Saturday, April 22, 2006

Lunch with the Washbourns

Had a good lunch with Roger Washbourn of the South this afternoon, along with being my grandfather's namesake, he's very much a fine New Zealand gentleman. In his working years, he operated a planted forest for the Department of Conservation, selling non-native resources such as pine and fir trees to garner profit for the regional council. The man knows trees.

We were delighted to see that Roger had the same geneological haircut as my mom and I. Heavily thatched salt and pepper color on top with calics all round, continuing the tradition of the healthy Washbourn hairline.

posted by ncawthon at 7:18 PM

Gore & Clinton '06

In the Nothern Southland (a nomenclature oxymoron if I've heard one) region of Scotland, there exists the Presidential Highway which connects two adjacent towns named Clinton and Gore. Gore tends to be a dry, dull, stoic place where people tend to act reserved and speak in monotonous diatribes. Clinton acts as the Sodom and Gamorrah for the region, with strip clubs, cigar stores and Slick Willie's Liquor Barn.

No word on whether Bush will have some adjourning highway shrubbery named in his honor.

posted by ncawthon at 7:16 PM

Friday, April 21, 2006

Look Kids, Big Waterfall

Tonight is our first and only night on the Fiordland Navigator, a $5 million dollar, flat-hulled cruising vessel built for the express purpose of toting tourists around the fiords. There's about 70 of us on board, all of whom enjoy gawking at the mystical canyons and towering waterfalls.

The Milford and Doubtful Sounds were carved through glaciers. Large chasams of granite slopes covered in vegetation hanging precoriously to the hard rock walls. The ferns and beech trees only survive by clinging to each other, as there is zero top soil to hang onto. Every so often, there is a tree avalanche where a whole slope of them give way and collapse into the fiord - dubbed a treevalanche.

We have been puttering along the sounds for most of the day, looking at different inlets of the misty covered passages. This is one of the wettest places on earth, and the past few days certainly didn't disappoint. If it wasn't raining, it was about to. This did have its advantages, however, as constant percipitation brought endless waterfalls. We must have seen ten thousand thus far.

In proper cruising fashion, the buffets were enormous. Peggy and I shared a table with three diminutive Japanese girls who had been travelling around NZ for the past few months. They had been 'thin slicing' meals for the past few days, saving up for this encounter. We watched them pile up huge plates of food - lamb, beef, chicken, pasta, coleslaw - take it back to our table and then proceed to photograph their plate before devouring their assembly. They then went back for seconds, followed by the desert plate. It was truly impressive to watch, we were surprised they didn't burst after eating twice their own body weight.

There were some informative nature talks on board as well, we learned about the flightless birds in EnZed and the scourge of rats, possums and ferrets that have killed off vast numbers of native icons such as the Kiwi. The guide was quoted as saying there are over 70 million possums (or squash'ems, given that they're common roadkill candidates) ravaging New Zealand. We'll try to squash a couple as we complete the journey. All in all, though, the critter count has been low. We saw dolphins today, but the penguins have been adjunct, much to Peggy's dismay. Many of the native birds in this part of the world lived without any natural predators for many millenia, evolving to lose their ability fly and residing mainly upon the forest canopy floor. The Brits brought over a bunch of the aforementioned nasties on their boats, who have since decimated the population of cute feathered animals.

posted by ncawthon at 7:18 PM

Thursday, April 20, 2006

Calling All Milfs!

After a restful night in Te Anu, we're preparing to board an overnight cruise to Milford and Doubtful Sound. There will be kayaking, dolphin and whale watching as well as presentations by the surrounding local residents, cheekily called 'Milfs'. This area in the South is called the Fiordland, not to be confused with the Scandinavian fjord. We're also driving a Ford around the fiords adding to the confusing chaos of spellings.

We've done a decent job of staying away from email thus far, usually checking it once every few days or so. With the prominence of backpackers and tourists, every small road town features a gas station, pub and internet cafe. Somewhat inversely reminiscent of South Africa, where every town featured a KFC, morturary and petrol station. Driving has been fantastic thus far, the kind of driving people do for pleasure - scenic mountains, autumn leaves scattering the road, smooth pavement and absolutely no one around.

We've also been fortuate to have some great meals whilst on our trip. Venison and lamb are popular meats both in the pastures and on the plates, we have had a bit of each. I had had chicken last night served topped with salmon topped with calamari rings. The trifecta! Lemon fish, prawns and whiting comprising the seafood category. Lunch is usually comprised of apples, crackers, peanut butter and Nutella taken at a picnic table on the road somewhere. The morning (and afternoon) coffee has been phenomenal, the Kiwis take pride in its quality and presentation.

Tomorrow arvo after the cruise we're meeting the Roger Washbourn of the southen hemisphere, my grandfather's namesake. He's been found as a long lost relative of the Washbourn clan, the name of my mother's side of the family. Earlier this month, my aunt paid a visit to Roger the Second's family and performed some on-site geneology research.

The company that we're using for our scenic cruise is Real Journeys. In such a underdeveloped place like EnZed, this outfitter certainly has the tourism industry dialled. Coach buses, boats, sea planes - all well branded, maintained and operated. Word is that they are the second largest company in the country, second to only Air NZ, we surmise. Not surprising as there doesn't seem to be many other companies in the area with this kind of backing and reputation. They are either well funded or extremely profitable, a sharp contrast to the mom and pop industries that seem to dominate the landscape.

posted by ncawthon at 7:18 PM

Baa Baa Baa, Bar Bar Bar

The Cawthon caravan is continuing their progress around the sheep filled Southland, having blown through Queenstown this afternoon on the way to Te Anu. Queenstown is very quaint, with a thriving tourism and skiing industry. We're still in the fall, with no snow as of yet, but that hasn't slowed down the thoroughfare any. The town has the flavor of Park City or Vail, with A-frame condos, a chair lift in the center of town and plenty of bars + breweries to be had.

