Road Trip
January 30, 2006
Hokianga Harbour, North Island, New Zealand
9:01pm.
Five days. 1400 kilometres. Five different beds. A car that smells of melted butter and stale crackers and here I sit, looking out at the Tasman Sea, close to the top of the North Island, and just an hour away from our second to last New Zealand destination. I am all swirled with melancholy and relief as the trip nears the end. It felt weird getting back on the ferry in Picton, to travel the Cook Strait, leaving the South Island for pretty assuredly the last time in my life. Hence the melancholy. The relief comes from inching closer to the return home, the scary familiar and of course, the wonderful unknown.
It all started back on the 25th, where we drove three and half hours from Ruby Bay to Blenheim. Our friends, the early retirees, with their methodically verbal son, bought a house about 20kms north of Blenheim, the South Island’s third biggest city, on a nice piece of land that looks out to the gnarly Pacific. The sand is black and pebbly. The garden is exotic and will take effort to maintain.
Glenn is tall and nerdy. Tana is earthy and cackles when she laughs. Their son, well, his speech pattern has accelerated past sloth on Valium like and is now a bit more normal, and a little less annoying. He is smart and builds things and does not watch television at all. Qualities I do not mind Hud aping. He is a tad strange, and very clingy to his mother, who walks him like a dog sometimes for fun. Even having him eat cereal that looks like pet food from a bowl on the floor. Good boy heh heh. Good times.
We spent the night where I started gulping too many beers the moment I started to get a little bored, which was surprisingly late in the evening. Steph claims she had to lead me to the bathroom a couple of times due to my weird sleepwalking habit, but I think she just makes this up so I will suck up to her the next day. If she is, all the power to her, it works, I am at her whim after hearing tales of my pathetic imbibed murmuring as I trudge around strange locations looking for interesting places to drain the main vein. She managed to corral my bowling pin body ensuring all corners and dishwashers remained urine free. The next morning we left, it was a good time and they were nice people who were very nice to Hud and us. My bitterness stems from the fact they are able to spend the rest of their lives wondering what to do this afternoon, go for another sea kayak or another gentle round wine tasting. I am deep as new sidewalk hoark, I know.
The ferry ride from Picton to Wellington was basically the same as the first time, spent in the basement of the big boat, watching Hud on the intermingled tubes and slides, which serve as a playground. This is fine except for the whole area reeks of kid head sweat and on occasion, older kids, kids whose parents banished to the basement so they could sip lattes in peace, get a little out of hand and I fear for Hud’s safety. We did manage to see some of the Marlborough Sounds on the way out, before the secret smokers overwhelmed us and we had to leave. The Pacific Princess it isn’t.
We arrived in Wellington a little after 4:30 and were only a few minutes away from our hotel. We checked in without incident and ordered pizza for dinner. The last time we were in Wellington we ordered pizza as well. It is a local company that we remembered for its great taste. This time we did not have a menu so when I ordered I asked for a meat one for me and a Margarita one for Steph and Hud. The guy on other end (who was way too happy and eager and kept on saying “sweet as”, which I think is the New Zealand version of “right on” or simply “cool”) did not know what a Margarita pizza was, so I told him, it’s just tomato sauce and cheese. Sweet as! He said and hung up. Dum dum dum, time passes, the pizzas arrive and I have a slice of mine and it is as good as I remember it. Steph tries hers. She tries another bite. Taste this she says and I do. Is that ketchup she asks? I try it again. Yes, I reply. Tomato sauce is ketchup here in New Zealand. They gave us a ketchup and cheese pizza. It was gross and after the fourth slice I just couldn’t have anymore. That night in bed we ordered Wedding Crashers and laughed our self to sleep.
The next day we went to the Qantas office and booked our flight home. We arrive in Vancouver at 7:40pm on March 14, 2006. It means leaving our last destination one day early, but the only other flight that worked was on March 29th, and we are broke enough as it is. So that is that. Off to Taupo.
The drive from Wellington to Taupo is about 370kms, about five hours with stops and treacherous curves. Our location for the night is a bed and breakfast we found online. We had not really stayed at a bed and breakfast on the trip and wanted another opportunity to meets some true Kiwis along the way. We found the place with relative ease; it was a new house, just outside of the town of Taupo, overlooking a river. It was a great location and a nice house. The couple who owned the house, Kim and Martin, were retired farmers, both very rural people who had sold everything and moved into the “city”. Both were hard of hearing, Kim calling Hud, Hutton for the first couple of hours. Martin was a salty fart, with crisscrossed yellow teeth, telling me yarns about one thing, like traffic, before being led into another tale completely different, like his golf backswing, all with me just nodding politely. I think I have figured out why people open their homes to let travelers stay. It’s not the extra income. It’s to have someone to talk to. I did my best not to be rude, but I just drove five hours and was just not in the mood to be someone’s conversation sponge. I slipped away and lay on the bed, allowing Steph do the listening.
