The Florian and Jane Adventure

I've been putting off this particular chronicle for weeks, I think partially due to the fact that I have no idea how to capture in any amount of words just how unforgettable it was.

I suppose I should start from the beginning. Not the New Zealand beginning--the real beginning. The real beginning means going all the way back to the early 2000's, when I first watched The Lord of the Rings and all six discs of behind the scenes with my brothers (I don't think Mom and Dad made it all the way through the special features). The real beginning was watching Arwen's epic ride to save Frodo from the Ringwraiths, to then find out in the BTS that the actual legend was Jane Abbott, Arwen's stunt rider.

I reveled in the adventure of finding out about all the different horses, riders, and wranglers involved in the movies. It made it somehow more real and more magical at the same time. But of all the beautiful horses used on set, my favorite was always Florian, the Andalusian who played Asfaloth (Arwen's steed). Asfaloth was so important to me that I valued his card in Lord of the Rings Monopoly above the Middle Earth equivalents of Boardwalk and Park Place. He was somehow even more majestic than Shadowfax, the "lord of all horses," though only just so.

I was moved almost to tears during the segment which told the story of how Jane, having fallen in love with Florian throughout the course of filming, wanted to buy him but could not afford to because there were others who wanted him as well. So Viggo Mortensen left her a voicemail saying that she could go pick up Florian. He had bought the horse for her.

Fast forward to about a month ago. I had only been in Levin for a few days when Carolyn, while telling me local LotR stories, mentioned that her vet, Ray (who she'd already spoken of several times and who lives only fifteen minutes away) owned the Andalusian stallion that was in the movie.
"Florian?!" I was in wonderful disbelief, but then the doubts began. Who's this "Ray" fellow, anyway, and how does a small-town vet end up with the stallion that Viggo bought for Jane? I was skeptical, but couldn't help being curious in spite of myself. I hadn't even dreamed of meeting Florian while in NZ because I didn't think he was even still alive after all these years. The possibilities flooded my mind, and I asked Carolyn if she could ask Ray if I could meet him. After all, there was a chance it was really him.

Fast forward another couple weeks. Nothing had happened, but I was still hopeful. I was investigating online one evening when one discovery led to another until I eventually found Jane's website and all the pieces fell together: the stunt rider and the vet got married! Ray and Jane actually met on the set. I sent Jane an email after freaking out drastically and gushing to Carolyn for about a half hour, trying and failing to rein in my enthusiasm in order to ask Jane if I could meet Florian and pay for a riding lesson from her. Then I waited for what seemed like ages but was really only a day or two, and she sent back a very sweet and modest email saying that of course I could meet Florian and have a lesson, and she would even show me "a few pics of life on set". I was beyond thrilled, and quickly sorted out my budget and set to work planning a day for the adventure.

The day we settled on was Friday, the 15th of May, at 1PM. I got more and more excited as the day drew near, but then the storm hit. It poured for three days almost nonstop, so badly that there was flooding in many areas. We decided to go ahead and plan for it, though, and see how it was the day of.

I woke up Friday morning, threw open the curtains, and was in awe. After days of heavy, gray skies, I could see blue again and the sun was coming up over the mountains! There was a light fog on the grass, but no rain. I was beside myself with gratitude and pent-up excitement. Then as the afternoon came around, the skies turned gray again. I couldn't decide whether to allow myself to stay excited, but we called Jane from the end of the road and she said we were good to go if we still wanted to try it.

So off we went. I was praying the entire drive over that God would hold off the rain, just until we finished--I actually asked for it to start pouring as we got in the car, so that we would know it was Him, and I swore that I would testify that it was. The skies grew darker, but I just kept praying.

It was an absolute pleasure to meet Jane. She is soft-spoken, unassuming, and her smiles start from her eyes. She was wrapping up another ride and told me that Florian was behind the barn and I could go ahead and see him.

And so I met the king himself. He's twenty-nine years old and had a halter and cover on, but even with all of that, you can still see how majestic he is.

He's a great deal whiter now than he was fifteen years ago, so I probably wouldn't have recognized him if I hadn't been told who he was. But his eyes are the same, and the fine shape of his head and arch of his neck haven't changed.

