Saturday, Feb. 24, 2007

After FINALLY getting my new passport on Thursday afternoon, my people took me to JFK airport on Saturday afternoon, where I met my friend and traveling companion, Leah. (We used to work together, back in 2000 and '01, and then for a few years after that, Leah was roommates in NYC with our other former coworker Jen, who we're about to visit in New Zealand, until Jen married Paul and they headed out to NZ in 2005. OK, now you're up to speed in case you don't know who any of these people are.)

Once at LAX we changed terminals and arrived in what seemed like another country. The international terminal, which seemed to mainly serve people headed to Australia, New Zealand and China, was just about the most backwards thing I have ever seen and I can't believe it was actually in the U.S. Long story short: the guy at the Air Pacific counter told us to make sure that after we brought all our checked baggage over to the X-ray screeners (note that we needed to do this task ourselves), we watch to make sure the airport guys bring it back to Air Pacific ("Fiji's International Airline") to make sure it "doesn't go to China" (presumably to China Airways, the other major carrier in that area of the terminal).

Things got much better once we got on our Air Pacific flight. The female staff are all wearing flowers in their hair and they're playing relaxing, tropical Fijian music. There are plenty of empty seats to allow everyone to spread out, there are options for TV and movies on the little screen in front of me, and they are serving a delicious hot meal and are offering free glasses of wine.

This is going to be a good trip.

Sunday, Feb. 25, 2007

Today only lasted a few hours. As we began the day on a plane someplace over the Pacific Ocean, about an hour or two later we passed over the International Date Line and then it became Monday morning. Leah slept through most of the day, and I wasted the whole day watching a horrible movie ("Scoop." I wanted so much to like it but was so disappointed). Also, this means both of us completely missed our friend Dulce's birthday. (Hope it was a good one!!) Not often can you use this excuse for why your birthday card arrived late.

Monday, Feb. 26, 2007

5:15 a.m. local time, Nadi, Fiji
We're in Fiji! OK, only for a couple of hours as we change planes. But, still. I never thought i'd be in Fiji. I almost didn't believe it was a real place.

When we got off the plane we were serenaded by these three guys playing more Fijian music. It's not enough to distract me from the fact that it's hot and humid. You know how people justify high temperatures in places like Arizona by saying "It's a dry heat"? Well, in Fiji, it's a wet heat.

Also, men wear skirts here. I think it helps with the heat.

2:25 p.m., Auckland International Airport, NZ.
We arrived! Changed some money, looked at a newspaper, and waited until our little flight to Napier, where our friend Jen lives. Since much of New Zealand is mountainous and time-consuming to drive (they don't have many highways here) Air New Zealand operates regular (and inexpensive!) flights between the major and not-so-major cities.

The exchange rate is pretty favorable for us; it's been described for me as being like "everything's on sale!" Basically, it's like everything costs 30 percent less than it says, but the prices in NZ dollars look a tad expensive, so all in all it comes out about the same.

6 p.m., Napier, NZ
We arrive at the Napier airport and are SO EXCITED to see Jen! Also, it's hot. Since NZ is in the southern hemisphere, it's summer. And we have arrived in "always sunny" Hawke's Bay.

Jen takes us to their house, which is up a BIG hill and is so cute. They have a view of a bay (not Hawke's Bay but another, little one) from the front of the house and some mountains from the back. Jen has also made some great discoveries in the garden at the back of the house, where a previous owner planted all kinds of fun things, and she's doing a great job of improving upon the situation.

We eat a fantastic, fresh dinner, sample some of Hawke's Bay's finest wines (did i mention that Jen works at a winery?) and spend time catching up. A great day was had by all.

Tuesday, Feb. 27, 2007

Napier is known for its vast amount of Art Deco architecture. The area was hit by a huge earthquake in 1930 and when they rebuilt, they decided to do it in the grand style of the time (I learned, at the Hawke's Bay Museum, that they took the idea in part from Santa Barbara, Calif., which had a big quake in 1925 and rebuilt in the hot style of the time). The city revels in its reputation, with a big Art Deco fest that was held just a few weeks before we arrived.


