Mental Chains

Howard Jones, eh?  Remember him?

Back home and a bit adrift.  Kiwi sunshine now behind me, and before me, well, who knows?  Back now in this odd bit of Europe where we drive on the left, use a local currency not a Euro, don't shut for lunch, and open on Sundays.  New Zealand seems European in a lot of ways.  Listening to recorded guides, and reading information, history, looking in museums it's kind of fascinating the way the people arrived in the Island.  Everyone and everything seems so new.  The Maoris weren't significantly earlier than the Europeans, although, to my mind, established enough that it's really odd that the names they gave places, and landscape features have largely been replaced by the good old arrogant empire building brits.  Dutch explorers were there at a similar time but seem to have taken a much more look, learn then get in and claim kind of approach.  It's an odd thing the remains of an Empire / Commonwealth.  Odd in particular because you get the feeling that New Zealanders see themselves in some way as European, and yet here I am, back in the UK listening to radio debate about Polish immigrants, and somehow it seems we have yet to embrace being European.  I wonder if I have?

Odd feeling of being slightly disconnected, which I associate with being in a zombie like not sure if I'm tired or not kind of a state, as well as that weird place where I have no job, no plans, a good chunk of emptiness (not in a bad way) stretching out.  And indolently, I seem not, for today, to care.  

Must part

Fare thee well for I must leave thee, do not let the parting grieve ye but remember that the best of friends must part.

And once again it is time to say goodbye. As ever I find myself drawn to the sea, pulled into a trance by the regular movement of the waves, with that feeling of sadness and finality coming over me.

New Zealand has taken its toll on my belongings too, so I say a final farewell to:

1. My camera, broken beyond repair in a strong gust of wind nosedive to the floor in Nelson. The replacement really is much better …
2. My walking poles left in a mountaineering instructor's car
3. My Aldi children's ski gloves. A gloved high five goes out to these which did a superb job of getting me through a five day mountaineering skills course. They did well, and by the end of the week they were dead. There may even be a photo of them in last salute pose on the sunny balcony of a hostel …
4. Micro Towel. Hated this, dumped it. Something smaller than the size of a tea towel has done a blinding job ever since.
5. Sunglasses. Bit the dust in a belly flop onto paddle board incident. Replaced with polarised better bigger lensed ones. Farewell sunnies.
6. North Face T-shirt. I loved you. You were a fabulous purple and you understood a woman's shape. You were polyester and you dried overnight. Unfortunately you held onto the Rotorua sulphurous mud smell for pretty much ever, and the flattering vertical white stripes down the sides were embarrassingly unwhite and unlikely to ever be so again.
7. Karrimor walking sandals. Your work was done. You were ancient and you were not designed to ride a bike. Mesh walking shoes were indeed the way forward. Your sacrifice has not gone unnoticed or unthanked.
8. Gelert stove. Ah, sadly you let me down. I mended you on arrival and you broke again, the teeny screw being lost forever. Today we say goodbye.
9. My heart. New Zealand has taken a part of this and there is unfinished business. I need to return. There are mountains and crossings with my name most firmly on them. Alas, not yet …
10. Half of my lower right back molar. I haven't mentioned this but yes, it's missed, and it's been slightly irksome for some weeks now. NHS will be consulted …

And I take with me:

1. The best ever trainers / walking shoes / sandal things I have ever had. I hope it wasn't just a holiday romance between me and the Kathmandu mesh topped, vibram soled darlings.
2. The tiniest souvenirs known to man. Badges and bottle openers for the main part. Penguins and Kiwis all the way.
3. The micro fibre map of the Redlands mountain bike trails, doubling up as the best camping towel I have known.
4. Tupperware. In memory of the hostel kitchen argument I witnessed, I have my own tupperware and nobody shall ever argue with me about it. It's been a boon for leftover food against the ravages of ants, wasps, inquisitive birds, possums … … … and I can see it having usefulness similarly for the future so it's coming home too.
5. A summer dress and sandals
6. Memories, thick and fast. Abel Tasman five day trail, cycling round Wellington's shoreline, cycling up One Tree Hill in Auckland, riding up to the lake near Rotorua on Christmas day for a swim, riding the Fixie in Nelson, bus journeys, people, hostels …
7. Skills. The Alpine Butterfly knot, knowing how to rope up for glacier travel, knowing how to get back to the bottom from a sport climb, snow anchors, a zillion different ways of cooking 2 minute noodles.
8. Writing and thinking joined up together. As time progressed, I found I was really enjoying bringing together thoughts on wildlife, culture, and environment and putting them into writing. I remembered I had a brain and almost used that 20+ year old degree from time to time. It was good.
9. Perspective. I've persevered with the mindfulness book learning, and if this comes home with me, I think it bodes well for a more balanced kind of future. I won't say a happier one because I am happy, it's what I do, I do it well.
10. Photographs. What am I going to do with all these photographs?

Legal Alien

Today I have visited a Kiwi wildlife centre. In the sense of the bird, not the nickname for the New Zealanders. Apart from seeing the funny and surprisingly large nocturnal and flightless icons of New Zealand, it was educational.

You can understand why the NZ customs guys are so vigilant about introduction of new species when you look at the issues the department of conservation is up against with the legal aliens who reside in the country. Many of these were deliberate introductions. For example, the deer were introduced for game hunting. Unfortunately much as happens in the UK, without natural predators and with abundance of food, the populations increase rapidly and so of course does their rate of consumption of the available vegetation resulting in depletion of habitat. So now the deer here are culled, or more bizarrely to my UK eyes, they are farmed, in that they are held in fields by the road side just as you would expect to see cows, fields of animals peacefully grazing, domesticated. Except when they are big enough, the stags in particular are sent off into the wild so that men with guns can come and shoot them for “sport”. I gag a little as I use the word sport in this context. I'm not sure whether it's really any different to sending cows to abattoirs for meat. Except of course we don't tend to have cows heads stuffed and mounted over our fireplaces. Which is as big or small a thing as you make it.

