Land of the Kiwi - This Place Has It All - New Zealand!

New Zealand is a lot of fun.  It has everything, good weather, mountains, beaches, abundant resources, waterfalls, good food, wine, good roads (mostly), and wonderful people. 

We've been here for a few days now and have moved around the country, with more spots to come.  I thought I would review the last few days in a daily travel log format:

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But first, a couple stories - 

The time zone thing is really messing with our heads.  We are now in New Zealand time, which is 21 hours AHEAD of Oregon.  When we travel we are almost always behind Oregon time.  This feels strange.    

So as I write this, it's 9:00 at night here, and 11:00 at night Yesterday in Oregon.  That's pretty weird.  All day Monday here was Sunday at home.  To put it another way, the Super Bowl is Sunday at home and Monday afternoon here ...


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Another amusing event happened today when we went to visit the House of Parliament.  It's a rather unusual building, and when you lay eyes on it ... it's not terribly attractive.   The buildings nearby are what you might imagine a historic government building to be, but the "real" House ... well they call it the Bee Hive. 

So with some time on our hands, we decide to take a tour of it.  Unfortunately, the tour doesn't start for half an hour but there's plenty of room, so we wander around the grounds and come back.  But the tour is now full.  We can't go on it.  Oh well, we didn't really care that much.  

But it gets a little weird as we try to leave.   We walk over to the exit and the guard says "hold on, where's your bar code?"
I answer:  "We don't have a bar code, the tour is full so we're just gonna leave"
He say:  "you're not leaving through here!"
I look at him and look at the sign that says Exit.  
I explain: "The lady told us the tour is full so they didn't give us a tour sticker"
And the guard says in a serious tone "I'd like to see you try to leave here without a bar code!"
What?  It was like a bizarre challenge.  It's almost like he said "I'd like to see you knock this chip off my shoulder!"  The dude needs some customer training.

We looked at him for a few seconds, in kind of a stand-off.  I didn't quite understand the system here.  You need a bar code to leave?  
He pointed back at the tour desk.  So we walked over and asked the lady and she said "Oh, I'm sorry, I forgot to give you an exit bar code!"
We made our way out under the watchful eye of the guard.   I felt like saying "It's okay, we didn't want to see your ugly unpleasant looking building anyway!"

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Friday Jan 25th:  Unfortunately, this day doesn't exist.  Or rather, we traveled across the International Date Line and lost a day when we left Tahiti on Thursday, and landed in Auckland New Zealand on Saturday morning.  

It was only a five hour flight, and the clock somehow clicked over another full day.   Still not exactly sure how that works.  

So ... not too much to report on a day that didn't happen.  And we're not gonna get it back, it's gone forever. 

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Saturday Jan 26th:  We were lucky that when we got to our hotel very early (9:30 AM), they were able to accommodate us and we were able to catch up on our sleep.   

Then we set out to explore Auckland, New Zealand's biggest city.  It's an amazing place and is booming right now with population growth and building everywhere.  Fiona had to get some grooming things done, hair and nails, so I set out on my own to dig around.

 
There are a lot of things to see and do in Auckland, and I was able to wander around and get oriented - the harbor, the parks, downtown, etc. It's kind of a cross between Great Britain and the USA, with it's own way of doing things.

Seems like everywhere we've been there are fashion photos going on, in this one, she was dressed kinda like a vampire.

When I met back up with Fiona, we had a nice afternoon wandering around some more.  

It's kind of how we get used to a place, just wander around with a map and a purpose.  

We found the oldest pub in town and enjoyed a nice meal of authentic fish and chips.  Then we visited a terrific book store and scored a couple more books to read.  Traveling like we do, we need to keep some books on hand at all times.  

I took a bunch of pictures.  I use my iPhone for all my picture taking, and there are ample opportunities around every corner.  We also made travel arrangements for the days ahead, and located the bus station for our next leg.  

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Sunday Jan 27th:   We had decided the day before to take a morning walking tour of Auckland, but frankly, we had already seen most of the things they wanted to show us.  Oh well, it was still fairly interesting.  

After that tour, we got on a ferry to ride out to a nearby island Waiheke, some distance across the bay.  It was a bracing day with clouds and wind, but very fresh.  