Today Jen had to work, so Leah and I entertained ourselves for the day by exploring the town on foot. I took a ton of photos this day, both of the Art Deco-ness, the flowers (there are a lot of beautiful flowers, and i'm really enjoying using the macro lens-ish feature on my new camera to take close-ups) and the beach (the sand soaked into the ground during the quake and so the beach is covered in pebbles instead. Jen says they say that it will be 100 years before the beach turns to sand again).

In the evening, Jen's friend Lauren from college and Lauren's cousin, also named Jen arrived from the South Island. Hailing from the Chicago area, they've been in NZ for a week. We'll all be together till Sunday. We have yet another fabulous meal, do some more visiting and catching up, and drink some more wine.

I think I am going to retire here.

Wednesday, Feb. 28, 2007

Did I mention that Jen works at a winery?

Today me, Leah, Lauren and the other Jen headed out on a Hawke's Bay wine tour. We spent the day checking out some of the local wineries and are going to wrap up the day with a visit to Jen at workat the end of the day.





We ended up tasting at four wineries and buying at those same four wineries. We ate lunch at one winery, and then got a tour at Jen's, which was very cool because it's definitely the best-looking one, both in terms of landscape and architecture, I thought. And of course the best-tasting.

Dinner was an official Kiwi barbecue (NO, not a meal consisting of the flightless national bird, but "kiwi" as a descriptive term for the people and culture of New Zealand. I am told that we should not be disappointed if we leave NZ having not seen a kiwi, since they are nocturnal and are rarely seen outside of captivity.).

Anyway, they do a lot of BBQing here. Pretty much, grilled meat is a major staple of the NZ diet. In preparation for the dinner, where we got to meet two of Jen and Paul's friends, a delightful couple, we went to the supermarket. There we had fun checking out the local culture and spent an inordinate amount of time in the candy aisle.


We were pleased to see -- and buy -- our new favorite vegetable, one that the four of us American visitors are vowing to eat every day that we are in NZ. It's called kumara and they tell us it's basically a sweet potato but it's much better than what we're accustomed to. It's less sweet, with a purple skin and pale flesh. My new plan for when I return home is to go into business as New England's first kumara farmer. And if there already is one, I will be their best customer.

Thursday, March 1, 2007

Today we woke up, organized who bought what wine yesterday, said goodbye to Jen's husband Paul and headed out for a girls' weekend at the beach. But first we're stopping for the night at Rotorua, a place that is considered one of the "1,001 Places To See Before You Die," according to the page-a-day-calendar page sent to me by one of my co-workers recently.

It is also one of the stinkiest places on earth, owing to the sulfur-rich lake in its midst. You know how they tell you that if you smell rotten eggs it means there's a gas leak, because they add the rotten-egg smell to the gas? Well, they must add pleasant-fresh-air-smell to the gas lines around here.

But first, we made a couple of stops. Our first stop was a brief lunch break at Lake Taupo, where we experienced one of my favorite bits of Kiwiana: the tomato-shaped plastic squeeze bottle of ketchup ("tomato sauce") on the table at the restaurant. Next up we stopped at Huka Falls, a waterway used to power a hydroelectric plant (and YES, the water really is this color. the melted-glacier water mixes with the fine gray dust of ground-up rocks, called "glacial flour," and because there is no topsoil mixed in, the resulting color is this awesome aqua.). This was a free -- no cost -- attraction. I think if it were in the U.S. they'd charge admission.

Next up was Craters of the Moon, one of the many semi-volcanic attractions. This only cost $5 to get into and was worth every penny. Apparently because this area of New Zealand is unusually close to the heated innards of the earth, signs of the toasty interior occasionally make their presence known, in the form of steamy bursts of superhot air. Sometimes the earth collapses inward, too ("craters"). So they have helpfully created a raised wooden walkway through the park where it is safe to tread -- but we were warned to make sure we keep to the path and not veer off because the superheated areas can singe away the plant life on the surface and make it look just like a manmade path. Yikes. There are also curious-looking plants that apparently thrive in these kind of conditions. Many of them looked like cacti, or kind of even like seaweed.

This was also the first (well, the second if you count our day spent exploring Napier on foot) of what was to be many more days of intense walking and/or hiking ("tramping," as the Kiwis say) on this trip. Intense by my standards, but not as intense as the three-or-more day NZ hikes that are so popular youhave to reserve a spot a year or more in advance. That's for my next trip!