Our area was two bedrooms, a toilet and a nice soaker tub. Out of curiosity I opened the closet doors to see what extra pillows and blankets were available. Sitting on the shelf, on top of one the pillows, I noticed the familiar pink and bubbly design of a pair of panties. Panties. Panties. They were kind of tossed up there and I thought it odd the closet was not cleaned prior to our arrival. I picked them up, thinking I would just give them to Kim. Oh goodie, they were….dirty. Dirty Panties was the name of my first punk rock band, how weird is that.
Needless to say, I folded them and put them back on the pillow, saving Kim and I the face-to-face embarrassment.
Later that night, after a Thai food dinner in Taupo, we returned and they showed us to a sitting room where we were able to watch some television. Hud went down pretty easy, being gymnast flexible again about all the different beds he sleeps in. Steph was mucking about so I sat down in the chair across from a large television screen ready to catch up on some sports due to their ESPN channel. Sniff. Sniff. Yikes. This chair reeked of old guy bum. I know it sounds gross but it was true. Martin must have sat in this chair six hours a day watching Sky TV; the Murdoch owned satellite television empire. I moved to the couch and watched a game of Texas Hold’em Poker.
The next day, Kim made us a nice breakfast, satisfying the other B. Hud of course schmoozed them both into thinking he was their grandson, and I thought they might shed a tear when he hugged them goodbye. We were off to Whangamata to spend two days with the Pugh’s, a family of five we got to know during our eight week stay in the Coromandel back in the Sept/Oct.
Before we left I did manage to sneak in a swim in Lake Taupo, New Zealand’s biggest lake and the site of a lot of holiday homes and motels. It was clear up to about ten feet, and a little cold, but man do I love swimming in fresh water.
Hud came in for a spell, dunking his head then demanding I return him to shore to his mother and a warm towel.
This is also the spot where our camera finally broke, for good this time, after 4350 pictures, forcing us to make an impulsive purchase of a new one. Not a tremendously expensive one, but one that will take quality pictures for the next six weeks and then some.
The drive from Taupo takes four hours or so (back through Rotorua! Fart town!) and we pulled into Brenden and Sheridan’s driveway around three or so. They were all there, swimming in their small but totally refreshing pool. They have three kids, a six-year-old girl, a four-year-old boy and a six-month-old baby girl. He is a painter/plasterer and she is a stay at home mom. They live in a five bedroom home moments off the main strip of the surf town of Whangamata, winter population 5,000, and summer population 50,000. Steph met Sheridan at play centre back in the fall, and we shared a couple of meals back then, becoming friendly enough to be invited us back to stay at their place for two nights as we make our way back up the North Island.
It was great. These are ex-Aucklanders who moved to a smaller town to focus on their family and try to eliminate stress. He is a bit wound up and very opinionated but a good old boy who likes a good steak and a cold beer.
She is sweet woman with a nice smile who takes care of the household with a bit of an iron fist. Their kids are well behaved and fun, the four-year old being an excellent playmate for Hudson.
The first night we just ate dinner and reacquainted. The next day Steph and I found ourselves at the grocery store alone, Hud too enamored with toys to care where we were. It was an odd feeling, both of us constantly looking behind us to see where Hudson was. We need a date night Steph and I, a real Saturday night, Sunday morning special.
That night, other people came over for a BBQ, including Tina with her daughter Sasha. She was the daughter of one of the couples who lived across the street from us in Onemana. Six year old girls are kind of fun, even if they do enjoy slapping me around a little. I still dug the attention.
It was great for the kids, six of them racing around, playing dress up, eating sausages on the bun (a Kiwi child table staple) and then all sleeping in the tent that night.
I slept there as well, next to Brenden, who snores, making sleeping next to a sawmill appealing. Good thing as well, as Hud woke up and crawled into the single mattress with me, making it cozy and completely impossible for me to sleep.
The next morning we packed up and said our goodbyes, with bloated promises of perhaps hooking up before we leave and other perfect things to say before leaving. Steph was driving, thank goodness, as Hud and I were on the edge of sleep moments after departure.
The drive from Whangamata to Hokianga Harbour was 400kms, taking about 5 hours, quicker this time due to the major highways through Auckland. We are at kind of resort now, for a couple of nights, before heading about an hour away to our February destination. It’s beautiful here, a lot less people, more Maori influence, and a nice swimming pool.
