Aotearoa, the land of the long white cloud

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Well, it’s that time again and I’m off to a new country on Sunday. New Zealand has been very satisfying in some ways, I feel that the work I’ve helped in has been of real value, but I’ve not been as thrilled by the country as I thought I would be. This may have been due to my restricted abilities as my arm was in plaster for the first three weeks and is still weak and stiff as I write this, so many of the activities that NZ is famous for have been beyond my strength(as well as my wallet).
I arrived five Saturdays ago and got off to a bad start, as the hostel that I was booked in was a hell hole, designed exclusively for eighteen year old binge drinkers. At 1.30 in the morning I had been listening to the pounding bass from the disco next door for two hours when I snapped and stormed off to the reception to demand a different room. I was put into a windowless, airless cell on the tenth floor with seven other beds that gradually filled with falling over drunks throughout the course of the night. Part of my accommodation package was a voucher for my breakfast on Sunday. Very nice except the café concerned did not open on Sundays. This did not improve my mood.
Aukland, turned out to be a smallish city centre, rather like a mini me of Sydney, including a shrunken bridge, harbour and an oil terminal instead of an Opera House. Check out the snap to see what I mean.
After a slightly better night at Aukland Central Backpackers, I was picked up and taken to the project office and accommodation at Mount Eden. Out team leader was off sick today, so the team I was on had a free day. I climbed to the top of Mount Eden, which is not as impressive as it sounds, because the volcanic crater is only two or three hundred feet above street level. When I got up there it gave impressive views of the city centre, only about two miles away, with the Pacific sparkling behind it, and as I turned round to face the opposite direction, I could see the bay that comes from the Tasman straits on the other side of New Zealand, only two or three miles away. Yes, New Zealand is that narrow, where Aukland is.
After lunch I decided to go into the city and walked down into town to the library to check out the email facilities. Oh what joy, I could hook into the wi fi facility for free. It’s a top library, on three floors with a small gallery on the top floor, that I checked out to see the photographic portraits of people from the late nineteenth and early twentieth century in Aukland. I walked back up to Mt. Eden afterwards, which only take twenty five minutes.
The work started on Tuesday and NZ become a lot more interesting. The first week was spent in and around Aukland, but we planted plenty of trees and pulled up lots of weeds, i.e. introduced British plants.
On Saturday, Kazune and I went to the main Art gallery in the afternoon and saw an exhibition of a celebrated NZ artist, who’s name escapes me. We were stopped at the door for a survey. Kazune was very polite in the Japanese way, I was a little more open with my opinion. We then went on to the museum, where we spent the full afternoon. It is a huge place showing the ancient pre history when it was part of Gondwanaland, the history of the Maori and then the arrival of the British. The top floor was the memorial museum of the armed forces, Including a Spitfire in it’s own dedicated room. I was goggling at this when the attendant came round to chuck us out at closing time.
On Sunday, a big gang of us took the ferry to Rangitoto island. This is one of the youngest volcanos in the Aukland area, which erupted only six hundred years ago. It was interesting to see the growth of the vegetation on the island. The lower levels were quite lush, but as you went higher you got to broken lava flows, that looked as though they cooled down only last week and were totally bare, except that on close inspection you could see patches of lichen and moss, which are the first plants to colonize volcanoes and break up the lave so that other plants can follow on. We climbed up to the top of the crater and around the rim in bright sunshine, until we got to the highest spot, looking back towards Aukland. As we ate our sandwiches we could look on with interest as the landmarks of the city were obliterated one by one by the approaching rain clouds. As we started our descent, the rain hit us and one hour later we were huddling, cold, wet and miserable under the cover of the information centre as we waited for the ferry back to town. Still, overall, it was a very enjoyable day.
The second week of work was more interesting than the first as we travelled to the Hunua hills to plant hundreds of grasses, flax, Toe Toe (pronounced toyi toyi} and various species of tree. This was abit more like it, as we stayed in a big cabin by the lake, or rather reservoir, with plentiful native birds all around. I got to light the wood burning stove in the evening and felt like a frontiersman as I chopped the kindling, just like Jed Clampett.
On Saturday night we all went to the Horse and Trap to watch the All Blacks play the Aussies. After a close and hard match, everybody roared at the final whistle as the All Blacks won by one point. A good night was had by all, except the Aussies.