After Craters of the Moon we stopped at this place "only the Kiwis know," Kerosene Creek, which, like Huka Falls, is FREE to visit. It's a hot spring. You walk down this trail and find yourself a nice spot among the trees and jumnp in. Just like a hot tub only there are minerals in the water so you end up with a find kind of rusty dust on your skin afterwards.

And so we were off to Rotorua. Once there (your nose gets used to the smell after a while and you don't really notice it anymore), we had dinner at this fun English-pub type place in an old police station.

Which brings me to another of the fabulous Kiwi ideas I think we ought to implement in the U.S.: Restaurants. A lot of places work like this: you order your food at a counter or at the bar, pay for it, then they give you a number on a stick (those things they put on tables at banquet halls to tell you what table you're at) and note your number. Then, when your food is ready, they bring it to you. There is no tipping. (I mentioned to a friendly bartender later on the trip how this no-tipping thing makes me vaguely uncomfortable, as an American who totes a tipping-cheat-sheet card in her wallet should a tipping need arise. He replied that people leaving tips made him kind of uncomfortable. So there.) Anyway, every restaurant keeps a handy supply of clean glasses and pitchers (or a faucet) of ice-cold water at the ready for anyone who wants it. I think this is linked to tipping in the U.S. because here, your waitperson's percentage of tip is often directly connected to their attentiveness to your water glass. So by taking away the tipping they also leave you in charge of your own water supply -- but therefore you always have enough water. I mean, how many times have you been totally thirsty but you have to waste a waitperson's time to get you a fresh beverage? Now, I'm an unusually thirsty person, but this has happened to me twice this week already. I'm just saying.

Friday, March 2, 2007

After a harrowing drive through the mountains (we'll get used to this, though, by the end of the trip) we arrive in the Coromandel.

It's beautiful here! Jen has hooked us up with a bach (pronounced "batch," it's the Kiwi term for a beach cottage.) but this is sooo much more than I had expected. This is going to be the best birthday ever! This place is amazing. It's up a huge hill and consists of three floors of living space but it has an amazing view of the water from every room. When we first arrive we're like "Oh my God, this is awesome." The down side is, Jen's car is having some problems, but once she brings it to spend the weekend at a local repair shop and there's nothing we can do about it in the meantime, I think the awesomeness of the bach helps us all stop worrying about it for a while.

We settled in with some wine and cheese on the porch for a nice leisurely night of chatting, BBQing (of course there's a grill, it's like the national cooking surface) and enjoying the view.

This is going to be the best birthday ever.

Saturday, March 3, 2007

This is the best birthday ever.

I woke up, and while the Jens and Lauren went out to check out the neighborhood and Leah slept in a bit, I settled in with some breakfast and some tea, painted my nails, and set about figuring out how the TV works. As it turns out, we have Sky TV, which is a dish service, and we have all the channels. Ahh. This is, as one of my friends pointed out when I returned home, "a perfect Erin King day."

It only got better when we went to check out Cathedral Cove. It required some doing to get there (a 40-minute walk, both uphill and downhill) but it was worth it. I don't think we all realized what it was going to be but it was awesome once we were there. There was even a couple having their wedding photos there -- which made me think later on, "um, was there a shortcut that we could have taken?" Because if that girl traipsed down the same way we came with a long dress on she deserves some kind of special award.

We spent a good amount of time there (and a good amount of time getting back up -- it would have been easier had I remembered to bring a bottle of water with me -- again, i'm a very thirsty person!) After that we went back to the bach, relaxed and plotted our next move.

To top off my perfect day, we had fried food for dinner. There's not much in this town, but of course there's a fish and chips spot. The fish and chips were delicious, but the absolute best part was the mussels. They have these awesome mussels in NZ and they get even better once they've been fried. They also have this curious thing called a "crab stick." I'm pretty sure it's just imitation crab meat chopped up and formed into a stick, covered in bread crumbs and fried. Kind of like a fish stick, but pinkish orange inside. It's a little weird, but not altogether bad. And we had some pizza, with some curious toppings but pretty tasty.

The moon was still pretty full from the night before so I was able to get some amazing photos from the porch. I learned when I got home that there was a lunar eclipse that day, but -- how interesting -- New Zealand was the only major temperate land mass where it could not be seen. (basically it was just NZ and Antarctica where it was not visible from at least some small portion of the land mass.) Once I returned home I realized that very often, when you see a map of the world used for some non-map purpose (like in ads, or on commercials, or something) they totally leave New Zealand off. I wonder if the Kiwis get offended by that.

