The Adventures of Dowling: Porter Edition

Been enjoying the Adventures of Dowling? Well, here’s a new edition, straight from the desk laptop of previous corresponding journalist Claudia Dowling’s sister Erin (Dowling) Porter, featuring her travels in Middle Earth. (New Zealand)

By Erin Dowling Porter

Getting here [preamble]

When two people plan to travel, with one taking an active interest and the other sitting in front of the fire and patting the dog, outcomes weigh more upon one party. In our case, the worker is Flip and the warm one is Erin. Thus, on Saturday the 15 February Flip and Erin began their trip to New Zealand by spending a night with the Garrisons in Providence before their departure.

Shortly after supper, having enjoyed a festive family meal, Flip went online to check us in for our flights. There is a peculiar sensation that overcomes you in certain circumstances, such as: a) the tickets to Hamilton that you bought were actually for last week; b) you did, in fact, put on your pants backward before school; or c) you are imminently departing for air travel to a country to which you forgot to obtain a visa. It is this last one that arises here.

It appears that New Zealand decided that although it doesn’t require a Visa, per se, it requires something that is a Waiver for a Visa which required the same information and… 72 hours advance notice. Needless to say, a scramble ensued and a sleepless night, wondering if we would be able to check in for our flight at the airport. In the end, of course, we could reach the gate. Then the flight was cancelled. The next day we flew out of Boston with the assistance of Uber Mouse (Madison Porter). We landed Wednesday in beautiful Christchurch, New Zealand on the South Island.

After this, we went many places and did many things. We learned a great deal during our travels and are happy to share the following observations.

No Screens

One of our earliest discoveries about NZ motels is that they have no window screens. As you enter your room, the curtains are vaguely flapping over the open window, a cool breeze is coming in, and there are… no bugs. Admittedly, we did not test the “leave a lamp alight all night” theory inside the room, but we noted that an outside lamp that was alight had only a a few months around it. Where are the bugs? All we ever encountered were a few uninspired houseflies. This deserves further research, in nicer hotels.

Left-handed Driving

When driving on the left, it is important for the passenger to shout “LEFT! Keep LEFT!” while the other actually drives. Also, one should remember which control is the turn indicator and which is the windshield wiper. Also important is which mirrors show what, and oh yes, going clockwise at roundabouts.

Especially exciting for the American driver are the myriad two-lane roads that go precipitously along extremely steep mountains and ravines, with sheer drops on one side and rock cliffs on the other. Depending upon the place, you can either dread falling to your death or crushing yourself. On the south island, there is little room for error; there are no shoulder areas on the roads. On the north island, guardrails are helpfully located too close to your driving lane. There are a great many one-lane bridges, some over frighteningly deep ravines, where you can try to decide if you will actually beat the camper van coming the other way. Photo: Very steep hills.

Wildlife?

New Zealand does not have coyote, bear, tigers, lions, or large predator mammals of any type. It does have the odd vole or two, but no skunks, groundhogs, moose, squirrels, bobcats, fishers, or packs of wild hogs. But then, there are Farm Animals. Cows, horses, sheep, goats, and even reindeer are farmed. I don’t know how they caught and corralled all the other deer, but they’re on farms too. All the other animals seem to live in the ocean here, like sharks and whales, or in the sky, like hawks and vultures. Many now invasive animals, such as a peculiarly cute but resource-killing brushtail possum, were introduced to the country via stupid Europeans. America knows all about this.

Dark Skies

Flip has always been fascinated by designated Dark Sky areas, where the lack of ambient light lets you see the galaxy with clarity — with the expectation, he says, of feeling insignificant. Therefore, when traveling, he tilts a hopeful eye toward staying at or near Dark Sky locations. We have had mixed success, given that many of the locations tend not to have hotels, have to be packed into by trail, or are in national parks that close their gates at 9 p.m., not to mention it’s always subject to the weather. Most recently, in Colorado, we ended up camping in an electrical storm and, needless to say, did not see stars. Almost everywhere in NZ except maybe five places, you find lovely stars on a clear night, but Lake Tekapo is an area that has been especially designated as a Dark Sky location, which meant that was where we would stay. We found a hostel, which was very nice, and then we settled in to wait for it to get dark. It did so rather earlier than we hoped, with increasing clouds, but Flip felt insignificant enough and it didn’t actually rain.

