Travels with The Rayman

We caught a shuttle to the airport, took a bus into downtown Auckland, took a ferry to Davonport Island…and then basically reversed ourselves to get back to our hotel. Not end of story.

 
The airport is located south of Auckland quite some distance. Think San Francisco. And Auckland does not sparkle, however. We were a bit disappointed but after Queenstown, most won’t rise to the occasion.

We decided to go to the ferry building on the advice of the bus driver. That’s where we purchased tickets to Davonport Island which included a tour of the place as well. That ended up being a good choice because it rained on and off. The weather here is extremely volatile. Sunny one minute. Downpour the next. We call them cloud bursts. They call them rain bombs which is a totally apt description.

So, Davenport is a 12 minute ferry ride but it is a world apart. And we got a guide that is like fourth generation giving us the tour. Steve. He explained that this island of 8,000 people only has one cop. He works M-F from 8 to 4 and half the time they can’t find him because he’s out on his boat fishing….just no crime on this island. And no graffiti. And houses worth millions. Steve says that once you move to Davonport, you stay in Davonport. Part of tour included dropping us at a battery from WWll. There was a movie about the island in which the military played a prominent roll throughout time. And then there were tunnels. So, we went into a tunnel and came upon three young women vamps being shot…that is photographed on film by some young filmmakers. I inquired what they were shooting. “Part of a music video,” one said. “For what?”, I asked. “The Scarlett Lashes, a band.” You should have seen them. They had light make up with deep purple lips purposely drawn on their lips…one of the women was barefooted. The others were fully dressed and in high, high heels. Black was the predominate color. Remember. This is down in an underground tunnel. A bit surreal. Didn’t take a picture. It just didn’t feel right. I’ll try to find something out about them and report back.

Then we left the tunnel, rejoined Steve and another couple from Sydney and completed the tour which included seeing the entire NZ naval fleet…of 4 ships. Here’s a pic. So, one cop and 4 ships. I like that. They use their money mostly for themselves. An interesting concept. And Steve thought we, the USA, was the world cop and “isn’t that a shame?”, he inquired. He reminded of us Mayberry, albeit a very affluent Mayberry.
Then we asked where to eat lunch. Steve said, “Platter”. He drove us there and we had the best seafood chowder we’ve ever had in a restaurant. Yummy. And it rained the entire time we ate. As we walked back to the ferry, the rain stopped and it didn’t start up again until we were going to meet our airport bus. Then the rain bomb hit. There’s a reason it is green.

 
Me and thee on the island with Auckland in the background. Some art in the park in the rain. The rugby mania ball.

 
Back in our room, we are getting ready to head back to Sydney tomorrow. And it’s going to 80 degrees there. We will defrost and visit the botanical gardens and hopefully catch up with our new AU friends for lunch. And there is one more day there before jetting back to Los Angeles and then driving back home on Saturday. Sure hope we remember how to drive on the right side of the road!!

We are very ready to be home in Cayucos. And anxious to see our friend!! Oh, we have more than one. Well, that’s a relief.

We caught a shuttle to the airport, took a bus into downtown Auckland, took a ferry to Davonport Island…and then basically reversed ourselves to get back to our hotel. Not end of story.

 
The airport is located south of Auckland quite some distance. Think San Francisco. And Auckland does not sparkle, however. We were a bit disappointed but after Queenstown, most won’t rise to the occasion.

We decided to go to the ferry building on the advice of the bus driver. That’s where we purchased tickets to Davonport Island which included a tour of the place as well. That ended up being a good choice because it rained on and off. The weather here is extremely volatile. Sunny one minute. Downpour the next. We call them cloud bursts. They call them rain bombs which is a totally apt description.

So, Davenport is a 12 minute ferry ride but it is a world apart. And we got a guide that is like fourth generation giving us the tour. Steve. He explained that this island of 8,000 people only has one cop. He works M-F from 8 to 4 and half the time they can’t find him because he’s out on his boat fishing….just no crime on this island. And no graffiti. And houses worth millions. Steve says that once you move to Davonport, you stay in Davonport. Part of tour included dropping us at a battery from WWll. There was a movie about the island in which the military played a prominent roll throughout time. And then there were tunnels. So, we went into a tunnel and came upon three young women vamps being shot…that is photographed on film by some young filmmakers. I inquired what they were shooting. “Part of a music video,” one said. “For what?”, I asked. “The Scarlett Lashes, a band.” You should have seen them. They had light make up with deep purple lips purposely drawn on their lips…one of the women was barefooted. The others were fully dressed and in high, high heels. Black was the predominate color. Remember. This is down in an underground tunnel. A bit surreal. Didn’t take a picture. It just didn’t feel right. I’ll try to find something out about them and report back.