Sunday, March 4, 2007

Today we experienced another of NZ's volcanic attractions: Hot Water Beach. Here's how it works: You wait till low tide, grab a shovel, head to the beach, dig yourself a big hole near the water's edge and voila! Your very own natural spa. It works because, again, the hot melty innards of the earth are a little closer to the surface there.

Well, OK ... first of all, everybody was very impatient and had already started digging when we got there, nearly two hours before the lowest of low tide. So we dug in, too, until we realized it wasn't going to get any hotter, and took a break till the water receded some more. Wouldn't you know it, though, as we retreated to our towels to relax a while, every johnny-come-lately would walk up to our hole, stand in it for a minute, and nod their heads to their friends as if to say "No, this one's not hot either." Dude, there's about a hundred holes with no people in them, and about two hundred people here -- did you really think we all had too good a time relaxing in our hand-dug spas that we gave them up for you to use? One older guy with too-skimpy swim togs (they call them "togs" there) even took our shovel and started digging himself his own hole.

What we figured out was that the part that gets real hot is pretty far out. When we were standing in water halfway up our legs and our feet started sinking in to the sand it would get really hot on your feet. Like, super hot. By the time we figured that out we had bored of the hot water beach and headed back to the bach to eat, relax and pack up.

We left Jen around 5:30 -- she needed to stay there by herself another night to wait for her car to be ready Monday -- and headed to Auckland.

I don't think I've talked about the roads in New Zealand yet. Ah, the roads. They drive on "the other side," all the roads are two-lane roads with perpetual passing zones, and because there are lots and lots of mountains to drive up and over, they tell you what your recommended speed should be on every curve. We even saw some that said 15. That's 15 kilometers per hour. Or, basically, "go very, very slow around this curve."

(The last big road trip I went on was also with Leah, when we went to California for Dulce's wedding in Big Sur and drove a big chunk of the Pacific Coast Highway. They also have a Pacific Coast Highway in New Zealand, and it's actually a lot like the one in California, only even more treacherous, and with the ocean on the other side. We joked that we'll only travel with each other if there's a Pacific Coast Highway nearby.)

Another thing about the roads is one of the great New Zealand ideas: one-lane bridges. They obviously use less steel and other materials, and if the road is not a highly-traveled one, it seems a good solution. They have these road signs with two arrows pointing in opposing directions, and if the arrow representing your direction of travel is highlighted, it means you have the right of way and the other guy has to wait till you complete your bridge passage.

The four of us had dinner outdoors at a nice restaurant in Auckland's waterfront area, ordered a bottle of Craggy Range and toasted Jen and her hospitality, and the good fortune we all have to have a good friend living in New Zealand. Cheers!

Monday, March 5, 2007

Today begins the second half of our trip. We said good-bye to Lauren and Jen last night and today we have some time before we're due at the Auckland airport for our flight down to Christchurch, on the South Island.

Auckland is a pretty nice city -- really, it looks a lot like Providence because it seems very new and there's a strong connection to the waterfront (because, like Providence, it looks like they just recently figured out how to harness the city's proximity to the water for urban-renewal purposes).

It's a beautiful summer day and the weather is perfect. We are really lucking out on this trip, in terms of weather (and will continue to; the only rain we end up encountering is as we pass through an actual rain forest on the South Island a few days later). We do a little touristy shopping (I bought most of my souvenirs this day, including a plastic tomato-shaped ketchup bottle for myself, at this souvenir shop called "From N to Z") and enjoy the day. Did I mention they pronounce the letter "z" as "zed" there? So European.

We get to the airport early, have a really great bowl of noodles and a pint or two while we wait. In NZ, the frequent Air New Zealand flights between cities operate much like if you were taking a train between say, New York and Philadelphia here. And it's really inexpensive.

We get to Christchurch, rent our car (a nice big Mitsubishi that I don't think they have in the US, which we'll have all week, drive all over the South Island and ends up being only US$300) and get to our hotel around 10 p.m. Christchurch looks like a nice city, but we won't have time to explore it till we return on Saturday. Tomorrow morning we going to be off bright and early for a long drive to the west coast in order to make our 2 p.m. glacier tour.