I loved on him, planting more than one kiss on his face, and then Jane came around and offered to take his cover off for better pictures. If I thought he was stunning before...wow. Even from the way he stands, you can see that he might as well be royalty.

Jane kept bribing him with treats until we'd gotten plenty of pictures.

Then we moved on to the horse that I'd be riding. Jane said, "I thought you'd like to ride him, since he's Florian's progeny." His name was Rico, and he was black and embodied the term "gentle giant". I didn't fully appreciate his height until he raised his head all the way up and I suddenly realized how tiny I was in comparison to him. I became very grateful that his temperament was nothing like Logan's.

Once Jane and I got our horses groomed and saddled, we led them out to the riding ring for a bit of a warm-up. I mentioned as I mounted that it had been a while, and Jane asked when was the last time I had ridden. I told her it had been a couple years since I'd ridden consistently, and that I'd never had the chance to really learn. She said we'd stick with beginner stuff then, and kept hold of the lead rope. She said it was just a precaution since Rico was still quite young, and that I was in complete control. It was up to me to tell him where to go and when. Since I had only really had two short lessons in my life, we started from the basics. That was so wonderful for me, because I've ridden a decent amount but I'm always a little insecure on a horse due to never being sure if I'm doing things right, and of course confidence is of utmost importance when riding.

She broke everything down and explained the reasoning for all of it, and it was so easy to trust her methods and direction because I've now seen how gentle and well-behaved her horses are as well as how she speaks to and treats them. I'm much more wary of taking advice from or adopting the methods of someone that takes a more aggressive stance toward horses or people either one. There were no red flags with Jane, and that was refreshing. In my personal experience, horse people can be overly dominant or even harsh, and I don't believe that's necessary.

So we went around the ring, re-learning everything from turning to stopping. I had no idea how little you actually need to do to communicate to a horse--especially an attentive and well-trained one--what you want it to do. You can tell it to halt by simply dropping your heels and relaxing in your seat. No hauling at the reins necessary. And I had to do little more than to look in the direction I wanted to go for him to respond. It was a bit of an adjustment to ride English when I've almost always ridden Western, but Jane said that I had adapted exceedingly well, and that I had wonderful form and was very well aligned. She did let me have the stirrups a bit longer than they would be for English, because she said that unless you're competing, it makes no difference what form you use or how expensive your tack is or anything at all. Just ride in the way that is most comfortable for both you and the horse.

She also pointed out that, "since you're such a nice person," I was asking Rico to do things instead of telling him. She told me something that surprised me, but then made so much sense: a horse feels more secure with someone who will be a leader to them, who knows what she wants and where she wants to go, and will tell him so. If the person riding him seems nervous or unsure, it makes things more stressful for the horse. She said you don't need to be harsh, only firm. Tell the horse what you want from him so that he can carry it out, and even if you're not sure you did it right, act like you did.

Jane and I both noticed a significant improvement almost immediately, and soon after, she decided that I was ready to leave the ring after trotting a bit. She mounted her horse and we set out side by side among the trees. There was some water to wade through in several places because of the flooding, but the horses were champs. Jane's two dogs followed us pretty much the whole way, and she said I should be honored that the little one came, too.

The trail was grassy, and wide enough that we only had to go in single file a couple times and I only had to duck under tree branches once. We walked out of the trees to a wide river, which was higher than normal from the storm, and then turned back.

We enjoyed a nice little chat on the way back, and as we passed one of the fields, she pointed out a dark brown horse and said, "That's Uraeus, Viggo's horse." Viggo being Viggo Mortensen, of course, AKA Aragorn. Uraeus played Brego in The Two Towers. Jane told me that Kenny, the other horse Viggo rode (Hasufel) was in one of the other fields, although he had a rough accident a while back and is now incontinent as a result. That was sad to hear, but it was so cool to know that they were both really there, as my friend Molly had found out online (and we had subsequently freaked out together, but weren't sure if they were still there). Jane also pointed out Clydie, the pony that drew Gandalf's firework cart through Hobbiton. I asked how Uraeus and Kenny ended up with her and Ray, wondering if it was just because Viggo travels a lot.