Then we left the tunnel, rejoined Steve and another couple from Sydney and completed the tour which included seeing the entire NZ naval fleet…of 4 ships. Here’s a pic. So, one cop and 4 ships. I like that. They use their money mostly for themselves. An interesting concept. And Steve thought we, the USA, was the world cop and “isn’t that a shame?”, he inquired. He reminded of us Mayberry, albeit a very affluent Mayberry.
Then we asked where to eat lunch. Steve said, “Platter”. He drove us there and we had the best seafood chowder we’ve ever had in a restaurant. Yummy. And it rained the entire time we ate. As we walked back to the ferry, the rain stopped and it didn’t start up again until we were going to meet our airport bus. Then the rain bomb hit. There’s a reason it is green.

 
Me and thee on the island with Auckland in the background. Some art in the park in the rain. The rugby mania ball.

 
Back in our room, we are getting ready to head back to Sydney tomorrow. And it’s going to 80 degrees there. We will defrost and visit the botanical gardens and hopefully catch up with our new AU friends for lunch. And there is one more day there before jetting back to Los Angeles and then driving back home on Saturday. Sure hope we remember how to drive on the right side of the road!!

We are very ready to be home in Cayucos. And anxious to see our friend!! Oh, we have more than one. Well, that’s a relief.

Let me say right off the bat that I much preferred our ferry ride and nice flight down to Queensland than the present turbulent flight we are in the midst of right NOW. While checking in this morning we heard, “Please step out of line. You are under arrest.” Oh, that trickster Jim, our MN friend. They were booked on a JetStar flight and their flight had been cancelled because of the wind. It was blowing flags up away from the flag poles. And did I mention that it snowed last night.? Not in Queenstown but all around the mountains that surround the town. And their plane couldn’t land. After three attempts, their incoming plane returned to somewhere thereby leaving them stranded at the airport.

At this point…stranded is not necessarily a bad thing. We are being tossed all over the skies. It took us 30 minutes to get in the blue and the flight attendants were all seated. I hate when that happens. It was the worst take off I’ve ever endured. My valium and wine didn’t do a thing. I’m waiting for cabin service to start so I can order a stiff one. Thank goodness we are on a 737…a turbo prop might be what they were to fly on. They would be better off on the ground.

Now that my life has flashed before my eyes…I’ll take this opportunity to reflect on our trip thus far. Observation one. Young people are moving around. They comprise the backpacker/tramper population down here. A sparse life, sleeping in youth hostels, eating at McDonald’s, and lugging their belongings where ever they go. They are having a great time. We’ve talked with a lot of these young adults and most of them are traveling to learn english, the language. One man from Japan was here because his employer sent him to learn english so that he could communicate with his clients. He is an accountant. Another young woman from Argentina is here studying english before she moves to Spain. She traveled to Spain, loved it and decided to immigrate. She is a teacher. Another young couple were working at the ski resort which just closed for the season. They were from Slovenia and they were traveling around to see the sights, improve their english which was already wonderful. “How did you learn to speak english, because you are very good at it”, Rayman asked. The Slovenian replied, “it’s compulsory in our schooling.” This lead Rayman and I to wonder what is wrong with the USA. We fight other languages with our english only ranting. This only limits our ability to talk with others and engage with the world. Yes, they are learning our language to be better off in their lives…shouldn’t we be doing the same? Just wondering.

Second observation. The people down under are wonderful. I’m at risk of repeating myself, I know. But I bring this up to encourage all my readers to consider a trip down this way. You will love it. The kiwis are so much fun, yeah, yeah. They never say yes just once. They are so enthusiastic they always without fail say, “yeah, yeah”. And they speak really fast which is a challenge for those that can’t understand their accents. It makes it fun just the same to try to figure out. And they take our lack of ability to understand them with good humor accompanied by a smile. Charming, I’m sure.