Tuesday, March 6, 2007

Did somebody say "bright and early?!"

We left Christchurch before the sun rose and saw another beautiful day arrive. The drive across the island is long and lonely, and in the middle it gets pretty intensely mountainous. We get to the west coast around lunchtime and keep going till we get to Fox Glacier, which apparently is the town's name as well as the big chunk of ice.

You know you're heading out on an adventure when you have to wear rented boots AND socks. I can't say I've ever worn rented socks before, but I enthusiastically pull on two pairs of the thick, green wool things because they don't have any half-size boots. I am starting to worry about how my back is doing. I have been doing my physical therapy exercises pretty religiously on this trip so I hope i'll be OK (for those of you who haven't been avidly following my health and wellness, I had a flare-up of my herniated disc back in mid-January and had to have another round of physical therapy. Good times.)

They also give us these metal cleat things we'll need to strap on to our feet when we climb on the glacier itself (called "crampons," they simultaneously sound like something you might need at that-time-of-the-month and look like something you'd want to injure someone with if they piss you off during that-time-of-the-month).

We take an antique bus up to the glacier's entrance and are told we have a 40-minute hike up 500 stairs in order to get to where we'll walk out onto the glacier, which looks like a big dirty, icy hill. There are some terrifying warning signs: "No stopping next 300 meters" -- what the heck does 300 meters look like?!! -- and one for the non-English speakers, with a stick figure falling off a mountain. Yikes. The hike up is not bad; somehow I even end up either second in line or right behind the tour guide at times. I vow to keep in shape once I return home and take up hiking as a hobby this summer (I'll let you all know how that goes).

Once we get up the the glacier proper it is cooler than on the ground below, and it starts to rain. The glacier is apparently near or actually in the rainforest, so this isn't unusual. It's pretty amazing -- I can't believe I'm walking on a glacier. I won't bore you with all the sciencey and historical things (the glacier was "that high" in 1760, over there is where people would climb on to it and have picnics in the 1920s) but suffice it to say, it was very cool (ha! pun intended!) .

We head back to terra firma, hand in our crampons, socks and boots and have a little graduation ceremony of sorts where we get a certificate of glacier-walking completion and shake hands with our guides.

Then we drive back to the town just outside the "other local glacier" (yes, there are two glaciers, and yes, we chose Fox Glacier because they had hilarious marketing materials that compared their tour's superb features to those of "other local glacier") where our hotel, called the Rainforest Retreat, is located. We eat dinner at "local pub" called Monsoon: "It Rains, We Pour." And yes, it's still raining.

Wednesday, March 7, 2007

We awoke this morning in the rainforest -- I got up early and had some nice quiet time on the patio outside, drinking tea and watching the hung-over American college students across the driveway trying to load their stuff onto their bus -- and headed out to our next stop, Lake Wanaka. Everybody in the know told us to stay there instead of Queenstown because it's "less touristy."

On the way we get to experience every kind of landscape and weather: rain, a national park with awesome waterfalls, an arid-looking area that looked like the American West, and tons of cows and sheep. Then we came to this amazing-looking body of water, and it turned out to be the northern end of Lake Wanaka. So aqua and really cool-looking. My photos don't really capture the color as amazing as it was. then we encounter another lake, and the town. It seems really fun, and our hotel is super great. We have been reserving all our hotels using these two Web sites devoted to last-minute hotel rooms. The prices all end up being about the same but the rooms vary in quality and amenities (but all of them have a kettle for boiling tea water! I love this country.). This hotel is the best. It even has a spa and very cool pool area that we can go to.

We head out and explore the town, spending happy hour sitting at a picnic table at a lakeside pub until supper time. We end up eating dinner at this Irish pub (and compare notes on our respective trips to Ireland) and getting more awesome fish and chips. I love these fried mussels.

We find a phone and call Jen to check in about her car. Sounds like she ended up spending the whole day up at the bach before it was ready and she could head home. Then we go back to the hotel and check out the spa to soak our old, tired bones. We're really feeling the glacier hike today. The outdoor pool and spa give us a chance to check out the Southern Hemisphere sky; not only are there way, way more stars than I've ever seen, but they definitely seem different from home. I should have prepared myself before we got here. I think I spot the Southern Cross but I am surprised to see the familiar constellation Orion. Note to self: look this stuff up online when I get home.