She told me the story as we drew closer to home: Viggo fell in love with them, Uraeus especially, but didn't want to put them through the journey from NZ back to the US after buying them, especially since they weren't very young anymore. He had made friends with Ray and Jane on set, and Jane had actually known Uraeus for most of his life, so he asked if he could keep them on the farm there. I remarked that it was nice that he had somewhere to leave them where he knew they'd be well taken care of, and she said, "It is, and he visits whenever he's over here, so that's nice, too."

I didn't have very long to contemplate how epic it would be to have Viggo just dropping in to see his horses every now and then before we were back. The ride had been all too short, but lovely all the same. We arrived at the barn and she taught me how to dismount in true English fashion, then was surprised by how well I did it. We got the tack off and groomed the horses, and as we were doing so, someone said, "Here it comes!"

And, sure enough, the clouds had finally let loose, as if by the approval of the Almighty Himself. I couldn't bite back my smile, and thanked Him immediately before saying, "I prayed for that--for the rain to come after we were done." Hours later, it still hadn't stopped.

Once we'd finished, Jane gave the horses a feed and then went to the house to look for her Lord of the Rings set photo album. We chilled with the horses until she returned, saying that she forgot her mum had borrowed it. She showed me a mini album in the tack room, though, which was filled with gorgeous pictures of her and Florian from shows and competitions. They were stunning.

Then she took me to the back of the barn, where there were boxes of souvenirs like shirts, hats, and special prints of photos. The photos were 10NZD each, and since I had enough cash, I chose one of Jane on Florian on location with mountains in the background, surrounded by the Black Riders' horses with their riders/wranglers. Jane said that she even rode as a Ringwraith in different shots of the same scene in which she's riding Florian ("chasing myself") and some of the other Black Riders were women, as well. Then she said I could have two photos since we didn't quite ride for the full hour, so I gleefully picked out a second. By the time we were done talking, she had thrown in a third one. So I walked away with 30NZD-worth of epic, rare photos for a third of that price.

Then, all too soon, it was time to go. I thanked Jane for everything, and she ducked under Rico to give me a hug. I said, "My friend Olivia said to give you a hug for her," and that made her laugh. I told her I wouldn't be able to afford to come back this time around (we had discussed the possibility on the ride) but that I would almost definitely be back, even if it was years from now.

Then we went home and Jane went to pick up her kids from school, and it's been a couple weeks and I'm still all like:

The Stars

The next full-length post will be coming soon, but until then, here's another excerpt from my travel diary. This was the first thing I wrote after a couple weeks of being in Levin and too preoccupied to journal:

I don't know what day it is (I think it may be the twelfth) and I know I haven't written at all about Carolyn's place, but I just have to say something.

I wish for everything that I could capture an image of the stars here for you. On the clearest of nights, they are a sweeping arch that begins at the treeline on one side of the barn, stretching overhead and becoming more expansive as it goes, to then sprinkle down to the tops of the mountains across the fields. At the highest point, they are so numerous that they seem to blur together into a magnificent cloud of stars, and then become less frequent but brighter as they descend to the peaks.

The only thing I can compare it to is when I was a young child and my family spent a couple weeks in the village of Nueva Vida, Bolivia, on a missions trip. Every single night, due to the lack of electricity, the Milky Way filled the night sky as we walked across the field to our temporary home.

Yet somehow, the New Zealand sky looks even wider, even more, so that I cannot help but gaze up at it in open-mouthed wonder when I tend to the horses after dark. All I could think as I walked back in tonight was that I must live in a place where I can see these stars. Where they are not crowded by trees or dimmed by city lights. Where they can be mine to look at whenever I wish, and I will never again forget their glorious majesty.

To quote Anne Shirley: "The world looks like something God just imagined for His own pleasure."

I'm wonder-struck and grateful to know that He chose to share His imaginings with us.

Foothills Farmstead: Part One

I KNOW.

I'm so behind, it's not even laughable anymore--it's just sad.

My excuse is that I've been too busy living it to write about it. Well, here goes.

But first, I thought I'd give you a visual of my trip so far, not counting the flights across the US and the Pacific, of course. Three cheers for Microsoft Paint.

