Saturday, Feb 23rd, Russell, New Zealand

Greetings!

I'll bet that only a few of you have ever been to the North Island of New Zealand.  Except for flying into Auckland to go to the South Island, or a three-day visit many years ago in search of my grandfather's sisters, I hadn't given it much attention. 

So we're going to spend the next 24 days exploring the rolling hills, sunny beaches, and crossroad towns which dominate this island.  So far, I can tell you that it's really beautiful.  The kind of beauty you don't find much.  It's attracted lots of retired and aging surfers.  And for those in my home county of Sonoma, imagine three times as many of you - in an area 20 time bigger.   But today, we drove up to Russell from Auckland, and there were only a couple of stops.

One was a surf beach with great bathrooms, lifeguard station, stairs to the beach, and miles of warm surf.  I could easily live here.

We'll stay here for three days, drive all the way up to the northern most tip of the island, and back down the other coast to look at some forests.

To see some of the other photos we took today, click on Saturday, Feb 23rd, Russell, New Zealand.

Friday, Feb 22nd, Auckland, New Zealand

Greetings!

Today, we listened to lions roar, and took the Sky tower elevator to its 60th floor to view Auckland.  Beginning with another train ride into the City, we hopped-on to the western circuit of the City Tour bus, and got off at the Auckland Zoo.   We saw penguins hiding under an over-turned boat, Sri-Lankan elephants in a barn escaping the rain, a serval sleeping in his small den, and two kiwis pecking at the ground in a darkened enclosure.

Not afraid to greet us in the light were two male lions, some meerkat, a southern white rhino, several tortoise, three giraffe, and four zebras.

The Zoo's layout is a fun to walk through, and allows the visitor to get a real sense of the environment in which each animal finds home.  It balances the need for security for the animals with our desire to get as close as possible.  Too many zoos seem to force their captives to put on a show for the visitors.  The reality is that they are not easy to find in the wild, and this zoo makes you understand and appreciate that.

Returning to the Sky Tower, we ascended to the Observation Deck to watch four young people conquer their fears by leaping off the ledge surrounded by video cameras and plenty of safety cables.  Eighty-five seconds later, they were being unbuckled on a platform at street level, and flashing victory fingers to their parents.

Dinner at St Pierre's on Queen Street, we rode the train in the rain back home.  Note to us: buy another umbrella, and a flashlight.

To view the other photos taken today, click on: Friday, Feb 22nd, Auckland, New Zealand.

Thursday, Feb 20th, Auckland, New Zealand

Greetings!

After 16 hours flying, we arrived in Auckland, New Zealand on Wednesday night around 10:00 pm.  Retrieving our luggage and the rental car, the sim card we bought at the airport, and Google Maps, got us to our B&B just in time to check in with our host, and finally fall asleep.

Today, we walked a couple of blocks to the Metro subway line, and rode it to downtown Auckland's Central Station.   A few blocks walk along the harbor, past the old Ferry bldg, we purchase tickets to the Hop-on, hop-off city tour bus for  two days.  Included is a free ticket to the top of the Sky Tower, the tallest free-standing structure in the southern hemisphere.  We'll see it tomorrow night, when the 90,000 lights on the Auckland Harbor Bridge are lit up.

The next best thing to reading the travel books written about a city you're visiting is to take a city bus tour.  It's not a substitute, but it gives you a chance to place all those esoteric little facts you think you read about the city into real images.  And decide which things are worth getting off the bus and looking closer at.  Today, it was the Auckland War Memorial Museum. 

Two special exhibits caught our attention containing pieces of art and village life for the last 5,000 years from the Maori and Polynesian cultures.  We were just in time for a performance of Maori history, and then walked through its large rooms filled with fascinating artifacts and stories.

Climbing back aboard the tour bus, we made our way to the train station.  Nearby, we found a great restaurant for dinner (Ortolanda), and an excellent Sauvignon blanc (Little Darling).

To see the rest of the few photos we took, click on: Thursday, Feb 20th, Auckland, New Zealand

Travels in 2019-2020

Greetings!
Pat and I have confirmed travels in 2019 and 2020 that will carry us to a few more places we've never seen.  Actually, we start at an old favorite of Pat's.  New Zealand's North Island will be our home for a month beginning ion February 19th.  From there, we're on to Taiwan, and South Korea, and we'll be back April 3rd.

