January 15th and January 15th- Heading for home
We leave late in the afternoon of January 15th from Sydney and arrive back in Fort Worth late afternoon of January 15th. Total elapsed time… about two hours. Qantas must have a really fast airplane?
It has been a wonderful trip. Kudos to Susan for all her planning that made it so enjoyable. We have seen many sights and met people who will always be friends.
Now it’s time to get back to family, friends, Cessna, Kincaid’s, Hot Tub’s, Railhead and Tex-Mex.
See you in Texas!
January 13 Last day in Blenheim
Sorry about the TV debut confusion yesterday. NBC postponed the Chase show until next Wednesday (Jan 19th), unless “Minute to Win It” goes into overtime.
Taking a short break from Marlborough wine tasting, our Czech companions indulge Mike and take a detour to the Omaka Heritage Air Center. This is an experiential air museum dedicated to flyers in World War I. Peter Jackson’s (Lord of the Rings) film production company designed and created this one of a kind museum. The pictures show off the unique design. If you expected another hangar with carefully restored aircraft sitting on their landing gear, surrounded by rope barriers, you will be surprised and delighted with this presentation.
The aircraft are shown in scenes in the condition they would have presented when they were in service… dirty, oily, patched… some with bullet holes… some crashed in muddy fields. Each scene is a reenactment of an actual occurrence during the war. Examples: Baron Von Richthofen’s (the Red Baron) final flight, with British troops taking souvenirs from his crashed tri-plane. A wounded airman being carried to a waiting US Red Cross ambulance. A downed British pilot surrendering to his German counterpart with his Camel crashed into a tree ina snow covered pasture. Just a first rate experience and unlike any air museum I have ever seen. (Pilot friends, e mail me and I’ll send more pictures)
More vineyards to sample before the day is over. Maria (Ria) our designated driver, pilots us to four more tastings, before we surrender and break for fudge.
Dinner with Richard and Ria (who have agreed to visit in Fort Worth in May) at Gibbs. This restaurant is a small farmhouse way off the road back in one of the vineyards. Interesting conversation with our favorite Czechs as they were born under the Russian’s control and they grew up in a very controlled environment. Then, when the Soviet Union collapsed, their lives abruptly shifted from control to freedom.
Ria told us about her first trip outside Czechoslovakia to Vienna as an 18 year old. (Czechs were not allowed to leave the country under the Soviets.) She was stunned by the retail goods in Austria that simply were not available in her country. Imagine living in a country where you are required to take language lessons to learn the language of your oppressors? Both have adapted well and thrived, but we wonder how many people in Eastern Europe had difficulty making the change… or simply could not cope.
They were polite about it, but it was obvious they blame 40 years under the Soviets on the settlements between the Allies at the end of WWII. They are correct of course. The US, Britain, France and the other western Allies sold out the people in Eastern Europe to appease the Russians.
Perhaps that should be a reminder to our current politicians and statesmen so that they may remember that ending a conflict is not the goal, rather reaching the correct solution for the people who are going to live with the solution is the real goal.
Tomorrow is a travel day from Blenheim to Auckland to Sydney. We are carefully weighing luggage. That last 6 ounces of fudge may put us over the limit. I guess I’ll have to eat it to be safe?
January 11, 12
New Zealand’s south island is a long skinny land mass that has a ridgeline like a backbone that runs its entire length, north to south. As we fly from Queenstown to Wellington, we see a curious weather (weether) pattern. In the west side of the ridge, not a cloud in the sky. On the east side, low clouds right down on the deck. Must be a terrain feature that causes it?
After a few hours in Wellington, we are on the 15 minute commuter flight to Blenheim. The airfield shares a New Zealand Air Force base with the civilian terminal. On the field are 17 A-4 Skyhawk fighters wrapped in white plastic, as they have remained for over 10 years awaiting sale. NZ Air Defense has been trying to sell these relicts to a purported US buyer. The NZ government has spent $11 million to store them and $2 million in legal and consulting fees. Now the sale has fallen through and they plan to give them to museums as static displays. After sitting in a humid climate, wrapped in plastic, engines not pickled, they would be of no other practical use anyhow. Who knows what it would cost to get one flying again.