We landed on the island and took a bus to the nearest beach, where we walked on the beach, had a look around, and enjoyed the holiday atmosphere.  

It was a three day weekend of some sort and the place was crowded with people from the city.  After we had lunch at a sidewalk cafe, we checked out property listings at a couple real estate offices.  We were interested in the price of property mostly because there were a lot of nice houses on the island, and we confirmed our suspicion that they were very expensive. 

 
Riding back on the boat was a little more interesting because the wind picked up.  Apparently it's windy in New Zealand a lot of the time.  This was our fourth boat trip of this journey, when you're in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, you end up on a lot of boats.  

We returned to our hotel later that evening and packed for an early morning departure to the next stop, a National Park in the center of North New Zealand. 

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Monday Jan 28th:  We took the early morning bus to the park and arrived at our hotel in a place called "National Park".  

This is what we look like sometimes, walking to our destination, pulling our bags along.

That was the name of the town, not very original.  It was a nice village a long way from most places.  We went for a hike in the warm afternoon sunshine.   

After dinner we turned in, and the next morning we had arranged for a shuttle to take us up to the real National Park - Tongariro.  It was a pretty spectacular place and we went on a fairly long hike to a waterfall, and looked around the lodge and stuff. 

The afternoon was filled with a hairy bus ride through the mountains down to Wellington, where we find ourselves tonight.  The bus got to Nat Park late and was overheating in the New Zealand heat.  So the driver was trying to make up time in order to meet the next bus on time.  

It was a four hour trip over winding steep mountain curves, and well ... he wasn't a very good driver, and it scared the crap out of us.  And we had chosen to sit in the front row of the bus, so we could see every dangerous twist and turn.  White knuckled all the way.  But we made it. 

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Wednesday Jan 30th:  Now in Wellington, we set out early to make it a full day.  This is the capital of NZ and it's a cool city.  We toured the active waterfront and took a cable car up to the top of the hill where there was a big Botanical Park.  

We also toured the House of Parliament, which was rather disappointing (see above).  We walked all over town and had lunch on the rather off beat Cuba Street pedestrian area.  There was a big fabulous museum. Then watched the dragon boats and kids jumping into the sea.  

To Boldly Go Where No Man Has Gone Before - Captain Cook - Profound History Does Not Come Easy

I am an avid fan of history, especially when it comes to places where we travel.  This current trip is no exception.  We are moving around the world south of the equator, and have spent the last few weeks crossing the South Pacific.  

During this trip I have been doing research into the original explorers - one in particular - who opened up this part of the world.   Back in the 1700's, Europeans first sailed these waters and laid eyes on many lands for the first time. 

I have been fascinated with Captain Cook, who oddly seems to have been given little credit for his heroic and history making journeys.    

Captain James Cook, aboard the Endeavor (pictured at the top of this blog post), opened up this part of the uncharted world.  He deserves credit and respect for doing this with his intrepid crew and ship 250 years ago.  

The obstacles he overcame and the courage to carry on in the face of complete uncertainty have earned him a place in history.  

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Ironically, we've been traveling to many of the places he "discovered" (I say that with quotes because there were indigenous people living in these places before he showed up).  

Anyway, he had a pretty big head start but we've been crossing paths with the Captain for a few weeks, with more to come. 

Our current trip I have named the Southern Cross - after the constellation that appears on the flags of New Zealand and Australia - and which has been a distinguishing mark of the Southern Hemisphere.

In other words, we're traveling south of the equator where the Southern Cross has a noteworthy significance.   Indeed, it's how these early explorers navigated through remote and distant waters, using the stars.

In fact unbeknownst to us, we are following in Cook's footsteps.  This was not by design, it just sort of happened.  

Captain Cook came around the southern end of South America, around Tierra del Fuego, and sailed up through the south seas into Tahiti, (Easter Island would come later), and into New Zealand, where we are tonight. 

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Before we left Tahiti, I made it a point to go visit the location where Captain Cook had landed.   It was a special moment for me.  I've been reading a book about his epic voyage for a month, with amazing stories of his courageous and resourceful journeys.  