Image from Google Maps

I'm pretty sure Hamilton was where we stopped on the bus and I had my first meat pie, then over to New Plymouth, and finally the tip of the red bubble, Levin (luh-VIN), is where I am now. Tomorrow, I'm leaving for Sydney, Australia, and then I'll be back here for the better part of June. I'm hoping to get down to Wellington at some point, and then on my roundabout way back up to Auckland to fly out, I'll be hitting Matamata and Cathedral Cove, both of which I'm SO excited about. I don't know if I said this before, but I'm not going to even attempt the South Island this time around. There's too many things I want to see in the North Island alone.

Sunday, the 26th of April (yes, almost a month ago) was when I arrived in the tiny town of Levin on the InterCity bus. I spent some time at the Te Takere library/community center, and then finally got to meet Carolyn. She hugged me on sight.

Carolyn is essentially living in a secret paradise. You're driving in Levin and then you cross the rails and go down a road that looks like it dead ends, but it doesn't. You turn left, go a little deeper into the farmland, and then you're surrounded by mountains and foothills all the way around, with just one road leading out--only ten minutes from town, but you might as well be 100k away.


This is where I've been for the last month. Just opening the curtains in my bedroom every morning is a thrill, because I get to look straight out at the sun rising over the eastern mountains. There are horses, sheep, cattle, and ducks all around, and nothing but varying shades of green for as far as the eye can see.

Carolyn gave me the tour and I met all the animals:

• Logan, the black stallion
• Rosie, the bay mare
• Dannii ("as in Dannii Minogue"), Rosie's chestnut offspring
• Two sheep whose names I can't remember
• Kyra, the boxer
• Three cats: Poppy, Quentin, and Carly

All three horses are pure-bred Arabians. Carolyn brought Logan and Rosie home with her from the US after living in Virginia for thirteen years, and foaled Dannii herself here in New Zealand (edit: I misunderstood that bit--Dannii was born in the US). Logan looks most like the classic Arab, although apparently good quality black stallions like him are hard to find. He's absolutely stunning. I have a serious crush on him.

And here's Dannii, staying nice and dry.

And Rosie, the oldest and cutest of them all.

Here's Kyra, looking all sweet and calm. In reality, she will explode into ecstatic leaps and bounds as soon as I take another step.

And apparently I was too busy photographing the animals to think of getting a snap of Carolyn. Maybe in another post. 

My first night, some of Carolyn's oldest and closest friends (Judy, Neville, and their son, Jamie) joined us for the rugby match--Wellington Hurricanes vs. Brisbane Reds. I should just tell you right now that Kiwis care a little bit about their rugby. As Nev put it, "It's only our life."

We had chicken burgers, which were amazing, and Judy brought hot fruit crepes with plenty of fresh cream for dessert. I had only seen rugby in one or two movies and never on television, so I was in awe of how fast-paced it is, and rough. The stamina of the players is incredible. The sport is just as nonstop as soccer/European football, but has all the tackles and none of the helmets or padding of American football. Yet somehow their hair/beards stay perfect. I won't go into the finer details of how the game is played, but it was incredibly fascinating and impressive to watch. Suffice it to say that those men are more manly than you and their thighs are bigger, too.

Then it was Monday, my first day of work in New Zealand. I had watched Carolyn give the horses a feed Sunday evening, so Monday I started learning to care for them on my own. Carolyn is gone from around 11:45AM until after 9PM four days each week, and all the animals are my responsibility during that time. I learned pretty quickly that there are no "days off" on a farm.

Every morning. <3

Most of the mornings here either look like this:

Or like this:

They both hold their own beauty and magic. When I see the mist like that, my mind instantly begins singing, "Far over the misty mountains cold" and it makes me happy.

And here we see in the distance my dream author abode:

The first week was definitely an adventure, because all three horses knew I was new and tried to pull tricks on me daily--a bit like every kid I've ever babysat. ("Oh yeah, we always sleep with the lights on," and "No, we don't go to bed until 10".) The tricks are much less frequent now, though, so I guess we're progressing into an actual, functional relationship.

I've learned that working with horses requires a lot of thought, as well as patience. You have to think through and be aware of possible scenarios, and when something goes wrong, you figure out a way to prevent it from ever happening again.