Third observation. They don’t get wigged out with security at the airport. You can transport opened wine within the country. They don’t even scan your carry-ons including computers when flying on the turbo-planes. The 737 required a check of the computer this a.m. That was a first. Shocking? I am not shocked. They are way out of harms way down here. We have done a lot of touring, walking, riding public transit and have never felt the least bit in danger in any way. Bicycling, is another matter as I’m a scared y cat (which means it’s my problem, not theirs) Really. People are kind, considerate, polite. It reminds us of our childhoods’ when you could leave your doors unlocked. You didn’t worry about a classmate blowing you to bits at your school. You could stop someone and ask for directions and receive directions or sometimes even get shown the way. It just feels safe and we love that about the down under. Yeah, yeah.

Observation number four. The beds are really, really comfortable…everywhere. Included as a subcategory to that is that I have never seen so many ways to flush a toilet. Handles are rare. Buttons are popular, lifting knobs are in good supply, turning a disk is a relatively modern way to approach the task. You can pretty much figure that almost no two are exactly alike. Shows the ingenuity of the peoples. Old task. New solutions. And when you ask for a bathroom, you’re sure to puzzle them. They say toilet. Straight up. Toilet.

Speaking of toilets, they are everywhere. The kiwis and Aussies discovered that people have a need to relieve themselves and they decided to provide for that eventuality. Never had to ask for a key. Never saw a sign limiting access.

Never did get that stiff drink…it wasn’t an option on this flight. Luckily the flight smoothed out a bit and I stopped hyperventilating, my blood pressure returned to normal and palms stopped sweating so that I could type with ease. We’re now about 25 minutes from Auckland. Looking forward to warmer weather. It was uncomfortably cold this a.m. on the south island. Felt and looked like winter. So defrosting will be a good thing. Yeah, yeah.

On or about Oct. 6, we booked our Doubtful Sound trip which included renting a car to drive 2 hours to meet the boat on Lake Manapouri at 8:30ish a.m. Yesterday was Oct. 15th, Sunday. So according to my calculations…Oct. 6th was quite a while ago. We were taking a gamble. We knew that. The weather here in NZ in the spring is completely unpredictable. And so…this is how our weather started out…
Here we are looking down on Doubtful Sound. To get to the sound, you meet at the lake and travel for an hour on the lake. Then they drag you to a hydroelectric power station that is located deep in the earth. And it takes the water from the lake, forces it into two huge pipes that run down inside the mountain and this turns turbines that generate electricity for an aluminum plant located south of here. The water is then pumped into the Sound. It was built between 1964 and 1972. An engineering feat that was so big and expensive, private enterprise could not afford to complete it, once started. So…the government finished the task and now they renegotiate the repayment to the government every 10 years with the aluminum company which is owned by Australia and the money is getting repaid to the government as we speak. (none of monetary info was included in our underground tour, I asked the guide about it). And did I mention it was really, really underground. Does buried alive mean anything to you? A bit eery but we did it without freaking out!!

 
But, I digress. Once we got on the sound, I snapped this picture. It illustrates our weather. Further, it shows how important light is when photographing.

Doubtful Sound got it name because Capt. Cook was doubtful that the opening from the Tasman Sea would lead to much. That’s because Doubtful has many islands in it and to the casual observer in a rickety old ship, you might not want to take the time to sail into a place that wasn’t very promising. With no GPS or, let’s say, map to follow…and quite possibly with people on board with scurvy, say, you needed to make every exploration count. So it turns out that the Spanish ended up being the mapmakers for Doubtful because they were the first to explore it. Looking for gold, I think.

So, our long journey from the place we took off from ,,,at the Sound to the Tasman Sea (our furtherest point out), the clouds were in abundance and few pictures merit viewing.

HOWEVER…sun was spotted over the Tasman Sea. The ocean was calm and the guides were really excited because they had only ventured out on the sea twice in the last two months. And away we went. And the sea got rough so we didn’t go too far. I think it was when our guide announced, “For those of you on the bow…you may want to move back as you might be hit by ocean spray”, I closed up my camera and headed inside.

Message interruptus.