The only thing it lacks is a grocery store, leaving us with take out food. The diet has been lacking as we meander up the Island, and I am eager to get back to casual starvation once we get settled.
The next four weeks will be Internet minimal, so I will post in intervals like I did in November, and at other random points on this trip.
Pretty soon there will be no more posts. My actual moving lips instead.
Love to all,
J.
Nelson bye bye
January 25, 2006
Ruby Bay, New Zealand
7:13am
It is just pissing out right now. I contemplated going for my walk about 45 seconds ago when it was just a pretty little drizzle, but now it is pelting the roof here like gunfire, and I can see the waterfall storming down the windshield of our car. Our car that needed a wash. Just hope it lets up for our drive today.
The summary entry. This place will always be where Hud spent his third Christmas. It will always be where I saw a dog pee on a dead penguin. It will always be where I witnessed a giant pig eat a massive round of venison salami.
It will always be where my father’s face almost slid off. Mostly it will be the place where we spent eight weeks on the South Island. Swimming at Kaiteriteri Beach and Rabbit Island. Walking part of the Abel Tasman Coastal Track then diving in the blue water on a secret beach.
Sailing with one of my best friends and my family as dolphins leapt out of the water and smiled at all of us, especially Hud.
Jumping into testicle squishing icy cold spring water at the source of the Riwaka River. Meeting a crowd of people who tend crops or serve coffee out of the back of a trailer for a living. Racing down the Buller River dressed like a Navy Seal only to be bucked into and under the water, thinking I may die until realizing I was really just living. Drinking cold beer sitting on hot rocks laughing with my wife as the surf saddled up to the sand. Lots of good times here. All of course with the undercurrent that, with each day passing we were getting closer to return to daunting yet oddly comfortable reality back home.
I did not finish my novel and will attempt to do so in the next seven weeks. I am close, but not three pages close, so at some point I will have to buckle down and get the words down so I can start the first edit. I did not lose all the weight I wanted to here. With Christmas and Tony and other beer related incidents I was more maintaining my weight as I still walked the 4.8 miles every morning. The next seven weeks will have to be more focused on shedding instead of simply maintaining.
The last two days were spent socializing mostly. On Sunday, a family that Steph met at swim lessons came over for a bbq. They were sweet and simple with two kids, a five-year-old boy and a two-year-old girl.
Hud and the boy raced around the grounds like madmen with the wee girl waddling on after them. They all played really well together and the adults were able to just gab about the differences and similarities in our lives. He was a former builder, who was now into the more administrative end of Aluminum siding sales and installation. He loved it and had warm eyes and a growing belly and talked so fast that I had difficulty understanding a lot of what he was saying. I just nodded and smiled and sipped beer after beer. We had a mixed grill bbq with sausages, drumsticks and burger patties. I made a green salad which only the woman and I ate, she also made potato salad which was still warm, but tasty nonetheless. It was a nice afternoon and they left around nine after getting here around four so we obviously didn’t mind each other’s company, even lamenting what a drag it was meeting them days before our departure. Such is life as a traveling wilbury.
Monday…what did we do Monday….oh yeah. Nevermind.
Yesterday Steph went into Nelson for Aqua fit and Hud and I hung in our underwear playing with all his toys he splayed across the carpet. We ate crackers and peanut butter and watched, I kid you not, The Six Million Dollar Man, complete with slow motion running and the furrowed brow of one of my childhood heroes, Lee Majors. The best part? The Marine Biologist who was taking underwater readings in powder blue short shorts, a tube top and high heels. She looked like a stowaway hooker. Ahh the seventies and its blatant sexism. Pass me a scotch; a mustache and a pantsuit would you?
Last night we had dinner at the main house here at Nelson Coastal Barnstay. It was long overdue as David kept hinting at it, but never coming through with a dinner invite. I marinated chicken all day in a peanut satay sauce, so we brought that as well as a chilled Chardonnay and a sixer of Speight’s. It was a nice night. Dinner was typical fare. The chicken I brought, the chicken they made, and have course, sausages. Gill made a green salad, a tomato onion salad, boiled new potatoes they picked out of their garden that morning, beetroot sliced thin, cut carrots, cukes and eggs to complete the table. It was all farm fresh and delicious. The couple staying at the cottage up top joined us for dessert. These are the Toronto people that arrived about a week ago. I could have easily written an entry specifically about her and her histrionics, but I am feeling warm and fuzzy about this place and do not want to offer up any barbs, however accurate they may be.
We left a little after ten, with Hud being the sweetest perfect little boy the whole night. He mingled with everyone and played with his trucks, mingled and played, batting his eyelashes at the women and grinning at the guys. He went to bed with ease when we got home.