On to the Marlborough Vineyard Hotel in the Blenheim wine district. Our room is a small cottage/apartment at the edge of a vineyard.
After settling in, we catch a ride to Herzog’s Restaurant that is one vineyard over from the hotel. Run by German’s with precise efficiency, we are seated in a beautiful patio and forced to drink a ‘mandatory’ before dinner champagne or wine. Then we are marched to our table to order from tonight’s dinner selection. The food is excellent, the service is obsequious, the schedule runs like a Swiss watch. They have a system that is set in stone. If you go there, just understand you will do what you are told and accept what they serve as they serve it. Exceptions are not encouraged and barely tolerated. “You vill enchoy the food and the vine, ja! Ve do not serve crackers mit de cheeses.” Great meal anyhow.
January 10
Planes, trains and automobiles… no, I mean to say “boats, helicopters and gondolas”
We told you about all the adventure stuff they promote in Queenstown. Today, we succumbed to the hype. Actually we had planned to take the Shotover River jet boat in a reenactment of when we were here 15 years ago. Only this time we bought the “combo package”. It consists of the jet boat, followed by a helicopter trip over the mountain ridge and a gondola ride down the mountain to town. After all, Queenstown is the adventure capital of the world!
Up early to get to the jet boat dock on the Shotover River. This river was the second largest alluvial gold find in the world. In 1862, miners clustered along its banks and took millions in gold dust and nuggets out. Now the Maori tribe who owns this operation takes million in dollars, Euros, pesos, rupees, yen and rubles from the tourists who cluster along its banks.
We are issued stylish back rain coats and life vests and climb aboard a custom made, twin engine jet boat that weighs 3,000 pounds empty and draws 10 centimeters of water under its keel. Its’ propulsion is from twin streams of water that are spurted out the rear of the outdrives.
Our driver is a young man who possesses absolutely no common sense. He revved up the throttle and we hurtle down a rock strewn river at 50 knots. He dodges boulders, trees and gravel bars with one hand on the wheel and occasionally lifts his water spotted sunglasses to locate the next target of opportunity. At the last second he swerves to miss a crash that would surely hole the hull and disturb Susan. Occasionally, he raises a finger in a circular motion and we spin around in the rushing water and we get full benefit of the rain gear they issued us. In spite of all this, Susan is giggling and screaming. I will remind her of this next time she gives me driving advice.
January 9
Jack’s Point Golf Club
Some investors paid a lot of money to build a housing development and a Jack Nicklaus designed golf course on an old sheep station (station means ranch in Texas) just in time for the recession to hit them. Almost no houses are built, but Jack’s Point Golf Club is in great shape.
We are the beneficiaries of their real estate debacle. We played on a sunshiny Sunday morning and had the whole golf course to ourselves. At $110 New Zealand for green fee and cart, it was the best golf bargain we have seen on this trip. The course runs along a ridge line that overlooks the lake and the city of Queenstown. It has interesting terrain and dramatic views from almost each tee box.
A grass airstrip alongside the course was busy with jump planes carrying skydivers up and dropping them over head. We could hear their chutes pop open and their screaming as they descended. Why someone would choose to jump out of a perfectly good airplane puzzles me. If it was on fire or a wing fell off, I can understand, but otherwise a jump into the thin air would certainly result in some serious dry cleaning.
Back to Q-town for lazy afternoon of strolling the village and watching the rugby championships on a field next to our hotel. We grabbed late lunch at Fergburger’s (pronounced Fergie burger). Big burger. Not our taste. Busy spot though, so some people must like them.
A grandmother from Maryland, who is on a five week backpacking trip with her 15 year old grandson, sat next to us at Fergburger. She told us she had heard about the shooting in Arizona. We got the news flash on the internet and a brief story on BBC TV. Tragic story, but we have no details yet.
Back to the Queenstown Park Hotel for our next to last night in Q-town.