We have just returned from our progressive dinner. It’s our last night in Queenstown, it is cold, it is raining and we had way too much fun. Our plan was to have fish at Fishbone, a local joint, followed by tapas at a place we ate at this a.m. So…we had a fabulous asparagus grilled salad and appetizer of mussels (me) and scallops (Rayman). Then we progressed to our breakfast place for tapas and it was CLOSED. So, we sauntered down the avenue in the rain and found another tapas joint. Who knew? Well, we had chorizo con tomate, judias blancasy aceitunas negro (or spicy Spanish chorizo sausage with white bean, tomato and black olive. Accompanying our dish was papatas con alcaparras y chili or olive oil pan fried gourmet potatoes with capers, chilies and chives. Finally, Goats cheese with truffled honey comb, balsamic figs and walnut toast. OMG. Fabulous. And we were two of four in the joint. The other two were busy on their electronic devices. We were busy admiring the small, comfortable room with a real fire roaring and birds flirting on the leafless branches of a tree outside a window. So…the progressive dinner was a big success. We plan on doing this more often.

And back to our regularly scheduled program. That is my story of yesterday.
The Tasman Sea entrance and a rock full of seals.
We were treated to a rare sighting of Crested Penguins. A bit blurry but it was very hard to photograph these with the boat rocking, the birds moving etc. However, aren’t they sweet?
So, here is another rare sighting. Ray sans wine glass. He’s drinking TEA. And look at that sky. That view.
Did you know that Sounds have arms? Well, yes they do and here is one. They are all named but my wine from dinner is interfering. Sorry.
Heading back the sun kept exposing all the sights we had missed going in for lack of sun. It was spectacular.

 

Below please find a picture of our guides. They were great!!

 

Here I am turning my back on what lies ahead. And below…well, what can anyone say about this? There aren’t words.

 

 

Lake Manapouri.
AND our new Minnesota friends, Jim and Mari (mary). We met them on the train trip from Picton to Christchurch. Their schedule was very much like ours. So, we invited them to ride with us and take the tour of the Sound, which they did. So, here’s a few interesting tidbits about our new friends. They have two daughters. One married a fellow from Alameda and they moved to Sydney for his work and they are visiting them. Jim has worked for the same firm for 42 years. That’s almost unheard of…and according to my calculations he entered the work force at about age 4. Isn’t that illegal? Mari is a scream. She managed to lock herself into the bathroom near the power generator and before Jim approached the restroom to save her, he said, “Is there anyone naked in here?” He swears that was a question, not wishful thinking. I have my doubts.

Jim loves old cars and heats his garage to 46 degrees so he can work on them. I’m not kidding. 46. I can’t even feel my fingers at 46.

When we were in Christchurch, we ran into them (a very small world) and went to Antarctica with them (the exhibit). While we were there, Jim (works in IT) spent all of our tea time (we took a break) trying to get a reservation made for the Doubtful Sound cruise using his computer. Every time he hit the “purchase” button, something went wrong. I think it was because he was using a DOS based computer. He did not give up. In fact, he missed the all-important feeding of the penguins trying to spend money on a cruise. And he works with computers all day. Just saying.

Oh, I kid Jim. He was a hoot.

But I digress.

As we were driving back from our cruise, we were all high from the scenery. Rayman was trying to perfect his driving skills…when a beep sounded. “What’s that”, Ray exclaimed. ( To save you from wondering yourself…it was the I’M OUT OF GAS warning from the Toyota we were riding in.) “Maybe we’re out of gas! The gas gauge shows empty.”

NZ is very sparsely populated. That is really the beauty of this country. You can drive for HOURS without seeing people. You see sheep, yes. People no. And gas stations are even more infrequent. “My RAV emits a sound and it means I have about 2 gallons remaining.” exclaimed Mari. “We are back at the lake, we’ll probably make it.” pronounced Jim. Rayman said, “Where’s a road sign showing how far we are from Queenstown? Why the heck don’t they provide more signs with distances?” Like that would help, I thought.

“Well, I’m confident we’ll make it”, Jim asserted while Mari added, “My RAV has two gallons remaining when it beeps at me.” To which I proclaimed, “Let me read the owner’s manual.” “There’s a car manual in the glove box”, Jim wondered aloud.