I did too and my tongue is a bit fluffy this morning from all the wine and the beer.
We’re off to Blenheim for a night with the slow talker and his parents, the early retirees.
The journey continues.
Love to all,
J.
Hey Ike, stop bogarting
January 22, 2006
Ruby Bay, New Zealand
9:50am.
So much for writing everyday. So much for completed my novel by the time we leave here, and while we are at it, after last night’s peanut butter festival, so much for sneaking under my lowest adult weight ever barrier. Although I have yet to confirm the latter, my fear of actually stepping on the cold scale is keeping me from actually seeing that I have somehow gained five pounds in 24 hours. Irrational I know, but I use weight gain fear as a motivator so it’s all good.
Talked to Andy yesterday. He finally picked up the phone after the 18th time calling him in the last six months. My dog Alice is fine, fatter he said, but that’s maybe because of having the munchies all the time. I hope she remembers me, although they say short-term memory is the first to go. Andy also filled me in on some of the goings on in his life in the last eight months or so, including some highlights from his wedding. I am sorry I missed that event. Although if the one-sided phone call is any indication, I am sure I will hear about it in detail upon my return. Having a friend with a penchant for the herb, but an unbelievable and rare ability to remember every little thing is sometimes a bonus. We both said we missed each other before we hung up. Both of us were telling the truth.
The last days here are being spent doing things for the last time. Two days ago we went to a picnic organized for Steph and Hud by one of the PlayCentre moms. We were the only people that showed up. Nice. We may have got the location wrong, but I do not think so. I think it was organized too late, and the moms and kids were already booked doing other hippie organic things. Maybe they were picking lavender or plucking their mother’s arm pit hair. Who knows. Steph was not too upset, leaving me to believe the connection with other mothers was not as strong as it was with the group from the North Island. We had a nice picnic by ourselves, watching the tide recede and Hud befriending a group of older girls who were walking a dog up the coast.
They got out of eyesight so I followed, rounding the corner to see the three girls fighting to see who could hold Hud’s hand on the way back. All three girls were very cute, including a seven year old with dark curly hair and crystal clear pale blue eyes. She looked like a painting. I swear Hud winked at me as he looked back over his shoulder running with the girls back to where Steph was waiting. Attaboy.
Yesterday was the last day spent at the Nelson Market. The only thing I will really miss is the Bratwurst on a baguette slathered with brown mustard served up by one of the many German immigrants living in the Nelson/Takaka/Golden Bay area. She was just starting to recognize me as I ordered one every time we see her, which is often because she moves from market to market. I think she may think I am a stalker. The sausage stalker. Yeah. Dig the moniker.
We got home and had lunch, Steph and Hud eating the spinach, feta, red onion and pepper pizza I made the night before and I ate a spinach salad with Tuna and yellow pepper with a lime mint dressing, not yet plummeting into the land of gorge until the evening.
In the afternoon, after the sun hit its highest point, and as the tide began to move back out to sea, we all went for probably our last walk to the beach closest to our little barn.
I brought a couple of beers in a bucket, and we lazily walked down the path, Steph and I holding hands and Hud racing up and down the dirt bike trail beside us.
The sky was blue, Hud’s hair is blonde and all was right in the world at that moment. Sigh.
We sat on the rocks while Hud played with Toshke and gabbed about nothing. Steph and I get along so well lately, her accusing me of finally relaxing, which is ironic due to the trip winding down factor. Whatever it is, it’s been great. She was always my best friend, sometimes scarily just that. Now she is my wife, my lover, my partner, and a really great mother to our boy.
Luck is my lady tonight.
Love to all,
J.
ohhhh sausage meat
January 19, 2006
Ruby Bay, New Zealand,
9:39am.
First up, Steph mentioned there was not any recent pictures of her on the blog, perhaps giving the illusion that somewhere along the way, she had ditched Hud and I and was off frolicking with some rough and tumble Kiwi bloke, steaming up some tent on a beach somewhere. Alas, to her dismay, she is not, she is here, being the housewife she never thought she could be.
Originally I was not going to say anything, mostly because I was afraid of the failure, but this morning, I weighed myself, and am the lightest I have been in at least 10 years, eclipsing my $1500 Dr. Bernstein experiment by one pound. I am not done either, wanting to lose at least twenty-five more pounds before May 1st, putting me at a weight I would be comfortable for the remainder of my life. Of course, talk is cheap and chips and dip are good so I will try to remain on course to squeeze myself into normal sized pants upon my return. Husky section be damned! Fuck you George Richards Big and Tall! Triple X will be for my porn collection not my casual shirt size!
But, I reiterate, talk is cheap and sausage meat is so tasty. Only time will tell.