Turns out he had landed ashore not too far from where we were staying in Papeete (pronounced Pah-Pay-Et-Tay), Tahiti.  Since we did not have a car, and Fiona was occupied with other things, I took a local bus. 

This is always an adventure, using local public transportation in a place where they don't speak English, and there is no published information on where you're trying to get to. 

Anyway, after an interesting half hour bus ride along the seashore, and a half hour walk down a local road, I came to Pointe Venus (that's the French spelling).  It was a rather isolated place, a nice contrast to the rather busy, crowded, and noisy city of Papeete.

Another note:  It was hot in Tahiti - close to 90 degrees F, and very humid.  It did not cool down much at night, but fortunately we had good air conditioning.  At any rate, once I got to this distant beach peninsula point, it was cooler with ocean breezes.  In other words, it felt really nice and rather refreshing there. 

 
I walked around and found several meaningful historical markers.  There were markers related to the early missionaries, and other things.  

Of significance were three in particular.  

For starters, this place was where one of the more well known sea borne adventures took place - The Mutiny on the Bounty.  Captain William Bligh was "relieved" of his position as captain of the Bounty by a certain Fletcher Christian (who was played in the movie version by Marlon Brando). 

Bligh and a few loyal crew members were cast adrift in a small boat.  Astonishingly, they reached the Timor islands, 4,000 miles away.  One of the more amazing stories of years gone by.

Regarding this episode, there was a small monument there, one that will probably not win any design awards.  

With a special appearance by Robert Louis Stevenson

 
And there is the lighthouse, built in 1867 by a certain Robert Stevenson.  This is the father of Scotsman Robert Louis Stevenson, the author of "Treasure Island", and "Kidnapped", and other south seas pirate adventures. 

Robert Louis visited here in Tahiti to see this structure (see the plaque) and it had a tremendous influence on him to write Treasure Island. 

 

But Captain Cook tops them all 

He sailed to Tahiti and other places in one of the most tremendous feats of exploration in human history.  There were no maps, and he had a rather small boat.  He overcame incredible odds to "discover" the vast corners of the world, (including Hawaii, and even parts of the Oregon Coast).  

He named this particular spot Point Venus, because part of his mandate was to come to this region of the world and observe the crossing of Venus in front of the Sun on June 3, 1769.  This was the place it happened.   They came ashore at this place in Tahiti.

Ironically (did I use that word before?) he has a rather modest monument in his honor.  

 
The son of a simple Scottish laborer, James Cook rose through the ranks of the British navy to become one of the most celebrated sailors, commanders, and explorers of all time.  

 
I sat on a rock at Pointe Venus and looked out to sea for a long time, trying to absorb the scale of what happened so long ago in this place.  Some things you just cannot comprehend.   They are not meant to be comprehended.  

The Legend of the Birdman - Another Easter Island Strange Oddity

The Giant figureheads on Easter Island filled a spiritual void for the people who lived at this isolated place.   Among many explanations for the massive objects is that they were gravestones or in this case "head" stones for deceased ancestors. 

People need something to believe in - and if they don't have it, they often invent it.  Many ancient cultures developed some rather unusual or bizarre "religions."




 
In this case we will focus in on the very extraordinary Cult of the Birdman on Easter Island.  

Turns out that the important faith associated with the gigantic carved stone idols of the remote island only lasted a few hundred years.  Nobody knows exactly when these beliefs started or finished.  The lineage of kings and nobility eventually descended into war and chaos. 

 
Hey, and we're not talking about a whole lot of people here.  The population of this small enclave in the middle of nowhere was around 18,000 tops. 

As a people group, they were a pretty small sample size.  They were so isolated for so long that they developed their own quasi-religion of the figureheads.

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But what came next was truly ... weird.  Following the collapse of the old belief system, the powers that be - the ruling class of the citizens of Easter Island - needed a new way to pick a king or deity for them to follow or worship.  

So someone - not sure how to describe the process, maybe a committee? - decided they would have a contest that would determine who the next winner (or sacred holy man, or king, or ruler) would be.

Thus became the legend of the Birdman:  
a) a select group of warriors would 
b) descend a potentially fatal cliff to the sea 
c) swim across open water to a dangerous island 
d) wait sometimes weeks for a sacred bird to lay an egg 
e) and the first one to return with the egg 
f) would swim back across the shark infested waters
g) climb the deadly cliffs
h) and the winner would determine the sacred holy emperor for the next year. 
i) who would then live isolated in a cave and let his hair and fingernails grow for 365 days until the next "contest". 

