Off to Peru

Been in LA this week catching up with friends and family.  Will be in LAX in less than an hour, and in Lima by mid-day tomorrow.  Tuesday I'm flying down to Cusco and will head straight for Machu Picchu.  After that, I have no specific plans, but I hope to be gone another 2 months.  I'll keep you guys posted...

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My Notes on New Zealand

I don't intend this to be anything more than it is: a type-written copy of the general observations I've been making about New Zealand.  It would be a huge mistake for anyone to misconstrue this as any sort of journalistic enterprise with even the slightest amount of authority or organization.  So, disclaimer out of the way, here's what I've seen:

• The British influence is unavoidable.  New Zealand, like Australia, has its own government, but still resides "under the Queen".  There's the accent, of course: a sort of drawled, kicked-back version of the Queen's English.  Then there's the place names: Christchurch, Oxford, Queenstown, Invercargil and Dunedin (those last two are Scottish settlements).  Sport: Rugby and Cricket are the two big ones, games still played in collared shirts.  Food: you can find beans on a lot of breakfast menus, and tea is ubiquitous, as in the motherland.

• New Zealand is also home to an indigenous population of polynesian people called the Maori that landed here a long time before Captain Cook.  Their cultural influence is as much a part of the Kiwi identity as the British part.   Aside from volumes of omnipresent visual imagery, the Maori have their own political party, language instruction in schools, a TV channel, radio station, and villages into which only Maoris are allowed. They've also had an impact on the accent: there's a popular TV commercial that embodies it well (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dIYvD9DI1ZA) and a YouTube video a couple of Australians whipped up to poke fun at the Kiwi accent (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZdVHZwI8pcA).  There is also a whole other set of place names that will tie your tongue in knots: Pukekohe, Whakatane, Rotorua, Urewera and Waikaremoana, for example.

• Each culture is distinct from the other, but both are an essential part of the national identity, like yin and yang.  

• New Zealanders LOVE Rugby.  Their national team, The All Blacks, won the World Cup for the first time in a long time here in NZ in October, right before I showed up.  The flags are still flying.

• Rugby players wear short shorts, so unfortunately that's embedded itself as a fashion trend here among men, even among well-out-of-shape men that you would really never want to see in short shorts.  And mullets everywhere, without shame.  Jean shorts too, even cut-offs.

• Lots of cute nicknames, like boat drivers are "Boaties", throat drops are "throaties", the barbeque is the "barby", the Off-License liquor store is an "Offie".

• New Zealand is not a country made for cities, and I wouldn't recommend traveling here to be a tourist in Auckland, Wellington or Christchurch.  Do that in Europe: go see Paris, London, Prague, and Barcelona.  New Zealand's best sightseeing is found in the natural environment.

• There's no Starbucks in New Zealand.  Maybe one in Auckland, one in Wellington, one in Queenstown.  Haven't seen any in Christchurch.  People somehow get by here without one on every corner - imagine that!

• Sheep outnumber people in NZ by 20:1

• New Zealanders take a great interest in their country's natural environment.  People have a decent understanding of the geology, geography, and the plant and animal life.  Everyone's an amateur naturalist.

• Anything with fur is not indigenous to New Zealand (as many NZers have told me).  And there are lots of furry things here.  New Zealand suffers from a history of rare indigenous species being wiped out by common, imported ones.  

• The birds here are numerous and impressive: kiwis, parrots, penguins, GIANT pigeons (would eat our city pigeons for breakfast), peacocks, some big birds of prey, and innumerable other strange and colorful birds endemic to New Zealand, lots of them flightless.  There used to be a giant, solid-boned, ostrich-like bird here called a Moa, but they have since become extinct (apparently, the Maori ate most of them and the Brits finished them off).

• People read the newspaper.  Regularly.  Thoroughly.  And defend their regional papers which make room for world reports and entirely small, local news (like hay thieves).  The newspapers here, much like the ones I've seen in Ireland, can be a bit tabloid and sensational.  The news is there, but there's also present an emotional appeal you wouldn't find in the Times or the Wall Street Journal.

• People understand the weather.  They know the difference between a low-pressure system from the SE and and high from the NW - there's a big difference!  And I suppose they have to - it's a reaction to their environment, being sandwiched between the tropics and Antarctica.  If being a weatherman in San Diego is the easiest job in the world, then being a weatherman in New Zealand has to be the hardest.  The weather changes by the minute and there are so many discreet regions with different climate patterns packed very tightly together.  Watching an evening news weather report is exhausting: it's rainy here, but only cloudy there and sunny here but only in the morning, then chilly, grey and windy in the afternoon, sunny again tomorrow... and that's only one corner of one island for the next 12 hours! 