A brief post because we are basically going through the motions before embarking on basically what are last real travel journey before coming home. We leave here in five days, spending one night in Blenheim with your favourite slow talker and mine, and his respective parents before getting back on the ferry to the North Island. After that it’s a night in Wellington, firming up our flight, then a night in Taupo at a homestay, allowing us another opportunity to socialize with people older than dirt. Then it’s two nights at Brendan and Sheridan’s, a family we really like from our time up in Whangamata, then two nights in Hokianga, which is north of Auckland before heading up to Takaurau Beach where we will spend February. The first two weeks in March are on Waiheke Island, where the whole NZ part of our trip started, where I first fell in love with the countryside, taking us full circle. An apt end to our journey.
I did attend Hud’s swim class again a couple of days ago. He is doing so well, although he sometimes does not listen to the instructor and has to be disciplined by putting his bum against the wall while the others do the fun stuff.
At one point I went over and tried to encourage him to listen and was scolded by Steph to not interfere. She was right. What this trip has done is made me so close to Hudson, that I have difficulty letting go, allowing him to be taught something by an adult other then Steph and I. Turning into a parent I always queered my eyes at in the past. It made me realize that while spending this much time with one child is great, both him and I will have detachment issues in the very near future. I can’t imagine not being there when he wakes up, where he is in true cuddle mode, where the first thing he wants to do is plaster his long body close to mine for a big hug, his wild blonde hair smelling of no tears shampoo and pool chlorine. I think I will weep like a widow the first morning I do not get that hug. What a privilege it is.
I will never take my love of my son for granted again.
Love to all,
J.
Sea hags and smelly goats
January 15, 2006
Ruby Bay, New Zealand
9:39pm
Ok maybe every other day I will post. Actually the last 36 hours was pretty jammed pack for the Graham/White trio. We attended a Teddy Bear Picnic on Saturday afternoon, which if I sing the corresponding song correctly, it is impossible to sound more gay. Hud went on the small train and played on the playground equipment. Pretty standard stuff, although I noticed there were a number of women that looked like Sea Hag from the old Popeye cartoons. You know the one, she had a crooked nose that almost met her ball-like chin, she would squint and talk out the side of her mouth embedded with exactly no teeth. This look is usually pulled off by women who have drank and smoked for a long time. I am talking well past the sit on the corner bar stool, hey sailor, cougar stage. They usually have a couple of kids, not necessarily from the same man, which I know only because the race of the children are not the least bit similar. They stand off from the main crowd, unleashing their mulleted, rat tailed children on the rest of the throng, while they sneak a butt, talking to anyone who will listen with a voice deeper then Barry White after a big hit off a bong. They wear midriff baring shirts with a ripple of flesh bulging over their too short black shorts. On their calve, or above their breast is usually a tattoo of a scary lion or an attacking tiger, or maybe a butterfly for the softer sea hag set. They are harmless when sober, which thankfully at the Teddy Bear Picnic they all appeared to be. My embellishments here are only mild, so don’t hate me because I spout the truth. I do hope there was someone watching me taking in all my physical detriments and recording it later chuckling to themselves. I can take it.
After the picnic we returned home for only a brief stop over as we were off to a Kiwi barbeque Steph got us invited to by one of the PlayCentre moms. We drove about 20kms into the country before finding the turnoff by the old sawmill. We waved to Huck and Tom painting the fence on the way in. The host couple lived on an apple orchard, right on the bank of the Motueka River. We pulled our old car next to another old car and were greeted by Bridget, the soft eyed, sun wrinkled woman who invited us to this little get together. It became quickly apparent that these people are not really hippies, but rural folk who grow all their own produce and wildflowers and herbal teas. Bridget and Ross have four boys, all under the age of 10, the youngest of which is the playmate of Hud at the PlayCentre. She asked how my book was going and I lied and told her everything was going fine. She asked what I did back home and I told her, which made her immediately throw up in her mouth saying it was her idea of hell. I went to argue and then stopped, remembering I agreed with her, although was still mildly offended at the level of her disgust. Her husband Ross came over and we shook hands. He had a good mustache and talked like a gruff Kiwi, and had a rough and tumble, I eat my own livestock swagger. He rolled his own Drum smokes and told tales of killing stinky billy goats on camping trips and not being allowed back in the tents.
More people arrived, about ten people in total, with about 15 kids running all over the property. There were apple trees to left of us, and the large Motueka guarded by trees and bush to the right. Hud loved every minute, running with the older kids, catching crickets with the younger ones, climbing up and down old apple crates, taking turns swinging on old hammock, all of course in bare feet. This country was built for kids.
