Twelve Feet, Six Continents, One Year

This picture has to go first. It shows the ramp, the lights and the walkways at the Redwoods Elevated Trail Once upon a time, a long time ago (2019) in a place far, far away (USA), we had to make hard choices about how to allocate our time in New Zealand. Based on limited information, we gave ourselves four nights in Rotorua. We thought it would be a good base for exploring mighty Lake Taupo to the south, the famous glow worm caves to the west and various cultural and natural attractions in the immediate vicinity. In hindsight, it's clear that we'd need about a month to do the things in this part of the North Island that we thought we might pack into a few days. In fact, we did none of them. Our arrival was very simple. Rotorua airport is tiny and between us we rented 2 of approximately 10 vehicles held by Hertz at this location. It was a five minute drive from the airport to our rental house and we spent all of it relishing the fact that we were driving civilian vehicl...

If you visit Milford Sound on a sunny day, as we did, you'll see this This land has seen many battles. This is where Gandolf and Suaron collide. But even more pitched is the battle between the thrusting of tectonic uplift and the onslaught of erosion. On a sheer mountainside several thousand meters high, a crevice might be the work of the waterfall or the tearing of an active fault. We have arrived in Milford Sound, the number one destination on our South Island itinerary. A coach bus brought us from the gateway town of Te Anau, where we spent two nights at the foot of an alpine lake. We have boarded an overnight cruise. Remarkably, the sun is shining. The guide points out that we can see clouds forming on the hillsides as the moisture from the warm surface of the lake rises to meet colder mountain air. The boat moors and the passengers are offered a choice of water activities: kayaking, dinghy ride, swimming. Elise and I enjoy some quiet on the kayak ride while the others...

Monday morning started off really well. A few minutes before 9 it looked like we were going to be on the road to Pennsylvania and happily settled in at our cousin's house well before dinner. At 9 it was apparent that the slide - the one that was stuck IN a few weeks ago - was stuck OUT. This is not only deeply annoying, it means that we wouldn't be driving anywhere anytime soon. I don't wish to belabor this point. Partly because I don't want you, dear reader, to endure this. Mostly, though, I don't want to think about it any more. In short, a mobile tech showed up and cranked it in manually; we spent much of the driving on the phone tracking down RV repair places and parts; we arrived at 10pm; we were at a repair place at 8:30 the next morning. To the good, our 48 hour visit with cousins was doubled. This means twice as many evening conversations on a comfy living room sofa. This means twice as much time for our four kids and their two cousins. To the bad, we...

I wrote a couple of short posts about certain days during our two-week stay in Iron River, WI but I feel impelled to reflect on that time. It was exquisitely vacation-like and it will make me happy in the future to remember the things that created this. Let's do this Letterman style: #10: Hayward, WI Sometimes you need something to do. The kids are getting rammy. The house is feeling small. The weather isn't what you hoped. So we hopped in the car and drove about an hour to Hayward to see the Fresh Water Fishing Hall of Fame and a small-town amusement center. We skipped the latter and instead spent quite a bit of time on main street shopping, eating ice cream, eating dinner and also enjoying a small little city park along the river. Elise, Ali, Cate and Henry in the mouth of the worlds largest Muskie. This gave us the chance to see the banner advertising the lumberjack world championships later that week. This was an unexpected highlight of the trip so far. Hayward...