Thursday, March 8, 2007

Today I woke up early and sat on our lovely patio and caught up on my travel journal. Unfortunately I forgot what day it was so I had to turn on my cell phone to tell me what day it is. (I can't figure out how to make the phone work, but I think it might have; when I first got to NZ I turned it on because I was curious and immediately got a "Welcome to New Zealand!" text message containing instructions on how to call home. It didn't work. The only call I was able to make was to a NZ operator who couldn't figure it out either. Oh well, it probably would have been very expensive. But I did turn it on periodically throughout the trip and suddenly, on my birthday, it told me I had two voice mails, with that little envelope icon taunting me, that I couldn't retrieve. They ended up being happy birthday messages. How sweet.)

Anyway, what a vacation, that I need the satellite-fed date feature on my cell phone to tell me what day it is! We eat breakfast at the hotel restaurant and encounter something that gives us weird vibes: the waitress picked up a huge pile of plates and, as if in slow motion, dropped them all right next to me as I waited for my toast to come out of the industrial-grade cafeteria-style toaster. This happens to be the fourth or fifth time on this trip that someone has dumped a huge load of dishes or the like somewhere right near us. It's very weird. I can't figure it out but I suspect it has something to do with the society's lack of tipping. Like, people are less cautious because they don't need to earn tips. I should ask the Freakonomics guys about this.

After breakfast we head out of Wanaka on our way to Queenstown, but first stop at "Mount Iron" for -- what else? -- a wee hike. It's pretty steep but makes us feel good. There's a pretty cool view at the top. It also gives each of us a chance to actually use the new hiking shoes each of us got in preparation for this trip, since we had to wear the rented boots on the glacier.

It doesn't take long to get to Queenstown. Along the way we make a pit stop for a photo op at "the highest sealed road in New Zealand," which was first "sealed" -- paved -- in 2000. The way down is where we see some of those 15-km max speed warning signs. Yikes. Did I mention that their lanes are much, much narrower there than here, too? Uneasy drivers need not apply. I can't imagine what this trip would have been like eight years ago.

Queenstown turns out to be a pretty cool town! It's a pretty small city -- we make quick work of mastering its layout -- but it provides ample eateries and places to sit by the water and chill. It's also a pretty adventuresome city, with this thing where people can jump off the mountain while hanging from some kind of parachutey thing (uh, forgive me for not knowing what it's called, this is sooo not my thing). It's also really close to the first bungy-jumping site, a bridge marked as an important site with the classically Kiwi signage alerting drivers that nearby is a "Historic Plaque." They never tell you what the attraction is, they just say "Historic Plaque" with an arrow and you're supposed to either know what it is, or step on the brakes and check it out. At least this one, we knew what it was, so we were ready.

Anyway, I'm glad we have two days in Queenstown because it seems pretty cool. Tonight we do a very Rachael Ray type thing and eat a small, inexpensive pre-dinner meal around 3 p.m. at this super-cute seafood shack right by the lake. I have some steamed mussels and a faux Diet Coke (it's a cola, it says, with "Real American Taste") and Leah has some steamed prawns. Here, they leave the heads on the shrimp, eyeballs and all. Good times.

A friendly guy with a cute puppy talks to us. Then we walk over to the "beach" (it's really just rocks) and we sit for a while. Then we walk around some more and contemplate either drinking or eating again. We choose drinking, and sit at an outdoor pub and people-watch. We watch as this one talkative guy at a table with his friends greets and hugs pretty much every girl that walks by. He's like the mayor of this street. Then we walk around some more. I think about buying things. I don't. Then we think about eating and eventually settle on a real seafood place right next to the lake. I eat more mussels.

The best thing about vacation is definitely the eating, and a close second is all the walking to combat the ill effects of all the eating.

Friday, March 9, 2007

It's another bright-and-early-day in New Zealand. Today we're catching a bus to Milford Sound, part of the Fjordland National Park. Fjords: they're not just for Scandinavia anymore.