For example, since Logan is a full-on stallion, he's never allowed near the girls. He's also not allowed to have less than two fences or gates between him and the girls at any given time, because if he is close enough to touch them, he will very likely hurt himself or them or break the fence/gate in trying to get to them. You have to be aware of this fact in everything that you do with and around them. At feeding times, the girls have to go into the barn first, because his path to the barn leads right past their paddock. Then, he has to be the first back out every time.

And when you're, say, bringing a wheelbarrow full of weeds out through the gate to his paddock, you have to make sure that there is zero chance of him getting through and getting next to the girls, because he is absolutely incapable of keeping it in his pants. And you can't count on the gate to remain at the small amount that you opened it, because it WILL blow open all the way, and he WILL go cantering right past you, and the girls WILL be standing there waiting for him. You will get no help from the girls. Ever.

That (totally hypothetical) scenario leaves you dropping your wheelbarrow and sprinting around the perimeter of the barn, your heart pounding as you jump multiple fences to get to the girls and get them away without having to go near him while he's rearing up in full stallion mode. All while you're the only human on the farm. All in your first week.  

So next time, you stand fast at the gate in the pouring rain, with your plastic baseball bat pointed at a restless and defiant Logan, saying, "Back!" and "Stand!" until he listens. No matter how long it takes. Because if you let a horse get away with something, you are training it to do whatever it pleases. So you stick it out and you finish what you started, and you feel absolutely triumphant when you are finally successful.

A quick note on the aforementioned plastic baseball bat: It is not a weapon. It is an extension of your arm for those times when you don't want to put a bare arm or hand within biting reach of a stallion. Stallions are also unpredictable and sometimes aggressive, so we always carry it with us when we're handling him, just in case. But it is not a weapon.

On an entirely unrelated note, I have developed quite a love for crumpets, especially when lightly toasted with butter and NZ honey (which is so thick that it looks like beeswax) or strawberry jam. Thankfully, six-packs of them are often on special at the Countdown. And what else is sometimes on special at the Countdown? FRESH CREAM DOUGHNUTS. Oh my goodness. America seriously needs to catch onto the less-sugar-more-cream mindset.

A part of me feels like I'm supposed to be jumping all around the whole country, seeing more things and meeting more people, but this is what I wanted and I like it--a chance to really settle into a way of life over here, to unload my suitcase and stay a while. I can simply stand outside and look at the mountains or lean up against Dannii's stall door with my hand caressing her face and be perfectly content.

Dirty boots are happy boots.

I've settled into a routine here with Carolyn. Get up somewhere between 6:30 and 9, with varying amounts of snooze bar presses; tea, breakfast, and morning feed for the horses; four hours of work out in the pastures or inside cleaning; late lunch and settle down to write/Facebook/Youtube/blog for a few hours; dinner for me and all the animals; write more until time to scramble and clean up the piles of dishes before Carolyn gets home (heh). Then we settle down in front of the telly for a couple hours, usually with some kind of cake or ice cream, and generally lose track of how many episodes of Banshee we've watched. Then it's rugby on the weekends and I go to church with Devany, Carolyn's nine-year-old-and-better-singer-than-me granddaughter. We get along capitally.

I do occasionally start to feel a little weary when I've been pulling poisonous ragwort and brambles out of the horses paddocks for hours, and the sun/rain (depending on the day) is beating down, and the sand flies are ignoring the fly spray I so faithfully applied. It's in those moments that I stand up and think, "Hang on. I am on a FARM in NEW ZEALAND," and everything else fades out.

Days 4 & 5: New Plymouth

Leaving Auckland was an adventure in itself. I spent too long using the uncluttered, early-morning WiFi at the hostel to upload the pictures for my blog post and was almost late for my bus. I didn't even eat a proper breakfast because I had about $4 in coins in my pocket and no cooked food. I stopped at the little Asian supermarket near the hostel and bought some weird-looking snacks that actually lasted me a good two and a half days. My diet for the first week was essentially Ramen, cafés, mac'n'cheese, more Ramen, random snacks, and the occasional piece of fruit.