Stoats were introduced deliberately too, in an attempt to control the rabbit population which was probably doing for young sprouting vegetation what the deer were doing for anything out of the rabbit's reach. Unfortunately the poor old kiwi is a ground dwelling bird not accustomed to such predators, and the rarer ones were becoming rarer still. The kiwi wildlife people now tag the male kiwis, and by transponder can tell what the birdies are up to. Heart rate etc. demonstrates when the birds are sitting eggs. And it's the bloke bird who gets to do the egg sitting. Division of labour, eh? But now the wildlife folk go in and remove eggs, taking them back to the centre to hatch. It seems a bit harsh until you hear the stats which are 95% of eggs left in the wild do not result in viable adults, and in incubation 95% do result in viable adults, all of whom are released back to their original area. The kiwis lay minimal numbers of eggs, and they are huge, so it's a massive investment for the birds to create their one or two young per year. Interesting stuff, eh? Efforts are also under way to reduce the stoat population so it is a two pronged approach.

I kind of like that the kiwis near Franz Josef were only defined as a separate species as recently as 1994. Goes to show we don't know everything about the planet doesn't it. I'm mildly curious as to how this was established. After all, definition of separate species, unless something has changed since these things were inserted into my brain, was about production of viable offspring. Presumably this means it has been established that the local kiwi bird cannot reproduce with those found elsewhere. Did someone take time to try to bring them together, I wonder or is this work done today by geneticists in a lab? Or is it done with syringes, female ova and male whatevers brought together. I rather hope it's a clinical genetic exercise these days. Don't know why. I love the example of horses and donkeys producing the sterile mule for some reason. Sticks in my memory as a clear definition.

Singing I'm an alien, I'm a legal alien ...

Rain forest

I climbed up a misty mountain through rain forest vegetation today. It brought back in amazing technicolour, and scent and sound the classes I took many many years ago. Walking on a man made path through incredibly dense vegetation you wonder at both the methods used to create the pathway, but also the almost moral decisions which would have to be taken to clinically hack through swathes of vegetation to create a sanitised pathway for us, the public to access this amazing environment. What plants would have been in the way, what decisions would have been taken as to the route, was it based purely on gradient, angle, need to connect A to B or would the creators have looked at the plants and decided which could stay and which could go?

Nonetheless, the forest is nothing like I've ever seen before. You try to peer in through the trees at what's behind, but it's just a tangle of plant life, rich, green, luxurious plant life which twists and turns. Plants grow on plants; every tree fern sustains the life of a myriad mosses and other ferns at every ring of their trunks. Vines crawl between plants, older wood rests on newer trees and everything is pushing everything else for light and growth and height.

It's just like in the books. As you hear it start to rain, and reach for your hood, you realise you are not getting wet, and remember about the canopy structure, the trees which reach the highest, the ones underneath them competing for the valuable and abundant resources of light and water, and the layer below doing the same. So much so that the rain water hardly reaches the forest floor. I take my hood down, realising I'm not getting wet.

Yet later on, by chance, I find my hand flat against my stomach, investigating the weird sensation of flapping material. I am wearing a lightweight, snug fitting base layer merino (bright pink for those interested), and yet somehow it feels like it's flapping. My hand explores, and I realise it is properly wringing wet. You could squeeze this out. The weight of the water content has weighted the material so it's slightly hanging in places. Funnily, my torso doesn't feel cold, clammy or wet. I hadn't even noticed. I explore further. The entire T-shirt is sodden, as is my hair. I have never experienced humidity like this. Truly amazing.

Like the rest of the world, so it seems to me (and I have not researched this), New Zealand came to the conclusion we need to protect and preserve our natural habitats post Victorian era.  I feel New Zealand took a pretty robust line on things, not exactly hard line but certainly no negotiation.  Along the way they didn't shirk at putting entire villages out of work as the main saw mill businesses could no longer carry out their trade as their only source of wood became illegal to harvest.  Interesting but somehow necessary.  These days it seems to be a country entirely bought in to the importance of holding onto this version of their past, whether it's related to biodiversity, research or simply people's enjoyment and appreciation.  Can't make up my mind here whether this version of wrapping in cotton wool is entirely great, but it certainly stops the place being covered in houses which take over the thing which brought people here in the first place.

Franz Josef

FJ is a funny little town. Someone whose research skills I trust (google / wiki) advises me the town's total population is 330 people. And the bar man, who I have no reason to distrust advises me it's nearer 350 these days but 700 during the peak tourist seasons. On my travels other people have talked to me about the place, and told me there's Nothing To Do if it rains or other than the glacier. As it's such a small town, somehow with growth not aligned to the big noise which is made about it at tourist info places across the country, they do indeed appear to be right. If of course your standards of entertainment are high. Mine aren't. There are at least four places selling coffee, I reckon three selling beer, two selling T-shirts and post cards, a small but perfectly formed supermarket, and a Kiwi wildlife centre. There's also lots of ways of leaving town, such as helicopters or minibuses towing kayaks. But somehow, yes, it does remind me a little of Bannister Green where my Nan used to live in Essex. Except BG had clear industry. Fields and fields of it, and my sister's nose and eyes ran with regularity as the pollen count soared during school holidays.

But what would Franz Josef be without the Glacier, we ask? And it is a relevant question because the glacier is retreating faster than its recorded history tells us has happened before. It's diminished visibly to the eyes of those who live here in their memory span. I've met people out walking (sorry tramping) today who have been here twenty years ago and remembered seeing the glacier at a distance in the areas we now walk along. Opinion seems to converge on the view that it will be gone in twenty years time. The neighbouring one at Fox Glacier perhaps in 10 – 15 years. Will people take the time to come to this town then, I wonder?

