The Fabulous Life of Ponteuf

A Sense of Adventure

People don’t travel to New Zealand for the interiors. The pubs are warm and cozy and the beer good, yes, but the real fun is to be had outside, in the oceans, rivers, mountains. Queenstown, far to the south of the South Island, isn’t known as the Extreme Sports capital for nothing; bungee jumping seems to be the least of the crazy options on offer. We didn’t make it as far as Queenstown (though I envision a separate trip that encompasses it, the Milford Sound and parts farther south) but we did manage to wander at least partially into the realm of exercise as sightseeing.

In Kaikoura, a funky little beach town on the west coast, we joined legions of other campas in the Holiday Park, all there for some serious marine wildlife viewing. Mike added marine life eating to the activities, stopping at a seafood store to introduce a giant crayfish to the campa. The town’s name actually dictated that we did this; in Maori “kai” is meal and “koura” is crayfish, so the town has been known for this activity for far longer than there have been Europeans of any stripe visiting. I was expecting crawfish, so the giant lobster-like creature was a shock – but a tasty one!

Most people go to Kaikoura for whale watching, but wanting something more interactive (and less available at home) we opted for the Seal Swim. New Zealand is home to large colonies of fur seals and for a modest fee and the willingness to climb into frigid water we could interact with them in their own habitat. I was sold, so our first morning in New Zealand found us getting fitted for serious cold water wetsuits, complete with booties and head coverings. The only exposed skin I had was on my hands and the part of my face not covered by my mask, and the backwards roll into the water was still so cold I felt my heart falter in its beating. Five minutes, the guide told us, and you’ll be fine. We were, but any time a rivulet of water found its way into my wetsuit I was shocked. We floated around next to a giant rock that housed a large colony of seals – the large bulls watched us impassively as we bobbed around at the edges. The younger males, hoping to butter up a female while the bulls were otherwise engaged (sleeping) slid in and out of the water with ease, circling the rock and us with a speedy grace.

It was cold and cloudy and the seals weren’t as inclined to be in the water as they would have been in burning sun, but being near them without a pane of glass was treat enough. When one came close enough to me to touch and then turned away, I swam along side him for a stretch, working hard (even with flippers) to keep up to his effortless motion. Still, I swam with a seal and it was worth the cold and the kelp wrapping around my ankles and my odd bout of seasickness brought on by the lack of visibility in the water and the death grip of my wetsuit around my neck.

In Abel Tasman National Park, a fringe of pristine tropical forest and stunning coastline at the top of the island, we took to the water again, this time in kayaks – and in sun. Our gear covered all parts of us above the kayak, and a skirt (Mike looked stunning in it standing up) clipped onto the kayak itself and kept our legs dry but the water here was warmer, clear and turquoise. I would have believed we were in the Caribbean if I hadn’t known better. The sun shone and the view from water level was postcard perfect. We kayaked all morning, surprising ourselves by clearly being the best of the group in a double kayak, often getting ahead and having to wait. In the afternoon we hiked three hours along the Coastal Track back to our campa, winding through the forest and back up to the scrubby ridge, catching sight of the never ending sparkle of the water from odd vantage points between prehistoric curls of tree ferns. I’d like to go back and walk the whole track, stopping overnight in the campsites above the powdery beaches and hearing the five beat calls of the exotic birds secreted high above in the vines.

In Oamaru we visited the Blue Penguin breeding colony and watched as rafts of fifty or more penguins came ashore at nightfall to sit their eggs and feed their chicks. Sitting in a shelter but still exposed to a biting wind and bits of rain, we watched the turbulent water for specks of black that rapidly grouped together and then swept towards the rocky shore as a group, swimming the way a flock of birds flies, all unified swoop and grace. The water here, as along most of the coast, was clear and we could see the birds as they moved through the swells, see them riding the motion of the waves through the face before they broke upon the beach and swept the penguins ashore. Here all their stupendous grace was lost and they struggled to waddle free of the surf, tiny wings flapping uselessly. A few of each group had to try again, circling around until a likely wave presented itself, but one group of five didn’t want to come in and they ducked through and over the waves for close to half an hour, riding the swells partially in before ducking out and backwards, rolling out of the wash and bobbing on the surface like unsinkable corks. Their grace underwater was stunning; they were playing, enjoying the waves and the freedom of their underwater flight.