The next project was really special. We first went to the forest to see the huge Kauri trees, reputedly the biggest in the world, a title they dispute with the California redwoods. Then we went to another glorified cabin, which was our home for the next five days. We were to be planting up Kauri saplings in the forests as well as potting up the tinies that had been growing in seed trays for a year. The chap in charge is an interesting character called Stephen King, who has not worn shoes since the age of nine and in the past has chained himself to the top of Kauris to stop them being chopped down. He led a successful campaign to protect them and now they are totally protected and none are allowed to be destroyed. He very much resembles a Hobbit as he wanders round in shorts and his surprisingly big feet for a small man. He has dedicated his life to the Kauris and it is even more amazing, because he will never see any of the trees that he has grown reach maturity, as this takes about five hundred years. While we were in the forests, we planted about three hundred saplings between five and seven feet tall and 1500 seedlings transplanted from seed trays to individual pots. When we looked at the huge greenhouse type thing we had filled, it was difficult to imagine where all these seedlings are going to live. Incidentally, while I was there, Bruce and I removed the plaster cast from my arm, and a shriveled wrinkly twig duly emerged from it’s six week old cocoon.
The following week was Tawharanui (pronounced Taffranoowi). This is a finger of land sticking out into the Pacific that is a kind of Noah’s Ark for the mainland. There is a predator proof fence that seals of the peninsula at one end and of course, the sea protects the other three sides. The problem that NZ wildlife has is that it evolved without mammalian predators, until the humans arrived with pigs, rats, rabbits, then stoats and ferrets to keep the rabbit population down. Now that predators have been (almost) eradicated on Tawharanui, Kiwis have been reintroduced and are breeding once again and many other bird species have re established themselves.
After my four weeks of work, I started my week of independence at the Bay of Islands, where I spent a couple of days. On the Sunday I had to check out of the hostel at ten, while the bus didn’t leave until four, so I decided to put my case in a locker that cost four dollars, (two quid) while I wondered around. I decided to hire a kayak and paddle round the islands and went back to get the waterproof housing for my little camera from my case in the locker. Big mistake! If I wanted to open the locker to get the casing out I would have to pay another four dollars and the only change I had was the four dollars I had put in twenty minutes ago, so I decided to risk it, and went out with the camera in the little pouch on the front of the life jacket which I assumed was waterproof. All went well, and I took some snaps of my voyage, until the time came to beach my craft at the hire place, when I found out that the combination of stiff knees and a left arm with no strength in it meant that I couldn’t get out of the Kayak. I thought a little and tried looking helpless so that someone would come out of the hut and help me, but eventually I tried turning the boat sideways on to the beach. Big mistake number two, as the waves tipped me unceremoniously into the briny, soaking me thoroughly, including what I thought was the waterproof pocket, That now had water pouring out of the mesh that was the bottom half of the pocket. Oops! The camera had got a drenching, and although the snaps were safely on the card, the camera was now defunct. Sorry Anna, your birthday present to me didn’t last very long.
On Monday, I caught the bus to Rotorua, the place that is full of bubbling mud springs and geysers. To say I was disappointed when I got there is a bit of an understatement. The town itself is just basic NZ type single story wooden houses and shops, the lake is surrounded by flat countryside covered in pine plantations and every geyser is safely behind bars with a ninety dollar (forty quid) fee to see it. Everything that you wanted to do cost ninety or a hundred dollars or even more to do. Rotorua, the rip off capital of the southern hemisphere. I hired a bike, still expensive, but just within the bounds of reason, for four hours and went to see the giant redwoods in a pine plantation. These were quite impressive, but nowhere near as big as the Kauri and the rest of the ride was along forestry tracks just like back home. Even the birds were mostly British exports; chaffinch, sparrow, redpoll, goldfinch and blackbird. After three and a half hours, my left arm was throbbing and so I rode back to town. It had felt good to be back on a bike for the first time since February.
Enough of Rotorua and on to Lake Taupo, which was much better, surrounded by hills and mountains, one of which played the part of Mount Doom in The Lord of the Rings. It was still expensive, but a more scenic area and the lake was much more impressive than Rotorua lake. They are both water filled craters from volcanic explosions, but because Rotorua is still active, the water is too acidic for much aquatic life, whereas Taupo is apparently full of introduced trout and is not surrounded by a kind of sulpherous scum.. I decided that my arm was still too weak for the white water rafting, so I took a gentle cruise on a replica steam boat out to some Maori rock carvings, which are quite impressive, even though they are modern.
And so, back to Aukland to stay in the YHA for a couple of nights while I wait for my flight. My time in New Zealand has been good and I have seen some nice places, but nothing inspiring. If I ever get back here, most of my time would be spent on South Island, where there is a thrilling vista waiting around every bend in the road. I would of course be on a motor bike. Much of the north is farmland, so as I’ve travelled I’ve seen lots of sheep, cattle and alpacas, lots of American Radiata pine in sterile plantations, but it has been like travelling through Britain with all the beautiful villages, stately homes and castles removed. I’m now looking forward to Ecuador and swotting up on the Spanish phrase book on the twelve hour flight. See you in November.

