Through The Wild, Wild West

Kate from Kansas, or RMB as I fondly call her, are on the move.  After disentangling ourselves from our coziest of nooks, we began the long haul down the coast.  Driving here in New Zealand is an art, for many reasons.  Apart from adjusting to left-sided driving, you are simply surrounded by magnificent distraction.  You don’t know until you come around the bend whether you’ll be astounded by snow-capped mountains, ducking beneath one of hundreds of waterfalls flowing above your head, or gaping open-mouthed at the surf rushing up from Antarctica to beat mercilessly onto the surface of the road on which you’re driving.  And that’s saying nothing of the endless hairpin turns, of careening around cliff after cliff, trying to dodge the gravel shooting like bullets from beneath the tires of the trucks skidding past, heavily laden as they are with freshly cut timber.  So you pull over.  Again and again, you skid to a halt and bust out your camera, saying to one another, “Can you even believe this?!”  Eventually you hop back into your sturdy little rental, only to do the same so many times over that your 6 hour drive imperceptibly becomes 10, and you arrive at your destination bleary eyed, but oh so happy to be here, to be taking up space on this island of imaginings. 

I know it’s winter, off-season for all but the ski bunnies living it up on the slopes of Queenstown.  But I’m glad to be here now, glad for the quiet, and space, and peace.  The early sunsets and late sunrises lend themselves to shortened days, but for me, right now, it’s a balm of gently forced rest after this year on the move.  Pop always told me that the best medicine is fresh air and sunshine, fresh water and exercise.  This place is the quintessential dose of all those things, and I need to remember when I go home, I can’t be long without them.  For my own sake, or those who have to be around me.  Yikes.

Kate and I continue to take full advantage of this perfect Kiwi medicine, hiking primordial glaciers, bounding across suspension bridges hanging precariously over swollen rivers, going on (failed) evening hikes in search of glowworms.  We dive headlong into the freezing deep night from our barely-heated room to ogle the glittering sky, the beginning of all things here at the end of the world.  Together we’ve become most dedicated investigators of the melty goodness and variety of Cadbury chocolate bars, and tasted just why Manuka honey is so dang expensive and so dang worth it.  Our days are full of shared hopes and fears, of giggles and peanut butter and jelly; Americana, we are.

Tomorrow we’ll part ways, Kate heading north to sort out the next steps of her new island life while I head to a teeny tiny, out-of-the-way-at-the-end-of-the-island town, on my ever loving quest to taste the world’s best oysters.  I’ll be sad to say goodbye to her, but not too much, because I’m confident that ours is a lifer of a friendship: whatcha think girlie, reunion 2017… British Columbia??