• Kiwis love American country music.  Love it.  I think it resonates with the landscape, and the people that still make a living working the land, so it's kind of like middle America, except...

• This is a very liberal culture.  We are talking full-on tree-hugging, tears-for-puppies, bleeding heart Greens.  Not that I have a problem with that (I'm still young enough to lean a bit left myself), but it's just very apparent here.  Rugby-playing cowboys for social medicine, I'm telling you.

Farewell New Zealand, and Onward

Well, I'm down to my last few days in New Zealand.  It's hard to believe it's been almost 3 months.  Doesn't feel like it.  Dad and I are watching Crazy Heart in a Christchurch motel right now, waiting for the last few grains of sand to slip through the hourglass before we have to head to the airport.  We first arrived here over a week ago, put the van up for sale, spent a few days checking out surf spots and climbing crags and then headed back into the mountains about 2 hours inland for a quick backpack trip and a run up a short, rocky alpine peak called Mt Oates.

Been back in Christchurch now the last few days doing more climbing and surfing.  Rode through a couple midnight aftershocks since we've been here as well.  This is definitely an interesting place to be right now.  It doesn't take long to figure out that the city is currently just a visage of its former self.  For starters, the entire city center, the heart of the business district and cultural core is closed.  Square blocks (maybe 10 x 10) are completely shut down, barricaded, every building within that boundary uninhabitable, in the process of either being torn down or completely rehabilitated (in the case of old masonry landmarks, like churches and museums).  Outside of there, the damage is spotty, but equally apparent.  Just about every church in the city is a fenced-off, half-standing pile of rubble with the steeple braced upright on the ground nearby.  Homes are wrapped in red tape, cliffs have crumbled, undermining foundations above and crushing backyards below, businesses are shuttered, heavy equipment visible through remaining storefronts, entire buildings missing, the din of demolition equipment (jackhammers and squealing metal equipment tracks) constant throughout the city.  Over 600,000 properties have been red-tagged.  The most damaging quakes were a 7.1 in Sept 2010 and a 6.3 in Feb 2011.  The aftershocks are constant.  In the last 24 hours alone, there have been 10 earthquakes ranging from 2.5 to 4.1.

People are obviously missing from the city as well.  The place is a ghost town.  Something like a third of the population has relocated to other parts of the country.  Everyday the paper is full of stories about the recovery effort, insurance claims, and the government's next steps.  They're putting the total anticipated cost between 20 and 30 Billion.  Unfortunately, a lot of the rebuild effort is tied up in insurance claims.  People are getting pay-outs to vacate their properties (residential and commercial) because even if they could reach a settlement to rebuild, the insurance companies aren't willing to reinsure, the government isn't stepping in to guarantee anything, and people can't afford the risk on their own - so they're taking what they can get and leaving.  Despite all of that, the folks that have stayed here are surprisingly upbeat.  They love this place and believe it will be rebuilt, and seem to understand that it won't be the same and will take a long time to get there, but they're still here, going about their lives.  A lot of business are operating out of shipping containers and temporary facilities - some nice ones too - I imagine some of them will stay like that permanently.

So, this might not be a bad place to find work after all, but that will have to be another day.  The plan right now is to spend a week at home, then meet a friend in Peru at the beginning of February, travel for another 2 months (into Central America, finally visit my family in Panama) and then go back to work.  If it's still quiet in Southern Cali, then Christchurch might not be a bad place to look.  There is some work unfolding here.  Aside from being on the other side of the planet, it's strikingly similar to California: lots of sun, golden rolling hills, plenty of surf, nearby mountains - what else can you ask for?  Family and friends, that's what,  which is why I'd rather be home, but I do have to return to the world of the employed at some point, wherever that may be, and being a part of the resurrection of this city would be a really cool thing to be a part of, so maybe...

A few days back in Milford with Dad

Well, after Mt. Cook, we had to figure out what to do with ourselves for a while.  I was itching to get back to Milford Sound and dad's never been there, so we made the long drive back to what's got to be one of the most beautiful and unique places on the planet.  

The evening we showed up, we were greeted by this fantastic sunset:

On our first day, we went for a hike up this valley

This is my "vato loco" look from the mountains

I found this stool in the snow very amusing

Our hike took us here, to a saddle at the brush line with a surprise view of Milford below

Kea, mountain parrot.  We stopped to rest and this guy found us within 10 minutes.