Got it?  Hunh?  Who thought this up?  Do I want to follow a god/king that was the first to win an Easter egg hunt?  What the hell?  No wonder they call this Easter Island!

 
Sorry, I don't mean to poke fun ... but you couldn't make this up.  There are a whole lot of beliefs, religions, cults and cross currents of faith crashing into each other on this one!

The Birdman thing survived until Captain Cook and other explorers showed up, and eventually brought along some missionaries who put a stop to this nonsense with a few ... umm ... possibly unusual practices of their own?  Party poopers!

I've never been to such a place as this.  A tiny island in the middle of the vast South Pacific Ocean with so many layers of unusual things related to it.  Wow ... travel opens your mind. 

Now we are in Tahiti

So we have flown more than halfway across the South Pacific, and find ourselves in the islands of a nation actually known as French Polynesia, but everyone calls it Tahiti.

This is of course a wonderful tropical climate with amazing mountains rising out of the sea, covered in green.

It's just as you might imagine, sandy beaches, beautiful blue water, palm trees swaying in the breeze.  Pretty idyllic. 

It's been a restful couple of days in the middle of a consistent travel schedule.  And here in Tahiti, in addition to their native tongue, they speak French.  After three weeks of Spanish, we've had to switch gears again.  

But hey, our next stop after this is New Zealand, and then Australia.  English at last!  In our travels, we haven't often been to English speaking countries.  

What? Are You Kidding Me? This Seems Impossible!

Easter Island! 

We have been moving around a lot in the last few days, and skipping between time zones.   In Mexico we were two hours ahead of Oregon, then Bolivia was four hours, then Chile was five hours, and now we are on Easter Island, back to three hours. 

Easter Island is one of those unique places with scenery like nowhere else on earth.   It's a place that has always been fascinating to us.   We arrived a couple days ago from Santiago, Chile (more about that later).

It's a long flight from the west coast of South America far out into the Pacific Ocean, and takes a while to get here.  Easter Island is kind of in the middle of the South Pacific, thousands of miles from anywhere.  

Which makes it all the more amazing when you see what's here.  Giant stone carved human figures with oversize heads.

The heads are shrouded in mystery.  How did they get here?  How old are they?  Who made them?  How did they move them and stand them up?   Why did they do this?  And what does it mean?

Some of these questions were answered, but many remain unknown.  The scale of this blog does not allow for a full explanation, and indeed there is much conjecture and multiple theories about this place.  

There are hundreds of them on this rather small island, and many of them are in ruins, or various states of disrepair.  Archaeologists, such as the late Thor Heyerdahl, have been at work here for sixty or seventy years digging them up and reconstructing them.  

So we made our way around the island visiting several sites and being impressed and indeed astonished at what we saw.  Pictures tell the story best.  It's a bit hard to see how big they are in a photo, but most of them are twenty to thirty feet tall and weigh around 20 tons. 


Early Dutch explorer Jacob Roggeveen landed here on Easter day in 1722, hence the name, and Captain Cook made it more well known in 1774.  It's part of Chile and they call it Isla de Pascua (Easter Island in Spanish) - of course, the locals have a different name for the place "Rapa Nui".

We have another day and a half here. We won't soon forget this wonderful tropical island in the middle of nowhere, with awe inspiring scenes.

Earlier, in Chile 

After we left Valpariso, on the Chile coast, we headed back to Santiago for a visit and to see a close friend.   Actually she is not physically close, but in some ways almost like a family member.  Our friend Veronica is doing well.

And a personal focus for me is the wine industry (many readers of this blog may be aware that I have a wine business).  We made a special trip to visit a historic winery not too far out of town.  It is the Santa Rita winery and is over 140 years old.  

The wine business goes back a long way in Chile, and they make world class wines.  This particular winery operation was very professional with high standards, in a great setting.  

They make excellent top notch Carmenere (a Chilean flag ship red wine) along with many whites and other reds.   Their "library" of archived wines held in storage goes back over a hundred years.