On our last full day on the island, we drove out to the end of the Otago Peninsula near Dunedin and went for a horseback ride along the beach. Instead of a large group, we had the treat of it just being us and a guide. Along the water we rode, hooves clopping in the hard sand and leaving white hoof prints trailing behind us, splashing occasionally through the gentle white foam of the surf. The beaches were covered in shells. Covered. Huge drifts of them coated the sand all around us, as if 20 pound bags had been broken open and dumped. Pointed conical spirals mixed with iridescent buttons and the horses crunched through them as though they were no more remarkable than the sand itself. Along our way we passed not one but two sea lions, sunning on the beach and nonplussed by two big horses strolling past ten feet away. The horses were similarly nonplussed, though a flock of eight black swans making a noisy takeoff and formation flight over the inlet were less to their liking.

Further on we turned into a sheltered cove, hidden behind huge craggy rocks boasting a perfect keyhole opening about thirty feet up. In the surf ahead of us we saw a penguin escaping the surly bounds of earth for water flight, ducking into the foam before disappearing. We tied up the horses and had tea in the sand, so fine and soft it felt more like baby powder than sand, talking and wondering at the sheer beauty of the spot. Steep cliffs rose behind us, striated with browns and golds and topped with heathery gorse bushes. The crescent of sand was white and spotted with shells, empty but for us all the way to the many hued ocean, stretching calmly away from us and glimmering in the late afternoon sun. On one particularly fine curve of beach, my Irish Hunter Shannon and I got a chance to stretch her legs, and we pounded along the waterline in a full out gallop the likes of which I haven’t had in years. Our guide raced along side me, horse hooves splashing water and scaring any penguins that might have ventured to shore. Tears streaming from my eyes, result of speed and sheer joy in being alive and being there, I balanced on the horse, moving in rhythm with her hoof beats and her heart beat, balanced between chaos and order. This rush, I decided (once we’d slowed to a respectable canter that allowed for thought) was the motive behind adventure travel. Perhaps I’m more of a daredevil at heart than I suspected.

Turning Over a New Leaf

We’re driving around New Zealand in a CampaVan. The odd thing is - we like it. A lot.

I’ll let that sink in for a minute before I continue.

Renting the campa was a whim. (Oh, and the campa thing, ending in “a” rather than “er” – it’s a Kiwi thing, and it has stuck. Our campa is a Cruiza, and now everything we see is ends in “a.”) Mike suggested it, and I agreed, perhaps more out of perversity than anything else. If I’m cool on camping, he’s always been positively ice cold, and I suppose part of a marriage is taking an odd schattenfreude in your spouse’s folly. I have a feeling he possessed similar motives, but in an odd reversal of the Gift of the Magi story, our mutual inner snickering brought us both happiness.

Traveling in New Zealand has probably elicited a few snickers from those who know us, anyway: we’ve never been outdoors/adventure travelers. I like wilderness, but I’ve always had difficulty spending my limited travel time on seeing the vast expanse of anywhere when a European city whispered seductively. New Zealand, particularly the South Island, is not a place for museums. Or towns. Or people, really – but we have seen copious amounts of sheep and not a few farmed venison. It is, however, a wonderful place for campas. The activities and scenery that are worth the hassle are almost always remote, at least in hotel terms; tiny little towns plucked from the past don’t bother with Hiltons. A map and a sense of adventure, tout the travel guides, are all you need to experience New Zealand. Those, I say, and a campa.