Also, on a side note, I'm 100% convinced that at least 93% of NZ place and road names end with a vowel. It's kind of unbelievable.
Matamata, Paekakariki, Kapiti, Rotorua, Tongariro, Taranaki, Waiheke, Hahei, Taupo, Te Takere--this is just off the top of my head.

I was planning to get so much writing done on the bus from Auckland to New Plymouth, but the landscapes were so breathtaking that I didn't take my eyes off the window for more than a short nap and a couple pages of reading. On a five hour ride. Yeah.

Partway through, we stopped for lunch (not breakfast, sadly) at Tiffany's and I had my first steak and mushroom pie. It was delicious, not too expensive, and very filling. There was an elderly couple in front of me in the rather long line, and they turned around and said, "Are you traveling on the bus?" I said that I was. "Oh, you go in front of us, then. We're traveling by car." It was so kind and unexpected. Later, I saw them sitting having tea, and they just looked so sweet and picturesque. I liked them.

Another side note: especially in the hostels, but even in the cities and towns, people don't really seem to care what you look like. Less make-up, fewer high heels, more messy hair...just a significantly more natural lifestyle. These are my people.

Mt. Taranaki

New Plymouth was wonderful. It has Mount Taranaki to the South and the Tasman Sea to the North, and you can often see both at the same time on a clear day. The YHA backpacker, the Sunflower Lodge, was quite a walk from the iSITE, but worth it. Just the view out the back is mind-blowing--overlooking a rainforest valley, and then across the valley are green hills with farmland. Plus, you can't beat sub-$30 nights. Seriously. Hostels are your best friends.

Everyone pretty much kept to themselves or their group in the Auckland hostel, so the first night in NP, I mostly listened to other people bond, besides chatting with Rachel, the owner, while we made our dinners. She introduced me to NZ feijoas and I have never looked back.

The second night, however, I took my dinner and asked if I could join the two Canadians who I'd heard talking a lot, even though they'd just met the day before. They were Ellen, from Nova Scotia, and Jean-François (or JF), from Quebec.

They very happily allowed me to sit with them, and I asked if they were both Canadian. They said yes, and that all the hockey talk gave it away. We talked for probably several hours, long after we'd all finished eating, and I gained a lot of knowledge from the stories they told. They were both wrapping up their two (or more) months in NZ, while I was just beginning. Ellen, as much as she raved about places that I wouldn't get to go or that even she hadn't planned to go, told me multiple times throughout the evening that a lot of backpackers see it all as a competition over who has been to the most envious places. She said many will check off all the big sights, but only spend a night in each place and therefore never get to know any of them. She said everyone will ask me if I've done or will do the Tongariro Crossing/Mt. Doom, which lots of them come to NZ exclusively to hike. But she said, ultimately, "It's your trip, not theirs." Basically, go where you want, stay as long or short as you feel like, and don't worry about what everyone else says you must see.

But I've gotten slightly ahead of myself.

Sunrise behind the lodge

On my first morning in NP, I found out that all the big stores and supermarkets were closed till noon because it was ANZAC Day (in memory of the NZ and AU soldiers who went to fight in WWI). Having no food to eat, I borrowed a bike and popped up the road to a little dairy, where I bought half a dozen eggs, some cheese, a loaf of bread, and some "yoghurt". 

A word to the wise: when riding an unfamiliar bike, check the brakes before you venture down a very steep hill carrying eggs. The absence of broken shells/asphalt-eating was a small miracle.

I finally made myself food that didn't consist mainly of noodles, and I am not lying in telling you that it made my entire week when I found a jar of blueberry jam in the pantry which hadn't been labeled. Fair game, and I milked it for all it was worth. 

Oh, and the tea was free there, too. I drank so much tea.

Ellen was playing piano and singing in a soft, indie rocker voice when I came back out from brushing my teeth. I harmonized with her on "Riptide". She asked if I play, and I said I do a little bit, but was just enjoying listening to her.