So, Glacial retreat, I am reliably informed is something which over history happens. It's part of a cycle, it ebbs and it flows. Because it's receding now doesn't mean it won't return. Although not in my lifetime, perhaps it would be generations or maybe not at all. The point is, that this isn't a signal of panic and global warning and a time to berate ourselves for our misdoings over generations of man creating his own habitat at the cost of another. It may be meaningful, it may not, and we simply don't know.

I do confess, however, when I saw Franz Joseph today in the prescribed walkers fashion, I was sad to see what is clearly a diminished object. I thought hard about this word and wondered if I was disappointed or if indeed sad was the appropriate term. Settled on sad. It's clearly a shadow of its former self. There's a sense of loss when some of nature's great landmarks are lost, and when somehow the most challenging environments move towards benign, that sanitised version of adventure we're so accustomed to now.

It was also sad to see how it no longer glistens, glows, no long smooth slopes. It's cracked, pock marked, scarred, areas are slipping and sliding in the melt. And maybe I am disappointed too, for me, to not have seen it in its glory, to not have experienced it in its youth. Although, I'm led to believe its heyday was 1790 and even I'm not that old. It's an odd wistful thinking thing when we look back to the past and believe it better than the present and one hell of a lot better than the future. Sometimes find myself looking at the people I know and have known and regret not having had the chance to meet them at their most youthful, vibrant and optimistic, but history cannot be changed, neither what mankind as a whole have done, nor indeed, the path I have travelled.

Miracle Mile

It's still rock and roll to me.

Today, after five days of physical hard graft which has left my body singing, humming and growling like a howling stratocaster (at this point feel free to put on Meat Loaf's Wasted youth lyrics to supplement the Billy Joel song), I have rested.

I think I'm getting better at rest.  Alcohol assisted rest, at any rate.  I woke up thinking bike hire.  But the hostel kitchen is upstairs and even though I kind of know I could have, I felt slightly sorry for my body which seemed to be trying to distance itself from my actions.  So I chilled.

I wandered down to the Queenstown waterfront via a number of cheap tacky souvenir shops (the guys at home have some treats coming their way), where I had long black and dark chocolate with lavender at the local chocolate experts cafe (patagonia).  Then bimbled into the botanic gardens, checking out frisbee golf as I went.  Strolled onto a round the lake cruise of 90 minutes where much chat with Americans and New Zealanders went on in a most mellow fashion.  Then it was back to land for lunch and more coffee.  More strolling, more souvenir hunting (those lucky folk at home), followed by a 3pm stop at a waterside bar for a glass of chardonnay.  Drank this slowly and quietly whilst idly looking at the Remarkables mountain range the other side of the lake and feeling that sense of wonder at the sheer size and impermeability of them, against the fact that only three days ago I had climbed Single cone in the snow.   Yet here I was, shorts and T-shirt, in a very melliow swelter in the sun.  Then of course it was time for ice cream ...

I have grown to love Queenie too.  Once you get beyond the shops it's all lake and mountains.  What is not to like there?  I  have been educated too.  The place was founded in European terms by a guy over from Haverford West (I can never remember if that's one word or two).  It's only industry (only, get that?!) is tourism so it's no wonder it's so geared up to it.  It manages a good turnover both winter and summer with many many adventures on offer.  No, you really couldn't get bored ever if adrenaline or shopping or meandering is  your thing.  I couldn't live here like I could in Kaikoura  but hey, it's beautiful nonetheless.

New Zealand has broken my camera and my sunglasses but as yet, it hasn't broken my spirit or my heart.  Loving it.

Body Aches

... and so begins another weary dayyyyyy, and so begins another weary day!

Oh my word, my poor old body, what on the earth was I thinking?  Most bits ache, but in a really really good, we've done a lot of work kind of a way.  Really good because a lot has been done, and I've not just survived it but actually thrived on it.  Feeling kind of fit and healthy and strong and fatigued in a really good way.  The kind of way that means I can devote tomorrow to swimming in the lake, eating ice cream, drinking coffee and going in search of cake.  It'll be productive, mark my words.

Over the past five days I have done a Lot of learning. 

I have brushed up on abseiling, prussiking, anchoring systems (with an emphasis on alpine not rock climbing techniques).

I have learned short roping, long roping, simultaneous movement over rock (running belay), using landscape features to enhance safety. I have learned self arrest with the ice axe, I have learned how to set up snow anchors with snow stake, axe, in soft or hard snow.  I have learned how to escape from a belay system without just cutting the rope and letting my partner drop to the ground.  There has been simulated crevasse rescue.  I have learned the rudiments of avalanche risk, degree of slope angles, weather conditions, type of snow, bond between old and new snow.  I have learned about sport climbing and about via ferrata.  There have been knots.  There has been navigation.  I have led, I have followed.  I have panted like a dog and crawled on my hands and knees.  It has been good.

Sunshine mountain

Finally I understand. This is what climbing is really about. It's about climbing mountains. People have always said to me, climbing is about getting outside, getting hands and feet on rock. When I did that at crags, it didn't make sense. Repetitive, slow, mundane, got less out of it than I got by going to the indoor climbing wall where I got a high volume of exercise, great cake and a social life. I thought climbing outside would make it part of a journey. If there's one thing in life I enjoy, it's a journey. A to B, not round in circles.

I love long distance walking, consecutive days, carrying pack or not carrying pack. I love the feeling of travel. Offa's Dyke path was one of my best endeavours ever. I love it too on the bike, Mary Towneley loop over two days was just awesome, a feeling of travelling, even though it is a big circle. Sea Kayaking has always held similar promise. I like to move it move it.

And finally today, climbing became what it should be. For the first time in my life, I climbed a mountain. I mean, yes, I've been to the tops of mountains before, walking, sometimes even with crampons, occasionally involving scrambling, but today I climbed to the top of the mountain. Walked to the base through boulder fields and snow, slow progress negotiating big lumpy pieces of landscape. Upwards through snow drifts, upwards through rocks. Upwards, always upwards. No vegetation other than the occasional moss patch, no trees, no grasses, the climate simply too severe to support life in quantity. Crickets now and then leapt out of the way, even in the snow.