There’s a snugness to the whole existence; I’m a large and ungainly snail, but I always have a place to sleep. Carrying your bed on your back means that plans can change, new roads can be taken and nothing is set in stone, flexibility I’m not used to but that I enjoy immensely. Not sure how far we could make it one night and headed west, we rechecked the maps and distances as the sun slipped away and found a dot with a camper symbol and a few choices for morning. An hour and only six cars later, we arrived in Reefton, a wide spot in the road that in its heyday boasted the first permanent electric power in the Southern Hemisphere. Cold and clouds and rain and a town closed tighter than an oyster would have been a nightmare without the campa – we just sailed into the motor park, confident that we could settle up for our site in the morning.

I’m regressing to playing house, or perhaps I’m just remembering the family cross country trip we took when I was seven, complete with two dogs and a cat in a camper shell on the back of Bob’s yellow Chevy Luv pickup. Living the campa life feels like a game, everything in its place, each morning a new adventure. It’s all just so cozy; I like cooking breakfast out the back tailgate, feeding the ducks the heel of our loaf of bread. When we stop to look at something, I can pull a drink (or maybe some local cheese) from our compact fridge, and if only Mike would let me, I’d take a nap on the back couches while we cruised down the road.

The problem with napping is that I would miss the scenery, and just a few hours of it clarified why so many people come to New Zealand, and why so many more talk about it. Unlike perhaps anywhere else I’ve been, the beauty here surpasses description, leaves promotional photos in the dust. The mountains really do rise up to touch the sky and the coastal water really is a stunning blue that gives clarity to the term aqua-marine. Like so many other countries where rain is more than an occasional fly-by-night guest, the fields and slopes and peaks of the South Island are painted with more variations of green than a California girl knew could exist. If Crayola made a 64-pack of just greens, they might be getting close.

And the sheep! Oh, the sheep. Prolific little cotton balls, they dot every open green space, proving just how high the hills are by their minuscule profiles as seen from the road. With far more sheep than people, the land proves just how awe inspiring it can be without our mucking about and putting up buildings; it is easy to see why NZ was chosen to be both Middle Earth and Narnia – it has an otherworldly quality that can’t be manufactured. Add in the odd bird cries and you feel that you’re in a new, untouched land, rarely trod upon. When the first Europeans arrived, the forest came all the way to the shore and the calls of the multitude of birds was so loud they couldn’t hear each other speak. A landmass that developed only two mammals (bats, both), New Zealand spent its bounty on birdlife in abundance. The Moa Hunters traveled across the South Pacific in open canoes, against all odds, navigating by the stars and ending up in this strange paradise full of fanciful plumage and flightless birds. It doesn’t feel so long ago, really, when the road strays into a bit of forest; nothing’s changed.

We drove for hours and saw only a few tiny towns, a handful of cars, a few hikers – and this was along SH1, the main (and in most cases only) route around the South Island. The towns are a journey of their own – if someone told me that we’d transported back sixty years, I would have believed it. The architecture isn’t anything special (in fact, it has the distinct look of American 50’s prosperity building about it) but the atmosphere: slow, gentle and friendly – is. Everywhere we went, people talked to us, asked about our holiday, gave suggestions, all in the most genuine fashion imaginable. We talked to strangers in pubs, in grocery stores, on the sidewalk – I felt as though I’d dropped into a Southern Hemisphere Norman Rockwell painting.

We’ve been spectacularly lucky with weather all fall, but a Kiwi spring had other ideas for us, and we saw more rain than we had in the rest of the trip combined. I’d been waiting to see the Southern Cross – in the few times we’ve dipped below the Equator, it has either been too cloudy or the wrong time of year to spot it, but here in crystal clear and so-far-south New Zealand, I knew it was up there. Walking back to the campa a few nights ago after a brief rainstorm I glanced up and gasped – there, in all its glory was the Southern sky, unfamiliar enough that, as in Africa, I felt like an explorer of the old school. The stars glittered and flickered in a bottomless blackness and there was the cross, five stars complete, lighting the way for all of us in our own small canoes.