Most, Best, Only

I’ve already told you about our visiting New Zealand’s oldest kauri tree, longest swing-bridge, most scenic drive and deepest lake, and about the other superlatives that abound here as numerous as cockroaches in New York City. A few days ago we were in the town with the most cooperatives (in New Zealand or in the region, I don’t remember). It seems you can’t hear about anything without learning also about its supremacy in some category. Today, for example, we crossed New Zealand’s longest auto bridge, over the braided Rakaia River. From guidebooks and word-of-mouth, we hear equally of something’s existence and its rank in grand scheme of things. To kill time along what I proclaim to be the South Island’s most boring road—Highway 1 toward Christchurch—I pored over our roadmap book. Te Kuiti is the shearing capital of the world. New Zealand’s best preserves are at Barkers in Geraldine. The Southern Hemisphere’s longest glacier is in Mount Cook National Park. So is Australasia’s highest mountain. The country’s only white heron nesting site is on the west coast of South Island. The art deco capital of the world is to be found in Napier. The northernmost point of the mainland is Surville Cliffs. Te Puke is the kiwi fruit capital. New Zealand’s toughest golf holes are located at Clearwater resort in Christchurch. There’s the oldest Catholic mission and the oldest town, the longest wharf, the first Maori settlement, the highest waterfall and what I presume is the only gumboot-throwing region (Taihape). Don’t forget the town with the longest name: Taumata­whakatangihanga­koauau­o­tamatea­turi­pukakapiki­maunga­horo­nuku­pokai­whenua­kitanatahu. And of course the whole country is the adventure capital of the world. This is all stuff I found just from a single source: the map. I am the person who has looked at this map book the most closely of anyone in the world, I maintain. (I want to go to the Bridge to Nowhere in Whanganui National Park, another pointless exercise.) Perhaps someday the Church of the Good Shepherd will become the Church of the Best (or Biggest or Most Friendly) Shepherd.

We’re in Kaikoura. Kai means to eat, and koura means crayfish, which is something I don’t plan to do. It takes them about seven years to get big enough to become a meal. It all seems so futile. It also makes them very expensive.

Aside from the abundant sea- and bird-life here, what’s notable about Kaikoura is that the mountains angle right down into the ocean.

When we arrived it was low tide so we got to scramble out on the rocky shore.

Be very careful of the green stuff growing on the rocks or your legs might remove themselves from under you, which nearly happened to me.

We took a tiny hike to the top of a bluff overlooking the ocean, where Syd and I tried our hands (literally) at something I haven’t done since I was in my twenties. My muscles will feel it tomorrow.

Jill had written to me that one can’t buy oneself a greenstone necklace. In order for their symbolic magic to be effective, it has to be a present. So today I followed her advice and sold it to Syd for two dollars.

Just a few minutes ago, Syd did the most unexpected thing: she removed the necklace she was wearing and bestowed it upon me. I paid her back her two dollars in a roundabout way. I’m ready for the potential of new beginnings the necklace now officially promises.

While I was digging through the back of the car looking for things to eat, I heard a noise and looked up to see a seal emerge from the bush and flop down on the asphalt nearby. One isn’t supposed to get closer than ten meters to them, because they’ll chase you and bite, so I kept my distance. I predicted that some people wouldn’t obey that rule, and sure enough some stupid guy had his kid go stand right next to it. Luckily nothing bad happened; the poor harassed creature just scooted to a secure spot among boulders.

We checked into The Albatross, our backpackers’ lodge for the night. We were shown to the tiniest room I’ve ever seen, just big enough for a pair of bunk beds. I balked. “Do you happen to have a room with two beds, you know, like side by side?” The young orange-haired, blue-eyed girl took us to a room where the beds are literally one foot apart, and there’s not an inch to put our suitcases. Oh well. The kids running the place are nice, anyway. She showed us an area called “The Heap,” a corner of the common room by the fireplace, that has a mattress and pillows. “What do people do there?” I wondered. “They cuddle.” “Do they know each other?” I asked. “They do by the end of the night,” she replied.

We took a Kiwi-five-minute (American-fifteen-minute) walk into town, through a park that had pairs of what looked like whalebones arching over the path, and a pretty view of the ocean and mountains.

Syd bought Jesse a present (I’m not telling what, on the off-chance that he comes here) and gathered some sand from the beach for her collection, as the sun set.