Then we began to climb. The shoulders of the mountain starting off wide and shallow, two people moving together on a rope, scrambling, hands now and then reaching out for rock. The ridge became narrower, it became steeper, rocks became bigger, parts of the mountain, no longer window dressing. Climbing became more involved, hands over hands over hands over feet, feet, feet and feet. Clanking of metal on rock, and short sharp phrases floating between us through the air. Climb, cleaning, on belay, off belay. Many many repeats, many meetings to swap leads, to return gear, just us and the mountain, climbing. Doing what climbing is really for. Together we arrived at the summit, in the middle of a glorious blue day, around us simply mountain, simply rock, simply air and snow. In the distances lakes, Mount Aspiring, Mount Cook, a panorama of challenge but all of it remote and irrelevant because we're here, at the top, climbing the mountain.

And then of course we head downwards, three Abseil pitches see us start on our way, gliding down between two shoulders of rock, skirting thick snow in the gullies, finally existing the narrow slit into yet another snow field. Crampons. Axes. Exhilaration and joy.

Tired, aching, sore, happy. I finally climbed a mountain.

Nice day

Such a nice day, did you have a nice day? Or lyrics to that effect pattering around my somewhat blasted brain.

Second day of mountaineering instruction completed. Today has taken out the contents of my brain, unwound the tangles and put them back together in the wrong order in an attempt to cram in more information than my tiny skull can accommodate. My, it's been work for the head today. Although, I believe, technically, it was rope work.

Today I have learned that we do things differently in the UK. My way of anchoring is not the only way. Shock horror, who would have thought it. So I've learned about a floating anchor, and frankly I like it. Simple, with safety built in, in fact, more so as there is some leeway to manage a climb which doesn't go straight up the side of a cliff. Surprisingly, not all climbs are in straight lines. Who would have thought it?

So, I have learned how to get hands free within a system, set up a back up and then release myself from a system (this is with me as a theoretical lead or the poor sod dealing with a crevasse faller). I have learned how to get myself to the victim and how to lift them.

Some of it has come surprisingly naturally. In fact, prussicing up a rope and coming back down it using the prussic (which wasn't part of the plan, instructor had a blonde moment, and was somewhat embarrassed that it was me that noticed not him) was actually one of the rare crossovers I've encountered from the tree climbing days. Exactly the same in fact and I'm proficient and smooth and unchallenged by it. Unlike the whole Italian hitch, half hitch, overhand knot thing going on as far as I can tell all over the place in establishing the escape route.

And after 6 hours of that kind of mind blowing learning we went and did two hours of sport climbing. Oh yes, I swore. Sport Climbing. Multi pitch in fact, and abseiling down, even if the instructor calls that by another name.

Tomorrow we have a really big mountain day. The biggest I'll have ever done. There's a ridge walk, there's scrambling with ropes, there's climbing, descending, there's snow. It's long and it's high and it's going to be interesting ...

Parking Lot

Today I have had a guide called Jono lead me around the Remarkables. The aim is to not be a complete beginner when I hit the Alps this summer. It's not a specific brief, and I might just as well have said take me out and teach me stuff. Because learning is what happened, cool, huh?

We started today at 08:30, without even a coffee under my belt (I was prioritising finding a shop to sell me chapstick which I seem to have misplaced). We talked about what I've done, what I aim to do and what he could offer and put together an ace plan. Then bags were packed; mine found itself carrying two ice axes, crampons, gaiters, an alpine harness and a world of other stuff of wintery nature. Good job too because up there in the mountain tops where snow still lies thickly, it did actually snow on us. Winter wonderland and all that.

I learned three (I think) different ways of ascending, depending on the steepness of the slope, on whether the snow is hard or soft. Zigzagging cutting steps, using 2 point, 10 point and a torturous method associated with the French. I learned ways of descending, some which felt like hands and knees, another with heavy heels. I learned how to use the axe for self arrest if I'm falling downhill on my front facefirst, if I've landed on my arse and my head is uphill, and if I've landed on my back head uphill. I learned how to travel between snowy patches covering rock on crampons, both climbing and downclimbing.

I blush to say the instructor has praised my footwork, said I must be a pretty good climber and told me he's showed me some techniques he doesn't normally show clients. I am, apparently kind of co-ordinated and able to grasp the techniques relatively quickly. We've travelled together with a rope between us as though we were glacier walking, and had a lot of talk about what's involved in that. Yes, it's going well and it's value for money. She says, rocking back to the accommodation near to 7pm at night.

There will be some long days and indeed a 6am start is likely on Friday, and maybe Via Ferrata on Saturday, something I've been yearning to do for years. And now there is homework. Knots to be learned … hmm.

P-p-p-parking lot on repeat around my head today.

Beautiful stranger

Queenstown is horrid. In the same way as Chamonix is nasty as Ambleside is awful, as Blackpool is a parody of itself. It's just nasty. And I'm here for six days, although most of those out in the hills. The only plus side is the town sees itself as a downhill mountain biking mecca so maybe, just maybe, there'll be some interesting t-shirts …