We sat around and jumped into conversations when needed. I talked to an Australian guy named Andy. He was bald as well, heavy set as well, and we chatted about a number of things including my novel (he dabbled in writing) and his reason for leaving his cushy job in Oz. We compared values and principles and laughed a little at bad jokes. I liked him best of all, although everyone was very pleasant. There was Chris and Brett, a Brit and a South African with two daughters, one three, the other just a baby. They run a coffee cart that travels all over the region working fairs and markets. Sarah was there with her three year old, telling us the reason why her son limped is because her goats were being too aggressive with him and may have to kill them soon, although they are a little young for killing. Another couple arrived later, and I shook his hand but forgot his name. His grip was strong, I think he was Dutch. Heather, another woman from Steph’s playcentre arrived with her two kids, and no one said hi to her, making me think that she was not really well liked. She had a really bad mullet. Maybe that’s why.
At certain points I just listened to all these people chat about farming and what was coming in well this year, if anyone wanted extra wild chamomile, who kills and chops up their pigs, it was all very interesting. They were all so grounded and real and weird in their own bucolic way. They did not seem to care about anything city; in fact Bridget and her clan were camping on their land even though their house was about 400 metres away. She only went home to do laundry as she refused to wash clothes by hand. These are real simple living kind of folk. Another notch in the New Zealand experience belt. On the way back we stopped at Kina Beach to see the full moon hover over the ocean.
Today we just hung out in the morning before heading off to the Motueka market where I needed to buy cheap sunglasses.
After, we went up to Kaiteriteri Beach for some sun and fun. The tide was on its way out, creating quite a fast little rapid as it drains out all the estuaries surrounding the beach. Hud is so water confident now. We have to watch he does not jump in places where he cannot touch. We sledged the rapids together while Steph watched from shore. Good fun.
Tomorrow we will meet and greet the people moving into the upper cottage. Our hosts are away for four days and asked if we could take care of their place for them. The new people are from Toronto as well, a professor at York or something like that.
They are probably pale and cynical.
It will be fun to watch them change.
Love to all,
J.
That'll do donkey
January 13, 2005
Ruby Bay, New Zealand
4:22pm
So after this entry I will be writing daily again. The entries will be brief, sometimes it will be difficult to eek out a sentence, but I must attack it every day, or it becomes more of a burden then a pleasure and at the very least it this should be an exercise in writing.
So where were we, oh yes, the tender pining for home and all the smiling faces that it would entail. Perhaps that is exactly what I am looking forward to, the centre of attention, the back slaps from the dudes and sexy hugs from the dudettes. The warmth of my family laughing at my bad jokes again. What I am not looking forward to is the begging for employment. In fact, my dream job was posted on-line and I quickly wrote a heartfelt cover letter appealing to the potential employer how I would be the perfect person for the job. Needless to say the male strip revue was looking for someone more….how can I say it…donkey like? I will continue to peruse the web sites.
The last five days were highlighted by our return to the Riwaka Resurgence, to actually witness the hole where the Riwaka River begins. It was not that exciting. Just really clean, clear water, which we sipped. Down the mountain a little I jumped in the very very very cold water after three younger guys did it first.
I had intentions of doing it before they arrived, but they were definitely the motivating factor for me to take the leap into the water, allowing my testicles to quickly ascend my body to nestle somewhere near my esophagus. The brave trio stood on the shore blue lipped and shivering. We all said goodbye with very squeaky voices.
Ironically, Tana and Glenn and their son arrived at the Resurgence as the same time as us. They are the couple that stayed in cottage on the same property for the first ten days after we arrived. Thier son is the one with the painfully slow way of talking. He was not very interested in Hud, or us, so we parted ways with promises of getting together over the next few days as they were visiting from the other side of the island with friends. They called and cancelled the next day as their son came down with the flue. I had an odd feeling that they may have dissed us. I wonder if they found the web site. Oh well, the kid should simply speed up his speech.
The other day, Hud and I walked down to the beach, leaving Steph to have a little snooze at home. Toshke the fox terrier skittered along with us. On the way down, I had the pleasure of watching my boy and a cute dog walk down a gravel path that split the greenish yellow field on the way to the ocean. The dog was excited to be going on a walk and Hud let her jump up and down his ever-lengthening body. It was like he grew a couple of inches on the walk to the water.
The aquamarine ocean lay dormant in the background, waiting for us to arrive, the tide creeping in, covering our crab hunting spot. The sky was massive, never ending, the clouds thin and scared, the sun somewhere else, too high in the sky to be seen, making its presence felt with a soft, but intense heat.