And their wine cellar, in the true sense of the word, is underground; it's amazing to see and behold.  I want to be like these guys when I grow up!  However, in order to have this kind of establishment, you need to start a long time ago ...

The vast grounds were well kept too, with wonderful gardens for wandering through.  Lovely flowers were everywhere, thriving in the mild sunny climate.

We have enjoyed (that's an understatement!) our time in South America, and tomorrow evening we continue on across the Pacific where we will just keep heading west. 

Every Restaurant Needs One of These - And Other Travel Pictures

Okay, we are now in Chile, after our first-time visit to Bolivia.  A lot has happened in the last couple days, and I thought it might be best so show it with a few pictures. 

I'll give a caption under each picture to describe what it is - or give a potentially witty comment.

Above:  Hey, shouldn't every restaurant have a three thousand pound cannon amongst the tables?  I would personally not want it pointed at me.  I think I would find it uncomfortable and difficult to enjoy my meal ... however, if you got a chunk of food stuck in your teeth, you could always flick it into the barrel of the cannon ... just sayin'

So the above picture was taken in Valparaiso Chile, where we are tonight.  

But let's get the chronology correct, and finish up our time in Bolivia:  

Above:  Even though the elevation of La Paz, Bolivia is pretty much insane, their "rapid transit" system is a whole bunch of cable cars suspended over the city.  Rather ingenious if you ask me. But the day we decided to explore the skyway it started raining, resulting in this picture of raindrops set against the city below. 

So the clouds parted long enough to capture a view of the city as a cable car sped by.  They move pretty fast, so I had to be on target with the photo.  La Paz is completely built on hills, and did I mention that we were constantly out of breath?  (okay, I suppose I did, but it's around 13,000 feet high)

The women of Bolivia wear the big traditional skirt thing, along with variety of hats.  It's apparently a status symbol.  We saw a few of them doing something like singing, with one of their fans watching.  

Latin Americans of all nations love a party, or celebration, or fiesta - you name it and there's a bunch of people ready to have a good time together.  Usually including a variety of loud fireworks and music well into the night (and okay, maybe a little drinking).  This picture above shows a big crowd in the center of La Paz ... in between the rain showers.

This picture above is at the Catholic Monastery Cloister in the center of La Paz.  It was a very beautiful, dignified, and solemn place (except for the noisy fiesta outside).  It was started by the order of the Franciscans in 1632.

Among the many historical buildings in La Paz, this place was an aesthetically pleasing photo opportunity of the house of the revolutionary leader who helped Bolivia achieve independence from Spain in 1825.  They were aided by Simon Bolivar, after whom the country is named. 

Okay, on to Chile!

The above picture was taken from our hotel room window.  We are back at sea level, and you can see the bay behind the clock tower.  We are in Valparaiso, right on the Pacific Ocean, and we can fill our lungs with the lovely abundant ocean air.  Did I mention that people in Bolivia live way up in the clouds?  Sorry ... It's sunny and warm here in Valpo!

  
What, another glam shoot?  Just outside our hotel in Valparaiso, they were taking pictures of beautiful women, just like in Mexico ( Lovely woman in Mexico ).  It's summer here and the flowers are out and it was a perfect day for photos.  

Not far from our hotel is a wrought iron fence with a view of the city below.  Love locks are a "thing".  Many places have a location similar to this, where couples put a padlock in place - and throw away the key, to symbolize their unbroken love bond.  Valparaiso is no exception.  

We've actually been to Valparaiso before.  In fact I think I might have referenced this statue before, it's one of my favorites.  Indeed I have a new caption:  "Come any closer bird and I shall chop you to bits with my sword!"  

Among other things, Valparaiso is an artist colony like few others in the world.  It seems like every available surface is covered with art, including this ten story building pictured above.   I couldn't resist taking a picture.  To me, it looks like the neck of a guitar ... 

Some of the artwork is simply amazing.  This animated wall art is about twenty five feet tall and extremely well done.  What a great place to visit.  We loved it so much the first time here that we came back.

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And one final picture below:  It's Fiona standing in front of a fantastic and intense wall painting with a vast array of images.  She's just ever-so-slightly enchanted, and maybe even a little enthralled ....