January 8
Flying to and cruising on Milford Sound
Before today’s episode something requires clearing up. We have always believed we were going to Milford Sound. We found out on our tour it’s not true, even though all the literature and signage says Milford Sound. This place is in point fact a ‘fjord’. I know we were shocked too. Shocked.
I asked the tour guide, “If narrow body of water surrounded on three sides by steep, rocky cliffs is called a ‘fjord’; and on the other hand, a narrow body of water surrounded on three sides by steep, rocky cliffs is called a ‘sound’, pray tell what is the difference? He stared past me and tried to ignore the question. But I persisted. He stammered and his young female assistant jumped in and offered, “A ‘sound’ is a body of water that was formed by erosion. A fjord is a body of water that was formed by ‘glaciers’.
I was about to get into how anyone would know whether Milford was glacier formed or erosion formed, since its formation took place before we had the Discovery Channel, but Susan had me firmly gripped by the elbow, so that question will have to wait. Hopefully the confusion over ‘sound’ versus ‘fjord’ has been permanently put to rest in your mind now.
No clouds or rain and almost no wind make this a perfect day to make up for our washed out flight to Milford Sound. We arrive on the back side of Queenstown Airport and join up with Captain Hank of Air Milford. As we load aboard his Cessna Caravan (single-engine, turbine, fixed-gear aircraft) he motions for Mike to sit in the right seat up front with him. Mike likes.
Soon we rumble down the grass taxiway and turn into what little wind exists and we are off and turning left between mountains as we climb at an anemic 500 feet a minute at 80 knots. I thought this was a turbine airplane. Come on, our old Cessna 340 will outperform this. The Caravan is a dog.
Captain Hank makes this trip four or five times per day so he knows every rock along the way. Well he does as we almost scrape wingtips on the peaks while he narrates a sightseeing monologue naming each mountain top and glacier along the way. At 8,500 feet we are above the cumulo-granite and headed down hill to the airstrip in Milford Sound. When Hank turns between two jagged peaks, Susan’s xanax starts to wear off.
The air charter operators all fly into the box canyon from the Tasman Sea on the right side of the fjord and out bound along the opposite cliff line. It passes for pattern separation Milford style. About 25 aircraft are on the ground when we arrive.
A short shuttle takes us to our sightseeing boat and we are cruising outbound in the sound. The views are magnificent. Stone cliffs soar almost straight up over 3,000 feet. Waterfalls cascade thousands of feet breaking over the rocks into the blue water of the fjord. We slow down to watch the seals sunning on the rocks. In the return trip, the Captain puts the bow of the ship into a waterfall and those who are demented happily stand under the spray until they are soaked with icy water.
Back to Captain Hank who takes us on a nature walk that leads back to the airstrip. After a quick 35 minutes of rock watching from the airplane as we claw our way from sea level to over 8,000 feet and we are soon pointed downhill to Queenstown airdrome. Nothing I ever do in our airplane will scare Susan after this.
Dinner tonight was arranged for us by our host at Kauri Cliffs last week so we could tour his new hotel in Queenstown. We invited our new Czech friends, Richard and Ria to join us and they accept. The pictures do not do justice to the Matakauri Lodge. The cluster of lodges perches overlooking Lake Wakatipu and each room on the property has a view.
The manager of Matakauri was formerly an assistant manager at Kimberley Lodge in Russell where we were married. We figured out she worked there about two years after we left. Small world? Wait.
Some of you have traveled with Susan and you know she is normally very reserved and shy. However today she came out of her shell and began to talk with everyone in sight. On the flight to Milford she met a young couple from California, Shan and Sonya on their honeymoon. The man grew up in Grapevine, Texas, graduated from Colleyville High, went to MIT, worked for Microsoft, started a software company that he sold to Google and now works at Google. But, that is all she found out about him. They are staying at the Matakauri Lodge where we are having dinner, so we agree to meet for a drink.