After flipping through the index and locating the “LOW FUEL ALERT”, it was determined that 1.7 gallons remained and that the car would, in fact, alert us in the event of low fuel. Having delivered this news, “How far are we? Why don’t they post more signs?”, Rayman intoned. “Oh, I’m sure we’ll make it. I mean we’re here at the lake”, Jim suggested again.

Then we came upon a one-car bridge with a traffic light. We had to stop. “OH, GREAT. I DID NOT WANT TO STOP.”, Ray snarled. The light changed. We were on the bridge and I murmured, “If we’re going to run out of gas, let it be here because we will get all the help we will ever need.” Snorting and snarling ensued.

Drifting in on fumes, we arrived at a gas station and it took $97 of fuel to fill the car. Does “just by the hair of your chinny, chin, chin have meaning to you?

Isn’t the driver of the car responsible for the status of the fuel? Just saying…now. Didn’t dare say it then.

The end of the story is more heart rendering. As we drove back, Mari invited us to dinner as a thank you for us inviting them to Doubtful Sound. We thanked them but thought maybe they could just buy us some gas (and in our defense, this was before we knew it would cost $97). So Mari remarks, “Well, it is my birthday”…(yada yada yada). IT’S YOUR BIRTHDAY? OF COURSE, WE’LL LET YOU TAKE US TO DINNER!!! She had us at birthday. So, we had a delightful dinner with Jim and Mari followed by a complimentary dessert because the meat was too tough. Tasty but tough is how we all described it to the server. But it didn’t really matter. We have a perfectly lovely day and dinner and with our wonderful new Minnesota friends. And we sang happy birthday during the half time of the Rugby World cup semi-finals in which the All Blacks held off the Wallabies…and then we hugged goodbye. I think they were going to the bungie jumping place today to watch. Personally, I was planning on a major collapse. This involved sleeping in, eating breakfast late, publishing my blog, writing my new blog entry, having a progressive dinner and then throwing myself into be at 7:45 to relax, regenerate and repack my suitcase for about the 25th time so that we can head out tomorrow back from the most southern place I’ve ever been to Auckland for 2 nights, then Sydney for 2 nights and the, OMG, back to LAX on Saturday (which will be Friday for you) which I have marveled before allows us to take a 15 hour flight and arriving before we take off. And the highlight of all this just might be that Air New Zealand safety film at the beginning of our flight back to Sydney.

Admittedly this sounds like it could have a double meaning. I report. You decide.

Flying at 15,000 feet, I came upon this. A list of definitions.

Spiral: style of kicking perfected during the psychedelic era.

Coathanger: Dressing room equipment which doubles as a car aerial as required:; Also an illegal tackle in which an outstretched arm catches an opponent under the chin causing a sudden and spectacular rotation of his body – making the crowd go “ooh!”

Box kick: When a kick is hoisted over the line out, scrum or breakdown to theoretically land in an imaginary box with no defenders in it. Hardly ever comes off. Not to be confused with a “chip”, “grubber” or “dink” which hardly ever come off either.

And finally:

Down his throat: Directly into the arms of the opposition fullback. See “box kick”.

This is an illustration of how fun the kiwis are. They are absolutely obsessed with rugby, but they don’t take it too seriously. Of course, they haven’t lost yet. They compete tomorrow night in the semi-finals against Australia.
This was just before landing. It was harrowing. Many mountains to miss. But what a beautiful sight even in the overcast. On the way from Christchurch to Queenstown (seen below), I observed lots of meringue in the sky. Example.
These are the Southern Alps and they run all the way down the island.

We left this morn at 5:45 a.m. to the airport. Upon arriving we couldn’t find any of our paperwork. And that’s all I’ll say about that. No telling where it is.

We got in our room early and went to get our car nearby. We jumped in the car and OMG…a standard transmission. It was the only car they had and we got it. Soooooooo…Ray managed to drive us to Lake Wanaka shifting from first to third, thereby bypassing second gear about 25 times. Of course, it didn’t help that we were taking hairpin turns that required constant downshifting…so that allowed Ray the opportunity to miss second gear on the way down too…many times. And while doing that as we approached intersections, he always signaled his intention to turn with his windshield wipers and on occasion, he tried to turn into oncoming traffic. He was very tense (an flagrant understatement) and so the other thing that he did was he kept veering toward to the left when oncoming traffic appeared thereby putting me in the position of closely examining any variety of weeds and shrubs that might be on “my” side of the road. Oh, and the drops in the gorge area caused a bit of concern on my part so that toward to the end of our outing I announced that I would definitely be driving tomorrow…with Rayman strenuously objecting…with words like damn, dead body, and my ass. But I will not bore you with the details.