Fast Food

If you’re on the road and are getting “peckish,” in NZ you think about stopping for a pie. Pie in NZ isn’t always, or even normally, sweet. You can get egg and veg pie, beef or lamb pie, or chicken and brie pie. Mushroom pie, cheese pie, mince pie. The type of pie assortment differs by the vendor, and they are offered at bakeries, diners, cafeterias, and even gas stations. They are always single serve — and universally delicious.

Paper or Plastic?

There is very little litter in NZ, probably because they almost never give you a bag for anything, much less plastic, and do not give out many napkins. In one of our rooms, they left us three paper towels, which became a kind of test of our ability to last two days without using any of them. The utensils, if you get any, are wooden and straws are paper. On the other hand, almost every room we stayed in contained a small bottle of milk in the fridge, for reasons we didn’t quite understand.

Public Toilets

Everywhere, big area or small, tiny picnic areas or just a curve in the road, there are perfect unisex toilets with extremely modern fixtures, clean floors, working parts, and twice daily cleanings. Here is a photo of one, basically in the middle of nowhere. We found this interesting, and of course convenient, by contrast to America, where “no public toilets” seems to be a sign of choice. For the peace of mind of the trans-phobic, it should be noted that these unisex toilets are largely one stall with an interior lock. We did not encounter a single drag queen trying to get in.

Water pressure

For a country completely gone over to conservation, NZ has the most prolific water pressure we have ever seen. Showers spew, faucets spout, and even in the most modest of environs, when you turn on the water, you Turn On The Water. Frequently, however, the hot water is in the reverse position on the faucet. This can cause concern in the shower, at least briefly.

The Color Blue

Many of the interior lakes of the South Island are vividly blue. Some are teal, some sapphire, some are just Blue. We found out that the reason these lakes are blue is because of its “glacial flour” content. This powdery substance, left from passing glaciers, infuses the water with tiny particles that reflect blue light differently. It is not visible in the water, which is clear, but enhances the blue-ness. Photo: This is Flip, pointing to Mt. Cook over Lake Pukaki.

Scone Survey

This reporter has found American scones to most resemble large, dry biscuits. A survey of scones in their native home seemed to be in order. The morning after we arrived, we walked into Christchurch, South Island, to breakfast at Little Pom’s. (Who wouldn’t want to walk to somewhere of that name?) These first scones were unbelievably moist, flaky, and flavorful. They came in two flavors, “dite” (date) and “shizz” (cheese). Each day thereafter, scones were duly tested in each location. The survey came down heavily on the side of Little Pom’s as the winnah, but scones were well-made all over the country.

No smoking

Smoking is not permitted in this country.

The Language

I must agree with most Americans that the NZ accent is cute. If you are familiar with the Australian accent, it bears a resemblance but is somewhat less emphatic and jarring and just as difficult to understand. Strangely, nothing seems to be pronounced as it is spelled, so we travelled through areas mis-pronouncing things. We called Lake Tekapo te-KAH-po, later finding out that it was pronounced TEH-ka-po. Just when you think you’ve figured one out, they’ll throw in one that’s pronounced as spelled, making you feel foolish all over again. They do say g’day, like Australia. Road signs are quite polite. Instead of “STOP,” signs merely suggest that you “Give Way.”

Boats with retractable wheels are used on the Coromandel coast to launch and pull out small watercraft without the need for docks and piers. They look very strange. Photo: boat with wheels

In sum, this is a beautiful country which looks very much as we think Narnia looked before the White Witch. Although lacking in talking animals, it does have many rain forests, green rolling hills, dramatic and jagged peaks, lovely rivers and stunning beaches. And the people are nice, and the pies are yummy.