28 – 30 March 2023
Observations
When you travel the roads in New Zealand, you find few motorways, what we Californians call freeways. Most are more like Highway 1 on the coast of San Mateo or Marin counties. When you do find a new multilane motorway, for some reason the speed limit drops to 50 kph (31 mph). And that is after you have driven winding two-lane country roads with speed limits of 80 to 100 kph. Also, don’t expect to go from point A to point B in a straight line. This is good because you travel through scenic landscapes that embrace planted forests, bush (wild vegetation) with tree ferns popping through, grazing sheep and dairy cattle, and even a few horses. Hills present themselves with mountains in the background. And the hills are not rolling and uniform as you might see in Marin County. The hills here are in all shapes and forms, often striped with the trails made on the steep slopes by erosion and sheep. The shapes and vegetation are so unusual that you expect to encounter some mystical creature popping through an opening in the landscape. And clouds do not lose out to the beauty of the land below. They too are in massive shapes and sizes that flow over you. Makes for dramatic views during the day and at sunset.
Roundabouts rule here. You encounter very few stop signs or stop lights once you leave larger urban areas.
If you are dyslexic, like Robert, be sure to travel with someone who is not, like Bonnie. Robert can deal with names like Twizel and Te Ano. But, when it comes to names like Paraparaumu and Pukeamoamo, he is lost. Too many syllables!
On the Way from Martinborough
Accommodations
Family
Palmerston North, a town of 90,000, is not a glamorous tourist destination. A major tourist attraction here is the rugby museum. Palmerston is a hard-working place, with a variety of corporate headquarters and Massey University.
The reason to head to Palmy was to visit Bonnie’s younger “sister” Nicky. On this visit Bonnie and Nicky reignited a relationship that had been smoldering for more than fifty years. Nicky and her husband Clel live on the outskirts of town on ten acres that they have transformed from bare scrub into a lush Eden, with dense planting of trees and shrubs. The vegetable patch and small orchard keep them self-sufficient for many months of the year. Nicky’s background in botany and Clel’s in geology contribute to the success of this venture. The spacious house, which they designed, looks out over miles of rural landscape and wind turbines. Both Nicky and Clel have taught at university level, but now they garden, volunteer, hang out with grandchildren, and pamper their elderly dog.
After giving us a tour of Massey University, Clel was enthusiastic about making a list of sights for us to see on the next stretch of our trip. These leaned heavily toward geomorphology, such as lookout points for river terraces and volcanic peaks. Both Bonnie and Robert know their basic geology. New Zealand is a young country geologically, which means the landforms have not had enough time to be eroded into smoother shapes. Unusual shapes with sharp edges appear everywhere in the landscape.
The Homestead
Massey University
Massey University is the UC Davis of New Zealand. Agriculture and veterinary science rule. The exceptionally pretty, park-like campus is spread over an extensive property, where beautiful cows with electronic collars munch near classroom buildings. Many students bring their horses to the campus. About 9,000 students attend the main campus. Massey agreed to begin a distance-learning program in 1960 when none of the other NZ universities wanted to tackle it. Now, of course, this has grown into an enormous success for the university. And many private research facilities, especially in food science, are sited next to the university. Glaxo, now GlaxoSmithKline began in a suburban of Palmy.
Wildlife Recovery Refuge
Clel took us to this small but very informative refuge center. Very nice. Volunteer run.
Breakfasts
Next Stop—Tongario Lodge!