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Photos

Aukland Harbour bridge
Not as spectacularly beautiful as Sydney, but you can get out on the ferries just as easily

Aukland from Devenport
Devenport is a nice little resort just a twenty minute ferry ride away. It's a bit like a genteel Devon village with views from the topsof dormant volcanos

Aukland harbour
They nickname Aukland "The City of Sails", because of all the boats here. Lots of small sailing boats mingle with the ferries, the warships docking on Devenport and the big container ships.

Turned out nice again.
A nice tripto the seaside after we had planted all our Kauris for the day.

Baby Lord of the Forest
One of my colleagues planting a Kauri. To see what it will look like in a few years time (well, a thousand or so), see the net picture.

Tane Mahuta
The Lord of the forest. The tallest existing Kauri, about two hundred and fifty feet high. Watch out Blackpool Tower, in another thousand years it will be as tall as you.

A Kauri tree posing with me
This is quite a big Kauri. They all have names, but I've forgotten this ones. Sorry, I've never been good with names.

Kingfisher
This was a regular fishing post for this Tawharanui kingfisher

new Zealand Dotterel
These birds are still fairly uncommon. This one was in Tawharanui reserve.

Pied stilts
Recovering their numbers wherever European mammalian predator numbers are controlled.

The gang at Tawharanui
I shared a cabin with these people lus Bruce who was taking the snap for four nights.

Waxeye
These lovely little birds are quite approachable, but won't keep still for more than half a second. Very tricky to take a snap of.

Pukako
These things are like giant moorhens, and are common wherever there is fresh water and open pasture.

Killer Kayaks
One of these devils tipped me into the Pacific Oceon. Well, alright onto the beach.

Macdonalds advert
Rotorua Mcdonalds. This is the way to get noticed

Birds in the mist
The birds roost in Rotorua even though there is nothing for them to eat in the soda filled water. The steam in the background is from a vent on the other side of the small bay.

Black Swan
They have them here as well as Australia and they are not artificial imports either

A Giant Redwood
Not as giant as all that really, but they were only planted a hundred years ago. They wanted to find out what species of Pine was best for their timber industry to replace the kauri that they had cut down.

me on a boat
This is the replica of the steam boat that used to ferry people and goods around Lake Taupo. Unfortunately it has diesel engines, but it is still a pleasant cruise to the rock carvings.

Maori rock carvings
As you can see, the boat got quite close. The facial tattos represent the family tree of this famous Maori warrior.

Behold Mount Doom
The volcano shaped volcano in the distance played the part of Mount Doom in the Lord of the Rings films. I didn't see any orcs though and the weather was too nice for the eye in the sky, or whatever it was.