastating; it’s an important part of our history. It’s one that is so personal to Americans, and yet rather disconnected from many other people.

So far we weren’t in unfamiliar territory, until Tommy said (something along the lines of): 

“What do you think of the conspiracy theory? There was so much research done, and evidence that shows that those buildings should not have fallen down.”

Yes, we’ve all heard this before. I laughed it off, Sara shot it down, and Tommy remained convinced. Then he went on to say:

“And do you really think they landed on the moon in 1969?”

I never knew I had reason to doubt it! Really. I had never thought about it, though I suspected that I knew the answer. Tommy explained how there’s no way that flag could have been waving since there’s no air on the moon, and he took issue with the supposed footprints that they left behind. He ended by saying, “Do you really believe everything the media tells you?”

Well, no. And I don’t like to think that I do, but I do like to think that I read enough different sources that I get the best information available. So I did just that. I went home and researched the 1969 moon landing, only to verify that, yes, I do still believe that Neil Armstrong was the first man on the moon. Phew, I felt much better.

I sent Tommy my evidence – he claimed that he believed me, but I think he was just trying to placate me. In any case, I moved on with my life. Literally. Now in Raglan, different people surrounded me. 

Once again it was in a car, when a woman we’ll call Maggie told me that the moon landing did not happen.

I promise I didn’t bring it up, and I didn’t mention Tommy.

I mentioned that I had researched it, and given, you know, science, I believed that it had occurred as reported. She shrugged with an air of disbelief.

About two weeks later I get a text from Sara-best-friend-travel-buddy-extraordinaire: 

“Get me out of here. Pete doesn’t believe in 9/11 or the moon landing either.”

It’s one thing to meet a conspiracy theorist. It’s another to realize they surround you. It’s almost as if in an effort to fend off spoon-fed media, they have run in the opposite direction, to find the most absurd and outlandish. Or…

Wait, it’s almost as if they get all of their news from the National Enquirer.

So at this point, I think I need to begin a survey experiment, where I go around to the Kiwi public and ask their opinion on the moon landing. And maybe any other fact I never knew I should have doubted.

But I can’t help but think there’s something else going on here... Most Kiwis doubting important American events? Convinced that the government shammed and continues to fool Americans days after day? Every country knowing it, while Americans continue to blindly trust? …What if this has always been happening, but these Kiwis were the first to let it slip to Americans?

Sounds like a conspiracy to me.

P.S. While I researched the theories, Sara pointed me to New Zealand’s space quest, which seems to have begun and ended somewhere in the pacific.

Kiwi Rocket Scares Sheep, Reaches Space

Yes, you read that link correctly. As the article states,

“As the noise of the blastoff sent sheep running, the 18-foot rocket raced into the sky, reaching beyond […] 62 miles above the Earth’s surface, which is traditionally considered the dividing altitude between the upper atmosphere and real space.”

Good on them.

((To any and all Kiwi's in the audience, particularly those mentioned in this blog, I come in peace! But I really don't believe in these particular conspiracies.))