The bus ride is going to be about four hours long but we've got a pit stop for breakfast about halfway through and our bus driver-slash-tour guide, Keith, is hilarious and very informative. For instance, did you know that a lot of the world's car commercials are filmed in New Zealand? No? He tells us that a lot of times you'll see hot new cars around there that have the steering wheel on the "wrong" side. He said one of the most recent ones was a Buick commercial, and, as I write this at home in May, I think I've seen it.

We stop at a few more pit stops for photos once we're in the park itself before arriving at the Milford Sound tour boat depot. At one of the stops, we can even fill up our water bottles with freshly melted glacier water that we can drink. I drink some of it and then start to worry about parasites so I figure I'll save it and make my tea with it tomorrow morning when it can be properly boiled. I guess I am not really a nature person.

When we get to the boat loading area we see this very cool looking mountain. We are told it's called Mitre Peak and -- guess what? -- it's the photo on the front of my NZ travel guide! I think that says something about the comprehensiveness of our trip. I have my picture taken with the mountain as a souvenir. I am finding that the photos I am taking are going to be my primary souvenirs. They better be, since I end up with 800 photos because of my super-huge memory card.

We get back to Queenstown with plenty of time for more eats. We eat, walk around some more, have a pint in another Irish pub (what is it with these people and Irish pubs? They're all over the place) and skip the bus up to our hotel and decide to walk. Whew. It was a lot higher up the hill than I thought.

Saturday, March 10, 2007

I can't believe we leave tomorrow!

We had a pleasant drive back to Christchurch -- it was long but pleasant and we had a nice chance to chat and reflect on our trip and what we have ahead of us when each of us returns home. We didn't encounter any "sheep jams" as we drove through the Canterbury region, and I was secretly disappointed. Sheep jams are when all the sheep are walking in the road in your way. You're supposed to keep driving very slowly -- don't stop, everyone said, because then they will stop too and you'll be screwed. But alas, no sheep jams.

We also saw one of the most amazing things that we hadn't even expected to see: Mount Cook. It's at the head of this crazy aqua lake, another one of those with the topsoil-free water that is used for hydroelectric power. THE WATER IS REALLY THIS COLOR.

We got to Christchurch in plenty of time for -- what else? -- more walking around before dinner. One of the more amazing things we saw was a sculpture put in place for the October 2002 World Firefighters Games. It features pieces of rust-colored beams from the wreckage of the World Trade Center that were given to the city of Christchurch by the City of New York. It was really something. You could touch them. One of the beams, a plaque read, shot down through the building and pierced the subway platform far below. Some of the girders have spray-painted numbers on them that, I wonder, if they are from when they were building it 40 years ago. Imagine the steelworker who sprayed those numbers on there, never thinking anyone would ever see those numbers again in his lifetime. It was awe-inspiring and very sad and very moving and everything.

The city is very beautiful and very English. Except for the Chinese Lantern Festival being held that weekend in one of the parks. We walked around for quite some time before settling on a place to eat, a very cute restaurant within a former college that's been turned into an arts center, where we ate outside and each ordered some avant-garde ravioli. We've encountered some very inventive cuisine here in New Zealand; I'm very impressed. Unfortunately we struck out on finding a place with the much-hyped Bluff oysters, which had just come into season and were all the rage in Auckland.

Then, as we were wrapping up the day -- and hence our trip -- looking for one last place to grab dessert or one more drink, we spotted it: A chalkboard sign outside a forlorn-looking Italian restaurant. "Bluff Oysters." What a find. We went in and ordered just the oysters, which arrived lovely and perfect and cold. As Rachael Ray might say (and, sadly, as I caught myself saying throughout the trip): "de-lish."

Our last walk back to the hotel in the summer night breeze brought us past a bush of yellow roses. We stopped, and smelled them, before heading into the room to pack our suitcases one last time.

Sunday, March 11, 2007: the first time around

This is going to be the longest day of my life.

I eat my first meal of the day at the hotel restaurant, where we have coupons for free continental breakfast. There is a ton of food to eat, which we do. We'll need the energy for all the traveling. After packing up the car, we head to the airport, making a pit stop to fill up the tank along the way. We ended up filling the car's gas tank four times during the week, each fill-up costing about NZ$60 or $70, which turns out to be about $40 or $50 in our dollars when I get my credit card bill back at home. So gas was definitely more expensive there but not prohibitively so. That's the moral of this trip: Just because New Zealand is far away doesn't mean it is expensive. I found the whole trip pretty affordable, and that means a lot because I don't have a lot.