1. The Japanese girl in the dorm yesterday in Oamaru is in a constant state of wonder. Big wide eyes opening at every experience anyone discloses to her. It makes her just fabulous company, in her world everything is new, vibrant, exciting and things are whirling around her like a toddler in a fun fair. She's managed to retain a youthful innocence and air of surprise even though she's been on the road for some time. She's hugely impressed with the German woman's hitchhiking prowess, she loves the Chinese woman's working stay methods. She's excited by everything. She showed me pictures on her mobile phone of her pushing a luggage trolley into the wall at Kings Cross station as per Harry Potter … I love being around people like her. It makes me lose for a moment or ten my highly attuned bullshit barometer and appreciate the world through her eyes.
2. I have had proper prolonged conversations with three lots of folk today. At least. Bumped into a couple at the cheese factory today who I'd met and engaged with over penny farthing rides yesterday. One thing led to another and we spent an hour drinking coffee (and eating cheese) and talking life on the road. Auckland residents. Talked to another lady, long distance lorry driver (what other kind are there?) from Perth for half an hour at the bus stop during which time she told me her pains, her dreams, her troubles, her hopes and ambitions. I seem to attract confidences, proper discussions about people's deep down feelings from time to time. She was extraordinary and interesting. Then sat with a guy from Dunedin on the bus for an hour exchanging tales of our home towns and what makes them great. He was returning from Istanbul, interesting tales, particularly the one about the Aussie guys next to him on the flight having a proper full on ding dong fist fight on the plane.
3. Sheep and cows
4. Liquor stores. I love the kiwi way of naming things. Every thing with a name like liquor store looks like a bargain booze. They don't have butchers either, they have meat shops. Take away the frills and froth from anything.
5. Almonds and Apricots. I'm in a country where two of my favourite tastes are cheap and plentiful.
6. Beer bottles with kind of ring pull tops. Genius. Hic.
7. Truly awesome hostel. My bunk has it's own curtains, its own light (yeay, I no longer have to lie in bed staring at the ceiling when I wake up at 6:30 and just stay quiet not to disturb others), its own socket point, no more fighting with folk, and under the bed a mahoosive lockable drawer. All this time I have carried with me my climbing wall padlock and key and now at the time I probably need it most, I get to use it. I'm out on a training course for a few days, and knowing the netbook is safely tucked up is a very good thing.
8. Toiletries. I'm in a world of discovery. When your main criteria for shower gel (or body wash), shampoo and conditioner is that it comes in a bottle under 90ml you get very accepting. I did try to do without conditioner but the sea water taught me best not to. And I am on honey soap for this week. I am going to smell Sweet (and not in the NZ sense of the word).
9. Buses. Today I had connecting buses. The first one was half an hour late and the second one waited for me, how awesome is that (for me, not the other 40 passengers sat waiting). Slight improvement on the bus service of a few days ago when I helped to push start it. All part of the kiwi experience, the pushing of buses …
10. Icebreaker merino. It's an investment, not an indulgence … honest.

And the words “in love with a beautiful stranger” are zizzing around a very mellow head.

Being happy

New Zealand for me is like an almighty bell, with the purest chime. It's as though my sternum is a tuning fork which resonates to the sound. The vibration is picked up and my chest begins to sing, a tune which emanates from the note of the bell but is not of the note, and throughout my body, the song grows, changes, continues, responds.

Gentle day today, walking the skyline trail over Oamaru. It takes you up through park land, residential style up into reserve land where you walk through a small piece of Bushland. It's labelled as Bush, and it's sadly small, a relic of what was here before man built and built and built and a town was created. It reminds me of the sad state of affairs in the UK where stands of ancient woodland are such a rareity that a name was assigned to woodland which resembled closely the original composition, with a scientific definition existing for semi ancient woodland. Just the name creates a sense of remorse at what man's actions did to the country.

Yet, change is not a bad thing, and there's part of me is uncertain why we are concerned for the encroachment of non native species into the natural wetlands, woodlands, meadows etc. In the UK we fight constantly against the rather beautiful himalayan balsam, and in New Zealand they have developed new ways of killing willows to allow native species to re-colonise the wetlands. Red and Grey squirrels would be another UK example, and the Kiwi customs demonstrate how important it has become to keep things as they've always been. And yet I wonder why it has become important? In human geography terms the UK finds 10% of its population weren't born in the country, and the mix of people and intermingling of cultures (by which I mostly mean food and religion) makes it feel fluid, a never ending dynamic equilibrium, and somehow it feels like there must surely be a strength in that change. After all, evolution in genetic terms relied on changes, adaptations, survival of the fittest and without change, surely all that can come is extinction as the climate and environment change and we fail to have the capacity to respond to dramatic change and disaster. Stagnation cannot surely be the answer? We cannot live in the past clinging to a belief system which no longer works and failing to see that it has stood still while the world moves on?

In Penguin city – Oamaru.

1. Penguins, ungainly cute little beasties. Cautious but not cowardly. Enjoying them a lot.
2. Human hamster wheel. Found this ace thing in a kid's playground. Big wooden wheel you get inside and start walking. Or if you're me, you end up crawling, your hands on the top, falling over and dizzy everywhere for ages before you finally work out how to remain upright and walk in a far more dignified fashion. But dignified isn't the point if you're playing, is it?
3. Getting on with being happy. It's become kind of easy and routine to just wake up happy and stay happy. Appreciating where I am right now. Just here, just now.
4. Proper pot of tea. Stopped at somewhere called the “tea pot inn” yesterday. For the first time since arriving in New Zealand I have cautiously permitted someone else to brew up for me. I carry my own tea bags. I am British. And yesterday's cup of tea was leaves in a pot, proper strainer, little jug of milk and there was fruit cake. The one oddness was that the cup and saucer included a mint imperial. Not sure what that was all about but embraced it anyway. Guid and strong.
5. Skyline walk – just a wonderful piece of town planning taking you through a tapestry of places.
6. Botany. It's odd as I walked through one piece of meadowland knowing some of the plants either as weeds or as wildflowers in the UK but also seeing there in the wild plants I'm more used to seeing in my mum's garden. There are thistles, cow parsley, dock, sedges and grasses, and there are plants I can only vaguely identify as solanum family, or as legumes of some nature, and possibly kinds of flowering currants past their blooming season.
7. Almonds & Apricots. I could live here. The common foodstuffs also happen to be amongst my favourites.
8. Giggling with French girl has now changed to giggling with Japanese girl as we have bed changeover in the dorm.
9. Long black. Yes, I have finally settled on my NZ coffee preference. And no, it's not the same as Americano …
10. Pokies. I have sought and found the answer to what this word means ...