We are seated for dinner and we recognize two couples adjacent to our table were also with us at Kauri Cliffs last week, so Susan chats them up. One couple offers they live in Naples, Florida where Susan’s mother resides. The woman asks, “What is your mother’s name?” When told, “Ann Jacobson”, she squealed, “I know Ann Jacobson. We belong to the same temple!”
Remember the newlywed couple we met on the flight to Milford? At this moment they walked in. So Susan went around the room in introducing everyone.
In order to describe the young Czech couple’s facial expressions while observing this exchange between Susan and a room full of former strangers who now know each other well, allows me to use a new expression I learned on this trip… “Gob smacked”. It roughly translates to “I would not have believed it if I had not seen it with my own eyes”.
I have seen this before with this woman and while I am still impressed, I have come to expect it.
Dinner was great too. Highly recommend Matakauri Lodge.
January 7
Nothing but blue skies come our way
We read the e edition of the Fort Worth Star Telegram every day, so we know what you Fort Worthians are up to in our absence. However, one item puzzles us. When we read our horoscopes for the day, are we reading about today’s forecast or tomorrow’s. Remember, when is Saturday here, it is Friday there.
I don’t know much about horoscope science except that they certainly would not print them in the paper if they were not totally proven to be accurate. But, beside the ‘which day’ problem, since horoscopes are based on the alignment of the stars and planets, are they looking at the sky view from the Northern hemisphere or the Southern? Wouldn’t that make a big difference? What about the stars you can’t see from the southern hemisphere? If any of you can clear this up for us, please respond. We are planning on purchasing a lottery ticket and need to know when to pull the trigger.
January 6th Queenstown- Like some cheese with that whine?
Repeat the sentence in quotations out loud. Hint- where you see double ‘ee’s, draw them out like ‘eeeee’. Say this out loud and slowly. “The weether ees cool and ryni theese morning, but eet will be beeter by eleeveen and cleah by seeveen.” If your office mates are looking at you strangely, it is not only that you have been busted for using the company’s computer for personal goofing around, but because you sound just like a Kiwi. Congratulations!
During the night, we woke up to heavy rain running down the gutters. We are scheduled to fly over the mountain to Milford Sound this morning in a light aircraft. The tour operator says they will make a decision on whether they will fly at 9 a.m. Mike has looked out the window and already made his decision. Light rain, low hanging cloud bases and valley fog in mountainous terrain that looks like news footage from Afghanistan. No aviating for Mike today. Bummer.
On to plan B. Susan quickly arranged a trip to the wineries near Q-town. In our rain gear we join up with 12 other un-happy campers and make the best of our first bad weather day since we began the trip. Two vineyards, a fabulous lunch and a cheesery (yes that is so a word… see photo) later we are in better spirits.
We make friends with our bus mates and get better acquainted. Hard to be grumpy when you are sampling wine and cheese and mingling with like minded people.
Back to our super trendy hotel. It is still pouring rain. We try to read, but end up asleep with the books on our chests. We do rally in time for the nightly wine reception and meet new people from Australia and the Czech Republic. They shut down the lobby party at 7:30, so we are forced to venture out in the drizzle. We trudge down to Winnie’s and eat pizza with the locals and watch cricket on the telly.
Made the best of a rainy day in the adventure capital of the world.
January 5th- On to Queenstown on the South Island
You may know that New Zealand consists of two islands, North and South. (Actually there are un-numbered smaller islands, but the locals only speak of the North and South when they describe their land so we will honor their custom here.)
They seem to enjoy similar prejudices as Americans from North and South in their opinons of each other. Those on the North Island (Auckland, etc.) will portray the South Island as a few thousand people surrounded by millions of sheep, goats and deer. Those on the South Island are extremely proud of their rural heritage and outdoors activities and speak contemptuously of urban problems in the North. So, Bubba versus Metrosexual conflicts may be universal?
Today we left the North Island and flew to Queenstown on the South island. Queenstown is a lake and ski resort, It’s a small jewel of a city sits on the shore Lake Wakatipu and is surrounded on the other three sides by 6,000 foot mountains. The only outdoor activity they don’t have here is nude sky-diving, but I am sure they would arrange it if requested.