On September 1st, my nephew Cody and his girlfriend Brittany are getting married in Pennsylvania.  After flying out to attend the wedding, we'll stop over in Hudson, New York, to spend some time with my Aunt Kitty. who used her four-year older wisdom to help me survive childhood.

Finally leaving the country, we'll fly through Paris to Morocco, where we'll spend a month in the desert (sans camels).  I'm trying to convince Pat to return home via Portugal and the Isles of Guernsey and Jersey, returning in late October.

We've delayed our trip to Eastern Europe (Hungary, Bulgaria, Romania, Ukraine, and Belarus).  We're waiting for a time when the weather is more supportive.

Next spring, we're flying to India and Sri Lanka on our own tour with an experienced driver for two months.  And I'm still lobbying for adding Madagascar before coming home.

The fall of 2020 will either be a wonderful recapture of the America I used to know and love, or the beginning of a very long series of travels to places we still haven't visited.

Tuesday, June 26th, Lahaina, Maui

Greetings!

I can't imagine a more perfect last couple of days.  There's a rainbow hanging over the valley between two mountains out our window, and it has to be illustrative. 

First, I want to thank Pat.  For suggesting we take the vacation, handling all the details (as usual), and for hanging out while I spent the last three days getting a many decade-year itch scratched well.  I have used every excuse possible to avoid facing the fact that I don't have the body of a 17-year old teenage surfer.  Over the weekend, I rented a very stable longboard, and paddled it out into 3-foot waves near where we are staying.  While I could catch waves on my knees, my legs failed me.

Yesterday, a high school friend whose lived on Maui since 1971 took me to his favorite spot with a full set of paddleboard gear and the best helper attitude possible.  So the problem of standing up after you catch the wave will be solved.  You paddle into it standing up.   But it turns out it's not so simple to even stand up and stay balanced on the board in the calm sea.

It all comes down to two ugly facts.  I'm too fat, and my legs are too weak. 

The good news is that it's fixable.  The equally good news is that I think I now have the motivation to do something about it.  I know how much the pleasure I get from the two sports that I have enjoyed the most (golf and surfing) depends on my losing weight and adding strength in my lower body.  I also know how much my health and long life depends on it.  A good friend of mine had a heart attack last week, and he was surfing at the time. 

So my challenge is to make the rainbow mean something about my future.  I couldn't have gotten a clearer message about what needs to be done, and a more classic visual to carry as the moment to begin.

Today, we drove out to find a redwood grove on the slopes of Mount Haleakala.  We got close, but needed four-wheel drive to through the deep holes in the dirt road for the last 6 miles to the trailhead.  On the way back, we visited the Kula Botanical Garden, had lunch in the town of Makawao, and enjoyed the Maui Ocean Center on the coast south of Lahaina. 

To see all of the photos taken today, click on Tuesday, June 26th, Lahaina, Maui.

Sunday, June 24th, Lahaina, Maui

Greetings!

Today, I spent the morning trying to get old muscles, warm water, and small surf to resurrect a childhood from over fifty years ago.   I failed.  But I had fun doing it.  This afternoon, Pat and I took the same old bodies on what's been called the best hike on Maui, and we used dinner and the evening to reward that satisfying exhaustion. 

To see the remaining few photos of the day, click on Sunday, June 24th, Lahaina, Maui.

Saturday, June 23rd, Lahaina, Maui

Greetings!

Our penthouse suite balcony looks at the mountains east of us this morning.  We plan on getting in a walk on the beach out front, but are still a bit sleepy-eyed from the flight last night.  Yesterday, we took the Sonoma Airport Express to SFO, and caught the 5pm United flight to Kahalui Airport on the other side of the island. 

Picking up a car, we drove here, checked in, and walked down the street to the "Down the Hatch' Restaurant at the Lahaina Wharf (great shrimp tacos).

To see our suite, and any other photos I take this morning, click on Saturday, June 23rd, Lahaina, Maui.