Partial lyrics are going around my head. “it's not the same as being happy”. Not sure where that's come from ...

Far off places

I notice my brain is randomly singing I'm relieved to hear that you've been to some far off places. A fantastically sarcastic line if ever I heard one. If of course I'm remembering it right. Appreciation of good things has overflown today.

1. Pain and suffering. I love the way my body feels. The knowledge that it's truly actually done something. And not just the soreness still gently present in my heels. My shoulders are stiff, my legs, thighs and buttocks unobtrusively ache, only when I rest my attention with them. The Paddle boarding wonderfully took its toll, and the four hour bike ride was just what I made it, on the flat and pushing the pedals with both speed and grunt, because I needed to feel this reminder of being alive.
2. Legs. I remember seeing ZZ top live singing legs. I eye mine with curiosity most days, specifically really when I'm applying yet more sun block. I have not shaved these beasts for a month, and yet, I have been prepared to face the world with shorts on. After a while, hairs reached both maximum length and density, and from there on, they are ceasing to be these dark mature woman's spiky growths, and somehow have returned to blonde and soft on my calves. I almost like them, not just tolerate them.
3. Mindfulness. I'm somehow on week 5 now into the book which guides me kindly through a process in the tiniest steps possible. Maths is not on my side because I'm only now moving into week 4 of my travels in the southern hemisphere. But one thing I have taken on board is that it doesn't matter, nobody is counting, judging or competing here. I'm enjoying the process much as I'm enjoying the journey and travels here.
4. Ruck me, maul me, make me scrum.
5. Little rat is a new word for valued customer on Atomic buses.
6. Smell of the sea
7. Joy of the journey
8. Tapestry of feelings quiet and extreme, happy and sad that make us human
9. Bicycles on the back of camper vans. I smile every time in a kindred spirit kind of a way.
10. Dignity of tree skeletons
11. Tupperware wars and the bliss of travelling solo.

Bloody Marvellous

1. Jonny Foreigner. I have met so many people from so many places, and learned so much about what it's like to live their lives. I have lost track of the Nationality count but approximately North Caledonia, Australian, Kiwi, Danish, Finnish, Swedish, Swiss, German, Korean, Chinese, Japanese. I just lose track. It's just really wonderful chilling and shooting the breeze (is it OK for an English woman of my age to use that phrase) with all manner of interesting people. Because when you're back packing the people do all seem to be interesting, because there's a tale to tell behind every one.
2. Discarded stuff. I'm enjoying the replacements for discarded stuff. The North Face T-shirt bit the dust after a sulphurous incident in Rotorua paired up with impractical white panelling in a world of travel wash. The camera got involved in a gust of wind incident and the new one is just the coolest thing ever. Yesterday the paddle boarding took the sunglasses out of my life and today I have a new pair, kind of surround wrap round ish, much better than the old ones for biking. Liking them a lot.
3. Tea & Cake in the afternoon on the balcony of the hostel overlooking the sea.
4. Day sack packing where the extra layer of clothing is now the swimming costume.
5. Dolphins.
6. 101 ways to cook 2 minute noodles.
7. Girls dorms – quieter and less smelly than mixed dorms. Earlier nights too it appears, although 5am departures for dolphin watching had me hiding under my bed covers.
8. Solo travelling. After watching some kind of thermonuclear build up going on in the kitchen today over the tupperware box which was his but she was furious about having been lost I'm kind of glad to be on my own. Well, actually I already was enjoying the solo thing which brings me on to …
9. Self contained. I'm self contained and it's really wonderful. I'm still connected with the world but am loving the way I'm feeling, kind of solid, with my customary competence and innate ability to be happy. I love the word solid. My nan used it about me years ago, properly observant of her because both physically and mentally I'm pretty solid. No, it doesn't sound exciting but I love being this feet on the ground head in the mountains person. You could tell when you were in favour with my nan because she'd start suggesting you were just like her. Which makes me smile, the arrogance of the woman to think that being her was what we should aspire to but she was a strong willed, opinionated, sturdy old battle axe, in fact, a true matriarch who had two generations answerable to her. Or thought she did.
10. People watching. This balcony is great. It overlooks bus stops and a car park. There were llamas in the car park earlier, now there are campervans, kayaks, bicycle, all sorts. It's actually quite a lot like Newquay being in Kaikoura.

In paradise

Today joy has come from:

1. The seal colony. I was walking around the peninsula along the pebbly beach, head somewhere in the clouds when from just in front of me is a snorting noise and I realise I'm about to stumble onto a sleeping seal which has now warned me off. I clambered round it giving a wide berth. Just around the corner was the larger colony
2. Birdlife. Big interesting birdies!
3. Clifftop walking. Looking down on the folk taking the beach walk, walking along a pathway mown through the middle of a corn field. Panoramic views of coast, sea, and all around me a bright blue sky.
4. Father Christmas flag. Just outside my hostel room window is a New Zealand flag and below it is Father Christmas flapping in the sunshine.
5. Paddle boarding. I rock.
6. Fun with strangers. Laughs and giggles with two German girls out in the sea, on the boards and in the water
7. Kiwi health and safety prior to exercise questionnaire “Feelin' good?”
8. Wet suits, warm and playful, and these days I don't feel I have to attempt to cover my belly. Again, I rock. Huzzah.
9. Room mates. Now sharing with a lass from Cardiff. Indian origin and beautiful.
10. Jaffa cake ice cream. I make no further explanation

And today Phil Collins has taken root in my head. Another day for you, you and me in paradise.