It will make you tired just reading the brochures. These people are fit, tan and buff. They all look like ski instructors in Aspen or Vail. They offer bungee jumping, parasailing, zip lining, white water rafting, black water rafting, cave exploration, jet boat rides, hiking trips, rock climbing and mountain biking. And that’s just in the summer. These people will wear you out and then work on you some more.
Our first day in Q-town, the activity we opted for was drinking wine and eating canapés in our hotel lobby. Why not? We had the stamina for it and went for it. Seemed like a better option. Give me break… rock climbing?
We are in the Queenstown Park Hotel, a terrific, small, extremely contemporary hotel, just off the main business center. It features a reception for the guests in the lobby every evening. Over refreshments, we meet our hosts, John and Donna, who own and operate the place.
The other guests are an eclectic group. We spend most of our time with an about-to-retire Professor of Engineering and his wife, who live in Cambridge, England. He had worked with engineering colleagues at UT and A&M. I had worked with my co-workers in the UK. So the language barrier was lessened.
On to a Thai restaurant for dinner, on the recommendation of our hosts and to bed after a day of travel from North to South.
A perfect day in a perfect place – January 4th
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| Golf Kauri Cliffs Style |
You may have heard that money cannot buy happiness. That is a foul lie.
Money bought us a very happy day at Kauri Cliffs. Let me describe and you decide: Up with the birds chirping in the forest outside our cottage window. A short walk to the lodge for breakfast. Down to the pro shop to get our clubs and cart. Eighteen holes on a world class golf course that overlooks the Pacific in about three hours, because we are the only ones on the course.
Then, the kitchen packs us a picnic lunch and a driver takes us down to Waiaua Beach for an afternoon on a wide sand beach in a private cove.
Back to the spa in time for massages. Cocktails on the putting green where we compete in spirited putting contest. Dinner at our regular table on the veranda. After dinner drinks in the salon. Back to bed at our cottage in the forest.
Regardless of your opinion, we believe all it takes is money.
Welcome back to the land of the Maori and the Kiwi
We arrive in Auckland late on January 2 and taxi to a deserted Westin hotel on the harbor. Susan interrogates the bellman and discovers the investors and Westin are in a dispute and approximately 150 rooms have been taken out of service. No worries. Our junior suite has flush plumbing and hot water so we are set for the night.
We have regained two hours on the time zone so Mike is not ready for bed and goes to the nearby casino, plays blackjack for about 45 minutes to win our cab fare to the airport next morning. A text from Susan alerts him ESPN is showing the Rose Bowl replay, so he gets back to the hotel in time to see TCU win again.
Next morning, January 3rd, we hop a commuter flight from Auckland to Kerikeri that is only 35 minutes. Our Kerikeri driver drops us off in Paihia at the ferry dock and takes our luggage on to the Kauri Lodge. We chug across the bay on the slow ferry from Paihia to Russell, the tiny village that was the inspiration for this trek back to the south pacific. As we walk up the dock into Russell, we see that nothing in the village is changed. High street still has a handful of shops and pubs. Maybe there are a few more homes up in the hills around town built in the last 15 years?
After a quick lunch on the waterfront in Russell we catch the ferry back to Paihia and join up with our driver for the 30 minute ride to Kauri Cliffs. We leave the highway and turn down a gravel road for about two miles and come upon a gate with a call box. The gate swings open and we enter the 6,000 acre estate that is Kauri Cliffs. Another two miles and we are at the main building which looks like a tropical plantation headquarters, maybe something out of Africa? It sits on a hill overlooking the Pacific. The staff greets us on the drive and welcomes us in for drink and property tour.
The place has guest cottages for about 50 people. Each cottage is in the forest and has a balcony with a view either the ocean or the golf course. The facilities are all elegant, but extremely comfortable. The golf course is rated by some of the magazine as in the top 50 in the world. It also has a spa and fitness center, tennis courts, riding, hiking and shooting. The staff is mostly young people from all over the world who live in a dorm on the property. Anything a guest mentions is usually delivered in few minutes. We find out the owner, Julian Robertson, is on the property so everyone is extraordinarily on their toes.
