Twelve Feet, Six Continents, One Year

March 24th arrived twice for us, first in Hong Kong, while we waited to board our 1am departure for San Francisco and then again in San Francisco, because we landed 3 hours before we departed, or 10pm on March 23rd. After spending the night at an airport hotel, we flew from SFO to PDX at 11:35am on 3/24. The only notable part of this flight was that we upgraded to First Class because it was approximately the same price as flying coach and paying for all the luggage we needed to check. The main perk was expedited everything: check-in, baggage handling, security, but not boarding. Not boarding because there were fewer than 50 people on our flight. The gate attendant called it, "Alaska Airlines Private Charter Number 427." He offered to board the flight according to quality of smile. Half the passengers were airline personnel being moved around. One pilot noted that he wasn't flying his usual route to Hawaii because they had cut back to a single wide-body, once a week, w...

Elise inherited a love of sailing from her father, who got it from his dad (aka "Big Papa") When our host greeted us on arrival in Whitianga, she mentioned, "if you guys want to go for a sail, and you definitely should, let me know and I'll call my friend Mat who owns Boom Sailing. He'll take good care of you." We did and here's how it went. Nana and Papa enjoying an afternoon with Boom Sailing Pura Vida! Still smilin' after all these days May the sun shine and the wind always be at your back Our sailors in their natural element  Ali was also all smiles Cate was splainin somethin Serious pura vida Mother and daughter living their best life Cathedral Cove Cathedral Cove

Our last stop in New Zealand was meant to be our most relaxing. The Coromandel Pensinsula is apparently the posh weekend getaway for the 40% of NZ's population that lives in Auckland. There's a ferry from the Big City to Coromandel town and plenty of evidence all around that these folk have second homes on the hillsides all around. And for good reason: it's beautiful here. For example, this is the view from our rental just north of Whitianga (pronounced, "Fiddy-ang-uh" with the first syllable rhyming with the artist 50¢). Our first outing was to a place called Hot Water Beach, where we were told you can dig down in the sand and create a natural hot tub for yourself. This is sufficiently true that the cafe next to the carpark rents shovels for a $10 deposit and $10 for up to three hours. Here's Cate at the bottom of the hole that we inherited and then expanded. Indeed, the water at the bottom was quite hot But it never filled up in a way to make it appeali...

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...

Probably the southernmost site on our trip: Slope Point, New Zealand Everybody was right: the distances in New Zealand are very deceiving. It takes a really long time to go anywhere. I'd guess our typical travel speed has been 45 miles per hour. One funny thing about this is that the national default speed limit is 100 kph (62 mph), which our navigation displays no matter where we are, including this gravel road. Going 42kph in a 100 zone; out the windshield you can see the gravel and in the nav you can see the curves! Anyway, we left Dunedin mid-morning on Wednesday and took about an hour to reach Balclutha on the motorway. We found a lovely municipal park with a picnic table, a great playground and a weird, small zoo. Then it was on to the Nugget Point Lighthouse, where we enjoyed a short hike hoping to see Penguins (no) but got rewarded with some baby sparrows in their nest (in the blind from which we hoped to spot the penguins!) Hoping to see some Yellow-Eyed Pengu...