The Joy

The Joy

Ooh, haven't done my ten things list for a bit it seems. Too many to write up, too many …

1. Boots and shoes. Passing through Blenheim (or something like that) on the bus today, the fences the length of three fields of grape vines were full of boots and shoes hanging off them by their laces. You can almost visualise how the collection grew and grew, and imagine some of the stories connected with the footwear. Little pink childrens shoes through to farmers steelies. Wonderful.
2. Waffle machines. The hostel I stayed at in Nelson had a waffle machine and with the breakfast room quiet this morning I gave it a go. And it overflowed, and sizzling batter went everywhere. English women are not meant to have waffles for breakfast.
3. Seals. Lots and lots of seals basking on the rocks.
4. Seaside and mountains. The joy of the two things in such close proximity, with snow visible on the mountain tops but by the beach I'm wearing shorts and a t-shirt right through to 9pm at night. It's weird, but I find peace by the sea, a feeling of restful contentment comes over me, and then I look up at the mountains and my chest physically tightens, and if I tried to speak in that moment I just couldn't because the mountains do literally take my breath away and I yearn to be in them.
5. The cutest Finnish lass in the world is sharing my dorm room. I have maternal instincts. Oh, and it's a girl's dorm tonight which is also a thing of joy because it smells pleasant and nobody is noisy. Boys come in late, kick shoes off all over the place and kind of lumber up bunk bed ladders and piss loudly in en suite bathrooms. Hostels really shouldn't have en suite bathrooms in 6 person dorms.
6. Bloody Big Bag. Met another woman today with a purple Lowe Alpine bag, although a different model to mine I suspect. It had a front pocket with mesh where mine's solid material. Funny thing is that she got a travel journal out of her handbag and it's identical to the van journal which Shazza completes daily (oh yes she does).
7. Ups and downs of e-mails, just as real life. Had a long long message from a friend, full of plans and tales of the festive period. Had a short piece of sad family news too. Reminder that real life goes on and yes, I am part of it.
8. Good quality knickers. Let us thank the knicker goddess for good quality knickers. That would be Elle McPherson then. Seriously, for a six week visit, I've brought with me three pairs of knickers. Well made fast drying pants which fit snugly and just work despite the fact I suspect Bridget Jones would approve of them only for the never having sex again moods. Sometimes I am horrified at myself for the money spent on these, but not now, now they are worth every penny.
9. Snack size chorizo. Who would have thought it. Perfect one woman sized chorizo. With slightly smutty connurtations.
10. Paddle Boarding. I don't know what it is, but I'm doing it tomorrow.

Innocent Man

I have a very good memory for lyrics. I was in a facebook conversation with a guy from my teenage years chatting over this and that, in fact, me asking him if we could do some collaborative lyrics. Because I think I have some potential at that, although I'm not quite sure. My world view is often a bit different to other people's and hard to relate to, and because Paul is somebody who it would be educational to work with. And because I like him. It's funny, because back in the day when I was in a schooldays band with him (I, believe it or not was sometimes drummer sometimes reserve drummer, mostly reserve drummer), his lyrics spoke to me so clearly that I can still remember them now. I quoted them back at him indeed. Three little words that mean so much, and so little, accepted statement of emotional equality, three little words that mean so much, and so little, they cannot begin to explain what you mean to me, but still I say that I love you … funny, really, on paper they aren't much but with a simple melody and repetition and twists to the story the rhyme and rhythm comes out.

The coach driver today (I have moved from Nelson to Kaikoura) played a Billy Joel album. The lyrics to Innocent Man always resonated with me in the past, and I identified with the male voice of the song. Not so much now, as indeed I felt annoyed with the singer for not moving on, taking charge of their own life and for pursuing a lost cause, and it was weird seeing myself as though from a distance feeling those things. Travel days, eh?

Oddly I find that I'm paddle boarding tomorrow. I will be honest, I don't know what that is ...

I learned ...

Packing.  Wot worked and wot worked not.

This selection of clothing has worked well for me:

One microfleece
One PrimaLoft
One hard shell waterproof
One pair of walking trousers which convert to shorts
One pair of lycra cycling shorts
One multi purpose pair of baggy shorts (in theory MTB shorts but multi functional)
Two polyester T-shirts.  Quick drying.
One going out top
Three pairs of knickers
Two pairs of walking socks
One pair of running socks
One lightweight pair of walking socks
One pair of walking boots
One pair of multi functional trainers / approach shoes, meshed and lightweight.
One pair of flip flops
One scrunch up dress which works for beach or pub.
Swimming cozzie
Shortie PJs for modesty in hostel accommodation

For the next bit of the trip I'm carrying
One pair of alpine trousers
One long sleeved thermal baselayer and one pair of thermal leggings.

Vango helium wotsit tent
Alpkit numo mat (packs up tiny but no thermal qualities, perfect)
One sleeping bag liner (essential for hostels where you doubt the hygiene)
One microfibre thing to use as towel
One small stove
Camping cutlery
One set of one person camping cooking pans (could have got away with one pan if I'm honest0
Four dry bags of various sizes (I've used all of them to date)
One Life Straw
One First Aid kit
One trowel
Walking poles
Rucksack bag for buses & airports & ferries
One big tupperware box for opened packets.  Bought when the ants set in, useful when the wasps arrived and pretty good as a possum deterrant.
Sandwich bags
Mountain Hard Wear "scrambling" rucksack has been invaluable as day sack, biking bag, food container, general hard working bag which by not having any structural shenanigans will also roll up and fit inside the Bloody Big Bag.  It was also a fine cabin bag, a shopping bag and a long bus journey bag.

Luxury items
Phone
Camera
Kindle
Netbook
I pod
Bloody chargers and connectors for the whole damn lot.
Solar power monkey.  I love this.  A lot.

Things I got rid of on the way were the second microfleece and a proper fleece, a lightweight towel, a pair of walking sandals and the open university books.