We check in our bags (phew! they don't weigh too much!) and set about spending the last of our New Zealand dollars. We sit down for one last flat white -- a very Kiwi coffee drink, it's basically a cappuccino but slightly different, and better. They serve it in a cup with some of the top foam mixed in with the coffee to form a design. Usually it looks like an apple or a rear end, depending on your perspective. But the cups we get at the airport look like hearts! Yes, New Zealand, we heart you too.

Off to Fiji!

When we get there, my hair immediately indicates that it is still humid in Fiji. We have just over six hours to fill so we get some advice from the travel expert lady in the airport and she sends us to the Sheraton. For just $44 Fiji dollars our cab driver will wait for us while we go in for an hour or two, sit by the water or the pool, and then head back in time for our long flight to L.A. The cab drive is about 20 minutes long and feels sketchy -- especially when the guy pulls into this closed convenience store-type thing, knocks on the door and hands someone something -- but then we get to the resort.

It's about six or eight familiar-name resorts, golf courses, and all the stuff for the wealthy foreign tourists, all off the same driveway. We walk into the hotel and see the beach. It's amazing. I've never been in a tropical vacation place, never mind somewhere like Fiji!! We sit at the outdoor bar, get some sort of frothy drinks (mine is green and has a pineapple and a cherry on a stick) and relax.

Then, the best part: the sun starts to set. I never thought I'd get to see the sunset in Fiji! We take photos and I, appropriately, reach the end of my camera's memory card. I also receive about 20 mosquito bites that are sure to be irritating on the long, long, long flights home.

But, nevertheless, this has been such an amazing trip!

Sunday, March 11, 2007: the second time around

The day wanes, then returns somewhere over the Pacific.

I don't sleep well on the plane, mostly because there are many things to watch on the little TV. I end up watching four movies (all of them better than "Scoop" on the way over two weeks ago), and do get some sleep. The trip, though, doesn't feel as long as it actually is. Neither of the flights are as bad as I thought they would be.

But wait, there's more.

Long story short: we get to LAX (remember, I had already vowed not to return there, since I felt our outgoing experience was so bad), Leah's bag is too heavy for the gang at United despite the fact that we were traveling internationally, and they make her try and repack it using a second bag she brought. The guy -- NOT an actual airline employee, there is only one of them and she is clearly overworked; this guy is one of many from some other company that they've contracted to work at the counter -- spies the wine and says there is an airline policy prohibiting people from carrying large amounts of liquid in checked bags unless they are packed all special-like by the UPS store. Only the UPS store. They hand us an unprofessional looking hand-written flyer directing us to the UPS store 40 minutes away. We have 40 minutes till our flight.

So basically, after trying unsuccessfully to call everyone we know in the LA area to come pick up her wine, these bastards say she has to give it up and get on her plane or wait hours and hours for the next flight to New York. So she has to give up the $100 of wine she shlepped all over New Zealand and across the Pacific because these jerks can't handle moving a bag with liquids packed in bubble wrap inside without potentially spilling it. I hope everyone -- or at least the supervisor to whom we were told the bottles would go -- in the United domestic terminal at LAX enjoyed their specially imported New Zealand wine.

My bag, also carrying six bottles of wine, gets through no problem, because it wasn't too heavy that I had to open it in front of them. Do I feel like I've done something unethical by not declaring that I, too, had six bottles of wine that hadn't been packed by the UPS Store but instead had been packed by me, with tons of bubble wrap and placed inside those giant new Ziploc bags they have? Not on your life.

I see the sunset for the second time on the same day while we are somewhere over the middle of the United States. I am too tired to take my camera out and take a photo of it.

We finally get to New York where my parents and Gary and Leah's dad are all waiting for us and eager to carry our suitcases. It's good to be home but I think we are both unbelievably tired and wiped out.

The best part? That second bag that Leah had brought, the one she had moved some of her main suitcase's excess weight into, came through the trip fine. It even had the little love-note that the Transportation Security Administration puts inside to let you know they opened your bag and hand-inspected it. And inside, unscathed, were her two duty-free, non-UPS-Store-wrapped bottles of super-cheap Fiji-purchased alcohol.