The tourist buses are in full swing, you can tell by the MTV generation filling the streets with US college kids. I pondered putting on a fake accent just to disassociate myself from them. Quite obviously, the extreme sports industry caters to this crowd. There's bungee jumping from helicopters, parasails and gondolas. Jet boating, sling shotting and other contrived adrenaline experiences are abound. I tried unsuccessfully to coax the parents to give it a go, they declined much to my chagrin.

It has only been in the past six or seven years that the majority of the development has occured in the tourism industry. From our unconfirmed, independent sources, we've found that there is not the same ban on foreign realty investment that Australia holds. Enzed allows money to pour in from mostly US and Japanese retirees who take advantage of the favorable exchange rate - currently at .62 to the dollar, pissing off local residents who find themselves priced out of their own housing market. They should try real estate in California, they'd find that there was nothing to complain about.

posted by ncawthon at 6:18 PM

Wednesday, April 19, 2006

Mashing Up Middle Earth

The scene has changed dramatically, we've continued south along the western coast, ducking inland to traverse the Haast Pass. The waterfalls have been so numerous that it is no longer an amusement unless they are truly majestic.

Our first 'tramp' of the day, as they call hiking here, was to Lake Matheson. About an hour's journey, we arrived at the View of Views lookout, the most photographed scene in EnZed. Yet. I can't recall ever seeing this vista of vistas elsewhere, perhaps with a good looking couple kayaking across a mirror pond with snowy mountain tops in the background.

We've been pulling off the road every few hours to do a quick trail of about twenty to thirty minutes, usually leading to a waterfall or river pools or vistas. The Department of Conservation, or the diggy diggy DOC y'alls, has really responded well to all the tourism that has come to EnZed. The trails are extremely well groomed, marked and mapped. The entire country feels like a well manicured regional park.

We've caught ourselves falling into the Lord of the Rings mindset here, gawking at the mystical landscapes and understamding why these films worked so well here. Everything seems so untouched - like England before there were any people. We're in the high plains area around Lake Wanaka (circa the Kingdom of Rohan - for all you Tolkien fans), where we will hang up our hobbit boots for the night. Every place we've stayed in thus far has had the Lord of the Rings trilogy for guests to view - we've yet to partake, but I'm guessing that there will be many more opportunities to do so.

posted by ncawthon at 7:18 PM

Monday, April 17, 2006

Moving at Glacial Speed

Today was a day of frozen ice. We visited the Franz Joseph and Fox glaciers, located about 25K apart. There are two tourist towns each at the base of their respected glacier, offering helicopter flights and extreme glacial experiences to anyone brave enough. Needless to say, we stuck to the main trail.

The Franz Joseph was the more memorable of the two, having an hour and a half walk to get to the front. Along the way, there were various barriers warning people not to pursue any further, as you would be iniment danger and certain death would result. At the same time, we would look up the trail and see a family with kids strolling merrily along. Couldn't be too dangerous, we thought. Besides, we were residents along the Hayward fault at one point.

Peggy and I snuck under the barrier and made our way close to the mouth of the river that ran through the glacier. All along the banks were giant ice chunks in various states of decay. One wouldn't want to get caught in the mouth of the ice cave when the next piece fell.

Ferns do very well for themselves here, the entire country seems to be covered in rainforest. It is so lush and tropical, what one would imagine Hawaii to be like, except a bit colder. There has been scattered showers - one minute glorious sunshine, the next drenching rain. We're hypothesizing that the Eastern coast will be a bit dryer than the west, given the direction of the weather patterns blowing in from the Tasman Sea.

posted by ncawthon at 7:18 PM

Sunday, April 16, 2006

Blowing Holes and Glowing Worms

Today we scaled the Southern Alps, heading across the Lewis Pass and following down the Buller River towards the Western coastline and the Tasman Sea. The drive was quite scenic (again), climbing and falling in elevation. As we got closer to the coast, the highway began to resemble the central coast of California, with much lusher vegetation. Still, very few settlements apparent on this South Island. Unlike Australia, who have had native residents for 40,000 years, EnZed's Maori settlers arrived about 700 years ago. Still a very young place as far as population is concerned.

We stopped for a look at Pancake Rocks, which is a series of volcanic upcroppings at the ocean with eroded arches and a unique layered appearance to the rocks. There was a short little nature trail which walked us around the different overlooks, going past a blowhole which erupted at high tide.

Down the road from the international rock of pancakes was Hokitika, a town of about 4000. We settled into our spartan cabins and trudged into town for dinner. Being Easter Sunday, we had a bit of difficulty for the second straight night finding a table. The one restaurant we could get a table had a bit of a wait until their staff showed up, so we again wandered the town for a bar to have an apertif. Unfortunately, New Zealand law doesn't allow the sale of liquor on Easter Sunday, except when ordered with dinner. We were lucky enough to find a bar seedy enough to be in violation of this policy. Several Hokitikans were hard at work commemorating their lord's resurrection in their own special way.

After a fantastic meal at the much anticipated French restaurant, we tramped on up the road again for a look at the mysterious glow worms. These tiny worms use their excrement to attract prey to a spun web by burning it off, causing a faint blue glow. The glow worm dell was a short trail which at first looked like nothing, only to turn pitch black and begin to be surrounded by pin pricks of phosphorescent light. The effect reminded me initially of those cheesy glow-in-the-dark adhesive stars in which many a kid would place on their ceiling. The trail ended in total darkness at a small dell (shallow pool) which was surrounded by glow worms, providing quite a surreal effect.

posted by ncawthon at 7:10 PM