Drinks begin at six in the salon and dinner begins service at 7 in the dining room and on the veranda. Men wear jackets. It is very civilized. Guests are from all over the world. During our time on the property, there are people from England, France, Spain and Russia. Some arrive by car like us, but several arrive by helicopter. We settle in after dinner, because we have an early tee time the next morning.
January 2, 2011
Today is moving day from Australia to New Zealand. We have really enjoyed our time in Sydney. We have made some good friends and experienced some unusual scenes and activities. So as we go, we are feeling some regret about some things we did not get to do, but looking forward to returning to Kiwi land.
Susan took a early walk on Bondi Beach to Bronte Beach with her new friend, Suanne Adelman.
Some girl time exercising and a stop for coffee at Suanne's regular java joint. It was just like home, except for the photo op with the Bondi Surf Rescue Team.
Australians have been wonderful to us and we feel they are like our companions in Texas in many ways. They are outgoing, fun, irreverent, unpretentious and open to strangers. They like to laugh and pull jokes on others and enjoy one on themselves.
Maybe we are like them because our histories are similar. We have read in the history books that Australia was settled as a penal colony for criminals from England. Like most things in history books, that is somewhat accurate, but there is much more to the story.
In the late 1700’s, England was an overcrowded country with a great deal of poverty and a class system that kept those at the bottom firmly in their place. Property crimes could be a hanging offense. The prisons could not hold all the population who were jailed just for stealing food. So for almost 100 years, about 650,000 convicts were shipped to Australia to work off their sentences. While some were probably hardened criminals, many were just caught up in an economic system that placed them in jail. Usually they were freed after seven years of servitude in Australia and could return to England. Most chose to stay.
In the US, our criminal justice system was not nearly so efficient as England’s, so our frontiersman who settled our wilderness were often un-convicted men and women fleeing the authorities. That is particularly true of Texas. Both our countries had a minor, but significant number of their early occupants who were not an approved component of the “civilized” societies from whence they came.
However, many more early settlers were neither convicts nor fugitives from the law, but people with entrepreneurial instincts who had the vision to see that an insular society was never going to allow them the opportunities they would find in the frontier. Just as the Western land rush populated empty territories in the US, a gold rush brought many more early settlers to Australia than the convicts we read about the history books.
In the Midwest, we heard about the courage of our pioneers who loaded their wagons with their household goods in Kansas City and departed for Oregon, Utah or California. But think about the mindset of someone who would board a dinky sailing ship in Plymouth, England with just a bag of belongings and set sail across the most treacherous oceans in the world to a land on the other side of the earth.
The happy result for both our countries is we created a population of productive people who were enthusiastic about the future and eager to improve their personal situations with the force of their enthusiasm and hard work.
See you in New Zealand!
New Year’s Day Sydney-side
We have the flu. Must be going around? Doses of Advil and black coffee are the cure. Could it have been something we ate… or drank? Healing nicely by about 11:00, so we decide to do the Sydney-sider’s New Year’s Day and take the ferry to Manly Beach.
Short ferry ride to the other side of the Harbor and we are walking through a corridor of shops, pubs and restaurants shoulder to shoulder with the entire population of Sydney. At the end of the “Corso”, the beach stretches from left to right. All sorts of bodies are sun bathing, sitting under umbrellas, swimming and surfing. Everyone from two year olds to grandmas is enjoying the first sunshine of 2011.
Susan runs into the surf for a quick swim while Mike rests his eyes under his hat on the beach. A lazy day at Manly is the custom and it is a good one. We look for lunch along the Corso, but find no black-eye peas. Bummer. We’ll get some as soon as we return to Fort Worth. We need the luck.
Back to Sydney on the ferry and upon reaching the dock; realize how fortunate we were to go early. The next ferry is sold out and the line to board the following ferry to Manly is two blocks long and growing.
We catch a movie and get home early. Tomorrow is moving day.