The whole thing was beautiful, the sight of my boy and a dog and an ocean and a field, and the actual feeling of being with him, in a place so far away from the familiar, us loving each other more every day, only me knowing how lucky we are to share such unique times, in such a unique place. I had to hold my chest to keep my heart from bursting apart. It’s these moments, and there have been many, that makes this irresponsible trip worth so much.
Today was another proud moment as I attended Hud’s swim class. I almost cried as I watched him hold his breath and swim to the bottom of a shallow pool and pick up a plastic whale. He was so happy to see me when he brought the whale up. I told him how proud I was, and that he should be so proud of himself. Yikes I am getting weepy again right now.
So two weeks yesterday we leave Nelson and this wonderful barn.
I will miss it.
Love to all,
J.
Let it snow
January 8, 2005
Ruby Bay, New Zealand
6:41pm
Life returns to normal. At least normal for the time being. In fact I have no idea what normal is anymore. It isn’t what we left. It isn’t what we are living. Perhaps living like we were back home, with NZ in the back pocket of our hearts will be our version of normal. Perhaps normal is overrated and nothing to strive for. Perhaps salt and peppering your life with completely bizarre and random events is how life should be lived. Perhaps the unpredictable should be the predictable. Although I do miss the comfort of knowing what was next. Knowing that the pay cheque was going to be deposited in my dwindling account on the first and the fifteenth of every month. I guess it’s easier when you are younger to feel the gentle thrill of wanton bohemia. Don’t get me wrong; it’s nice as a balding pudgy man of 36 as well. But the echo of responsibility is bouncing back from the canyon wall. I can feel it. Steph can feel it. Hud, well, he likes playing with trains in his Incredibles underwear.
If the weather was any better, my guess is we would be on the first plane back home. I know that sounds bizarre, considering we just spent the last six hours at a market, a craft fair, swimming in a see through river and then letting the chilly surf blanket our tanned bodies at the beach. Pretty sweet yes. It’s just the pot on the back burner, the one on low, the one just starting to get hot, water just starting to look like Sprite, the one you are going to have to deal with sooner rather then later. I am glad I am not the only one of the group feeling this way. My peaks and valleys have already been documented in this journal and even I am sick of myself sometimes. Although I am spectacularly good looking. And have a penis the size of Florida.
The fact that family and friend were here over the holidays was another reminder of the life we have back home. It also was a real wake up in regards to how much time Steph and I spend together, and how well we get along. It even got better and better as the trip progressed. We get along better now then we ever have, and we got along pretty well before. I thought once all the distractions were gone, the work, the nanny pick ups, the Alice poo clean ups, the dinner/cocktail/birthday/engagement/I’m thirsty parties, she would just stare at me blankly and pack her belongings in a red kerchief, tie it on a stick and book. Nope. She digs me. And I dig her. She’s the mack.
So the novel progresses, Hud starts swimming lessons tomorrow, and we have two and half weeks until we get back on the ferry and slowly move up the North Island, including a stop back in Whangamata to visit some cool people we liked.
I will try not to think about March 15th too much.
Love to all,
J.
Done Dirt Cheap
January 4, 2006
Ruby Bay, New Zealand
7:23pm
So, this morning, at 3:08am, I found myself walking the brown and white corridors of the Rutherford Hotel in Nelson City in just a pair of navy blue jogging shorts. Isn’t that weird? Because I don’t jog at all.
But, seriously folks, I was sleepwalking, half lit up, after Tony’s last night was spent in the city, bar hopping a little, but basically just reminding ourselves what good drinking partners we are, and how each of us missed the camaraderie that can accompany many pints, greasy food, and sadly, a couple of cigarettes.
In September of this year I will have known Tony for 25 years. He is the first person that approached me in the playground at Glenview that fall in 1981, me with so much curly hair, wearing an ACDC concert t-shirt and a black corduroy jacket. Luckily, he liked ACDC as well, and a chord was struck that still rings true no matter the gap in distance or time between us. I am lucky to have him, and others like him, as friends. I am also glad he is gone. My liver is bloated and my lungs a gentle colour black. Tomorrow the walking and water cleansing begins.
It wasn’t all just beer drinking during Tony’s visit, but it was close. With New Year’s Eve adding additional incentive, we managed to plow through many an icy can of Speights (The pride of the south!), including a lovely 15 each to welcome in 2006.
You would think that would be enough for the two of us to be slurring and cursing, but the beer is light and we started quite early, so all the three of us could do was say “happy new year”, followed immediately by “good night”. We are aged flatulence.
New Year’s Day was spent at Rabbit Island, (which is neither an island, nor has rabbits; discuss) where the weather was hardly agreeable but sure beat the words wind and chill. Hud and I swam and then we all walked up the coast seeking nubile bodies through the corners of our sunglasses. Hud ran most of the time, weaving in and out of cricket players and their mock games with plastic wickets. After the beach we came home and ate homemade pizzas. That night we watched the remake of The Longest Yard, which was both racist and stupid, completely matching my expectations.