Things I came out without but bought out here - dress and flipflops.  Couldn't survive without something feminine about me.  Sunblock and more sunblock and even more sunblock.  Buying toiletries in small bottles every week or so.  Lots of hostels have shower gel and shampoo dispensers in the showers and if you're not fussy what you use on your hair it's perfectly fine.  Chemists tend to have end of range and sample bottles in baskets and that's what I've been using.  48 hour anti perspirant is also sold in aerosols which last about a week.  Longer if you really take to heart the every other day thing.  Which of course I'd never do .. or would I?

Sigh.  It's not good to be back in the world of electronic communications.  It's brought me back to earth with a flump!  But tomorrow is a new and exciting day!

Because the wheels on the bus go round and round, round and round, round and round, the wheels on the bus go round and round all day long ...

Prove it.

I am proof that women like me exist, and so are a lot of those I met on the trail.  Five days of tramping the Abel Tasman Great Walk complete. 

Unlike the other grown ups I encountered, I did it the hard way.  I carried all my stuff and opted for the personal space of my own tent.  Interesting.  Other proper grown ups had gear shifted for them, or undertook some of the journey by kayak, and others stayed in the huts all the way.  But there was no them and us, and I chatted on consecutive days with Alyson (with a y), the professional cake decorator for Auckland who was there with Pete from Barrow in Furness (now Auckland).  There was the woman doing a mad mother hen thing and loving every single minute of having a group of ten to look after, sons of 19, 22 and 24 with their respective girlfriends and other hanger oners. 

And on my last two days camping on the other side of the world, there was a girl on the site from two miles down the road from my Manchester home.  And why indeed wouldn't there be, because that's how life happens.  I know this because I had a mail from my friend Tavi before Christmas asking me if I would be in the Nelson area on 3rd Jan.  I was due to be in Nelson for just one night, the 3rd Jan, so we met up and she walked with me for the first day of the trail which was just too wonderful for words.  I am this incredibly lucky woman, blessed with friends who I adore.  Tavi is one hell of a woman, different to me but alike.  She can't imagine a life without activity, and she gathers people to her like fir cones on a forest floor.  She was breaking up a business trip to talk glacial retreat with peers to go kayaking in New Zealand.  I feel blessed by the people I have in my life. 

I chose this trail because, honestly, it sounded easy, and indeed it was a gentle amble along the coast line.  Temperatures in the late 20s, bright blue skies, turquoise seas and yellow sandy beaches.  Birds, insects, tree ferns, the full on New Zealand experience, just as I'd always dreamed it. 

And I learned a bit about how to play the Monopoly card game from Sandra from Japan, Ah-kee (that's how it sounded) from China and John from Auckland.  It was the settler for all their disputes along the way.  Would, with hindsight, have been kind of nice to have someone to split the weight of the tent and cooking stuff, but then, is there anyone out there who could stomach the 2 minute noodle and tuna diet I have become queen of ...

trundles off singing I have climbed highest mountains, I have run through the fields ...

A drifter

Like a drifter I was born to walk alone. Or something like that. My lyrics memory is good but sometimes I twist things to say what I want them to say.

So, here we are then, eh? 2013 and all that. I have to say that, for me, 2012 was a blinder of a year. By the May of the year I had two feet firmly, absolutely on the ground and my head as is customary in the hills. I had an overwhelming sense of wisdom, of knowing just what and who I am, an undisturbed solid faith in me. And I resigned from the best job in the world with a smile on my face and no hard feeling to head out into a pretty cool future, one that was mine, all mine. Solid. I seem to have been properly blessed by life, every decision seems to me to have been appropriate. I bought the campervan, I booked the tickets to New Zealand, I figured out how to do this, how to grow on the feeling of fulfilment. And so far it's been good. I mean, I do anticipate bads too, life does not bless us with nothing but good, but so far, it's been pretty much ace.

Things changed a bit last year. For me, fundamentally people are important, and it's worth a spot of reflection on that front. Unlikely people became properly friends. Folk who were work colleagues and are now ex work colleagues changed “label” into friends, one or two into inner circle friends. My boss, peculiarly is in the not losing touch category. Other unexpected people arrived in my life; it's been a year where it seems I have met new people and there's promise in new friendships. Proper promise, and joy. And it's plural. Others ebb and flow, as people do, and there's been more unexpected joy with my friend becoming house guest and that friendship becoming more comfortable for lack of a better word. Comfortable is a good thing to have with friends. I love people.

It's a funny trip I'm something like 10 days into. Living life out of a couple of bags, moving around on buses, ferries and at some point the train, between bunk beds and tent. In France in the campervan I spent a lot of time alone, somewhat isolated both by language and surroundings, having chosen a less than social way to live. In New Zealand I get to chose, and largely I do chose solitude. Some of it is a shyness, or perhaps a polite British reluctance to inflict my company on others. I'm tactful, I presuppose age related rejection and avoid putting myself in that position by being sociable to a point but not inflicting myself on the yooofffff, not wanting to cramp their styles. It's really hard to express this without it sounding as though in some way I'm being snooty and self deprecating. That's not how it feels to me. I simply feel kind of mellow and content with the Alison shaped space I inhabit. Solid, I guess. Solid.

The ten things list (not written this up for a while)

1. the world's crappest bike on hire for a day which proved to me that you don't need the best equipment to enjoy riding and you can push it to your limits, it's just your limits are different when the bike's different.
2. Germans. Three fresh out of school lads cycling through New Zealand until March / April. Fresh faced, bright, fluent in English, no hippy urchins but neat and tidy middle class. Enjoying their company immensely as I room share with them.
3. I am not a lesbian. I could elaborate but it's something of periodic amusement to me that I give off this vibe.
4. Neither am I a sailor.
5. Little Blue Penguins
6. New Zealand supermarket sandwiches
7. Electronic gismos. Getting a lot of use from my work leaving presents of kindle and solar powermonkey. Many hours of fun with chargers …
8. Kathmandu trainer shoes
9. Glacier dreaming
10. New Year texts