The Welch captain just got ejected for slamming another player into the ground. He was “sent off”. Oh, dear.

But I digress.

The highlight of our day must be reported at this point…lest the casual reader think that Rayman’s driving is the end of the story. Au contraire. Bungy jumping has always been at the top of our bucket list. So this was our chance.

Part of the charge for the jump is free video of the jump. We welcomed that because we decided on a tandem jump. That way if anything went wrong…well, you get the picture. Problem is I screwed up the video and can’t seem to figure out how to rotate it. So, just turn your computer 1/4 rotation and you can see it the way it really was. Oh, and this is the movie so just click on the arrow on the left side to view.

So…well…we did the jump. How fun was that? Oh, you protest do you? Do you think we are crazy? No, we’re not. We tease you, dear reader. Wasn’t that fun???? Well, it turns out that trying to publish my blog with the movie was causing a problem. So, in order to get published, I have dropped the movie. I will figure out another way to share it with you. And you just have to see it.https://www.me.com/gallery/#home Click on the link and it will take you to my mobile me gallery. Then click on bungie jumping. And this is how much it costs. What a deal. The picture below is the building that is undergoing renovation at the bungie site. Rayman wondered aloud what they might be building. I chirped, “The mausoleum for all those that didn’t make it.”

 

 
Some of the other things we did:
I singlehandedly lifted this tower by myself. And we came across this giant fruit.

 

Ray seated in the car which has no scratches on the outside…but as we arrived at the hotel it became clear that the clutch was half gone based on the burning smell permeating the air.

 
And this is how we started the day. On our way to get the car, we observed this guy running up the stairs (behind us) with his behind in front of us as he did. (yes, it’s a thong). By the time I recovered from the shock of it all…he was already back down the stairs and I politely yelled out, “I’ve got to get a picture of you.” At which time all his buddies cheered as I snapped. You don’t see this every day. Oh, and he was wearing lipstick…like it mattered!!

It’s official. I got Ray on a train. It was touch and go…but he did it!!

 
And as you can see, shooting photos didn’t work so well. Too much glare. However, it did make for an interesting picture in this case. Ray, vineyards, mounts, clouds. C’est bon.

The trip was 5 1/2 hours straight south. Most of it hugged the Pacific coast which is on the east coast of NZ.
So, here’s a shot…most had more glare but you get the idea. We are right on the beach. And then as we proceeded further south, you could view the coast on one side and this on the other.

 
Yep. Snow capped Southern Alps. It was extraordinary. This picture came out because I was standing outside. What? Yes.
The train had an open car where you could go to freeze and get totally wind blown. This was helpful, say, if you had a glass of wine to accompany the cheese and crackers and fruit…and then you felt a bit sleepy. It would wake you right up!!
Here’s Ray by the open car before leaving Picton for Christchurch.

And, as you might have noticed, we did have sun so the it made the trip all the more special. You do know that there is a reason for all that green grass.

 

Two pictures. One looking back, one forward. Miles and miles and miles of this beauty. With no development. NZ is sparsely populated. And my apologies for that cable in the bottom photo. I don’t know what it is. There were no phone lines. Maybe a crack in the window?
Finally, a picture of the surf and the snow. Enjoy.

As we approached Christchurch, we saw evidence of the earthquake. However, it wasn’t until we checked in that the true enormity of the devastation became evident. The entire downtown has been fenced off. The lady at the front desk showed us on the map. We plan to investigate this today.

We met some people from Minnesota and sat near them on the train. They may book the same cruise of Doubtful Sound as us since their travel plans include the same itinerary as ours. Or…it might be doubtful because they only had one night’s lodging arranged in Christchurch (we have 2) and every hotel/motel we passed had ‘no vacancy’ signs lit. The earthquake rendered so many downtown places useless…that it is hard to get a booking here. We are lucky to have ours. Blind luck, but, luck nonetheless.