The next day, woo hoo, Tony and I were out of the house by 7am to drive the 90 minutes to Murchison where we scheduled to attack the Buller River in a inflatable raft. It was pissing and windy and we were unsure if they would actually run the trip, but when we checked in, the dread locked guide did not even bat an eye at the howling wind and torrential rain as he slid our credit cards through the machine. Next up was the dreading shoe horning of my body into a wet suit. It went better then the sausage incident up in Byron Bay, but it still was somewhat heavy on my lungs. There were 14 of us on the morning adventure, in three boats. All of us piled into two vans and drove down the highway ten minutes where we were led down the bank of the Buller to be taught how to run whitewater in about 10 minutes. The people were split into three groups, Tony and I with Leon and Neve, Leon visiting traveling Neve from Ireland for the holidays. Neve was traveling for a year. The relationship dynamic was not unlike Tony’s and mine, the difference being Neve’s vagina and her lack of partner and child and of course Leon was taller then Tony. But then again, who isn’t?
Adam was our team leader, a pony tailed outdoorsy type, friendly and good at whitewater expeditions, but pretty much dumb as a throw pillow. We were raft two, behind the United Nations raft, and ahead of the Scottish family raft. We began paddling down the river. Somewhere, dueling banjos were playing.
We were actually a pretty strong group so we were soon in the lead, listening to Adam’s instructions and paddling in unison down light and fluffy rapids. The first big set of rapids we hit hard, the raft spinning right around soaking us all, but it was raining so we could care at all. In fact, whitewater rafting may have been the perfect thing to do on such a rainy day. We were totally decked out in a wet suit, including little wet suit booties for our feet. I was actually quite warm. Adam instructed us to paddle back up the side of the rapids to try and surf the swell once again. Well, talk about tempting fate, we hit the rapids and the raft spun and spat me out like watermelon seed. I was in the raging river, floating far away from the raft.
There was only truly about one full second of panic, an actual thought of “I am underwater being shoved downstream” before I popped up like a buoy and heard the white Rastafarian (he was the group leader) yell at me to turn around and look at him. I got into the whitewater dump position, on my back, toes pointed in the air, and turned to look. He yelled at me to swim to the right where a pool of calm water awaited. With three or four good strokes I was there, now wading, and waiting for my raft to come and get me. Adam pulled me back in and I sat up and whipped my long wet hair around my head. Uh. No. I shook my helmeted head and caught my breath. Woo hoo I screamed out loud. That was totally wicked. It was. I felt great.
The next couple of rapids were as exciting, me almost dumping again, before lodging my giant feet underneath the raft bench, almost breaking my legs, but staying in the raft. We also were allowed to jump out at calmer points and just float down the river, laying back, watching the rain fall on our faces. They thought the water was cold. It was about 17 degrees. I thought it was downright balmy.
The last, and biggest rapid was a grade 5 drop, which is about a seven foot waterfall. We actually disembarked to look at it and plan our entry point. I felt pretty cool. We were nominated to go first and all of us were eager to tame this bad bitch into submission. Adam told us to paddle lightly to get into position and then with a booming voice told us to forward hard! We hit the tongue and jumped into the raft into a full on crash position. The raft basically disappeared into the rage and swirl of the furious water and then popped out again. We jumped back into position and paddled safely near the rocks and moored, Adam having to play lifeguard for the remaining two rafts.
What a rush. All four of us were in awe of the water, and of each other as Adam said we did it perfectly. The other two rafts also managed not to dump anyone, but did not look as cool as we did, that being the most important. Of course.
The last half hour was spent lazily drifting downstream, stopping to cliff jump (about 25 ft) and then haul the rafts up the bank to return to base camp. We all took hot showers and crammed into a hot tub, me closer to a barely clothed Tony then I would of liked. Although his nipples were quite captivating. They served us baguettes and cold cuts for lunch and then showed us the pictures Sabine was taking from the bank at various points down the river. Of course this would be the point I would insert a picture if only Sabine knew how to work the camera, blaming the lack of photos on a technical malfunction.
So all Tony and I have is the memory, no tangible proof that we actual spent half a day battling the Upper Buller River. It was enough for me, and I think it was enough for him.
I could go on about last night in Nelson, going to three different bars, the most fun being the time we spent at the first bar, drinking pints, finally figuring out cricket and just being the same old friends we have been for the last 25 years.
The only thing missing was the ACDC t-shirt.
Love to all,
J.