A little hide-and-seek

My idea for the next day was to climb Mitre Peak (the one on the left).  It is only accessible by water, directly from the fiord, and there are no official or marked trails.  Only about 20 people ever set foot on it each year.  It's a 14-hour round trip or an overnight halfway up the ridge.  We opted to travel light and go for the one-day push.  So, early in the morning, we set off in a borrowed kayak (we stayed with the guides again), paddled out to the toe of the mountain, and dragged the kayak into the trees.

Dad got this sunrise shot from the base of Mitre right before we started our ascent

The first part of this climb is unlike anything either of us have ever done.  It's basically a bushwhack through the jungle on a near-vertical slope.  The trail is... well, it's not really a trail.  It's a few stepped-on plants, just a very faint track.  We actually started the walk about 4 times before we got it right.  We'd walk into a hole in the bush, thinking it was the right way and then find that it just ended in impassibly thick ferns and vines.  Ultimately, we found our way up the steep slope, hand over hand on roots and mossy rocks.  Usually when I go hiking, I'm used to being able to see where I'm going and where I've been , but in this case, all we could see was the dense foliage around us.

At one point, we came to a rare clearing with a view back down to Milford Sound.  That's the airstrip down there, next door to where we were staying with the kayak crew.

There were a few trail markers along the way like this.  Someone with a good sense of humor used a bunch of "Danger Keep Out" tape!

Here's a straight on view of the peak.  When you're done with the steep jungle slope in the foreground (our trail would have gone right up the middle), you're spit out on a loose, rocky ridge and free solo for the summit.  About 3 hours in, we were at the top of the bush-covered portion in the back, to the left of the peak in the front and were facing a big dip in the ridge, back down further into the bush before climbing back up again to the rock and dad called it, said his legs had enough, so we had lunch, soaked in the view and turned back.  No big deal on the summit.  I'm just glad we got out there and went for it!

A couple more great sunset shots from that trip

Funny signs seen in NZ

Classic

I took this at Cape Reinga, the Northern-most point of NZ

Road signs here are messed up.  WTF is this supposed to mean?

Hey guys, take it easy on this turn.  Keep it to 85.

Now you tell me!

I love this sign.  You see it all over NZ.  It's not the most unusual thing - it pops up when the roads are potentially slippery, but I love how drastic it is.  Look at that car!  The tire marks are all crossed up, and it's about to flip over and burn up in a fiery crash!  Slippery roads in NZ are no joke.  You will die.

Dually noted

Some good German humor.  Saw this in a hostel.

What do you mean if it's not working?  Does that happen often?  This seems dangerous.

Seriously?  15 minutes?  And what am I supposed to do if it's 6:30?  

This was at the tunnel entrance on the way to Milford Sound.

I couldn't resist.  This is the unfortunate name of a country town on the South Island.

It's really funny if you pretend you have a lisp.  "Don't be such an Athol!"

Also seen, not photographed:

"Horse Poo.  $1"

On a farmer's fence: "Dogs will be shot"

Slide Show

I have a great internet connection right now which is very rare and pictures are uploading quickly, so I figured I'd take advantage and upload a bunch of shots I might not have otherwise had the bandwidth to share.

Lakeside Dinner a few nights ago

I think dad got up to pee in the middle of the night and got this shot of Betsy and the moon

Sweet surf-mobile in Dunedin

These "Kea" mountain parrots have been in all the alpine areas I've visited.  They are very smart and very friendly - they will come right up to you and try to steal your food when you're not looking.

They have some beautiful red feathers on the underside of their wings

Camp the day I picked up dad

Shot of the two of us at first sight of Mt Cook

Contemplative: "Crap that looks like a big mountain"

Dunno.  Thought you'd like to see a blurry picture of me in orange light.  I like this one.

Pretty flowers

Great swimming hole the locals showed me in Milford.  There's a jump from the bush on the top left.

"The Chasm", Milford

Mountains + Sheep = NZ

This was in Abel Tasman.  I had to cross these big tidal estuaries that drained out on low tide.  People would tie up their boats, the water drains out and leaves them sitting in a desert landscape, a sort of surreal scene to come upon during the walk

Some more pretty flowers

Some more Milford.  So good.

Mountain Biking Queenstown

Dad and I rented a couple of full suspension bikes in Queenstown today and bought a gondola pass.  They have some pretty sick tracks.  We stuck to the easy stuff, but still plenty fun!

Here's a gondola with the bikes all racked.  I don't know who the random guy in the foreground is.

Dad goin for a ride.

Here's looking back down the gondola to QT, past the crazy bungee jump platform

Ripping

Shredding

You gotta pay to play!