Quick note on Ellen. Her speaking voice sounds exactly like Jennifer Lawrence. I am not exaggerating. Same inflections, same very slight rasp, even the same way of phrasing things and lack of a filter. AND the exact same accent, which makes absolutely no sense seeing as Ellen's from Nova Scotia and J-Law hails from Louisville, Kentucky. But yeah, it was basically like I was in the room with J-Law all the time. I'm just gonna start telling people that I met Jennifer Lawrence in a backpacker in New Zealand. Yep. That's what happened.

After probably an hour of trying desperately to figure out a way to get to the Goblin Forest Track without biking 50km, I decided it wasn't meant to be this time. It was simply farther away than I had realized. This was probably the roughest day for me so far, because the Goblin Forest held the highest spot on my list of places I wanted to spend time in (besides the obvious Hobbiton). It took a couple of days for me to reach a point of having peace about it.

Excerpt from my travel diary, 10:12 AM on the twenty-sixth of April, 2015:

"The most important thing I've learned so far: you can only plan so much. You HAVE to be able to go with the flow. Because sometimes your plans don't work out, and you can't let it get you down. It just means God has a different adventure in store.

I'm learning to be more reliant on Him, and a particular line of dialogue from The Fellowship of the Ring keeps going through my head: "Trust me, as you once did. Let it go." It's when Gandalf is lovingly urging Bilbo to give up the Ring, something very important to him which he is clinging to blindly, unaware of the bigger picture. The thought of those words encouraged me, and brought me back."

As it turns out, that different adventure in store was the famous New Plymouth Coastal Walkway. Seven miles of pathway right next to the sea, open to walkers, runners, and non-motorized wheels of any sort.

A lookout point on the Walkway where I spent some time writing and rock-hopping

So that was how I spent my full day in New Plymouth: on the coast. And I can't possibly oversell it. Every inch was beautiful, and no mile the same as the one before it. That's the thing about New Zealand coasts--none of them are the same. In the coastline of only one town, it went from high cliffs, to thick trees leading to scattered rocks, to a rocky fishing pier, to black sand, to a quiet river inlet, and finally to rolling farmland.

The black sand of the western coasts of New Zealand

There were lots of nice little places to stop off and rest along the path

Overlooking the river as it meets the sea

Look how tiny the people are

At the end of the line

(I'd like to point out that no editing was done on any of these photos. NZ is just that beautiful.)

That night, as people were starting to congregate in the kitchen and new backpackers were arriving, I sat down at the keyboard and played for a while. I wasn't sure anyone really noticed, but later on, as Ellen, JF and I were talking and a Frenchman was just leaving the keys, JF said I should play because I was really good. Ellen replied, "Yeah, I asked if she played yesterday and she was like, 'A little bit.'" I laughed and said, "I don't like to make a big deal out of it."

But I did play again, after I'd washed my dishes. I had just finished playing "People Help the People" and "Home" when I was genuinely startled by applause. All the French people at the tables, and even the others in the lounge, were looking my way, smiling, and clapping.

A bit later, the Frenchman was playing again, truly beautifully, and I came closer to listen and watch his hands. He stopped and asked if I wanted to play again, to which I responded that I liked listening to him and just wanted to see his hands. He finished the song, then rose and said it was my turn again.
"I don't know what else to play."
"What is in your heart?"

So I improvised. It was remarkably fun and freeing. When I finished, I went to collect my things from the lounge, saying something about getting my junk out of their way. A lady with a thick accent responded, smiling: "You can leave it here and keep playing."

When Ellen and I were turning in, she wanted to show me a picture or two and ended up showing me a lot of the places she'd been so that I could sort of experience them through her eyes--and add them to my list for next time. We also found out that we were heading in the same direction on the bus in the morning, and she let me in on the fact that you can tell the bus to pick you up at the All-Boys School instead of the iSITE. So I changed my ticket and only had to drag my suitcase half a mile instead of about two. Cannot tell you how happy that made me.

I'm still struck by how different the whole atmosphere in the Sunflower Lodge was from Auckland International. It felt like fellow travelers became family in that one evening.

So that was New Plymouth, and the people I met there. I miss it already.

 


 

Days 2 & 3: Auckland

It's time to tell you about Auckland.

On the morning of the 22nd of April, my arrival day, I missed my bus stop and so I walked back a little way to a Starbucks that I'd seen as we passed, where I got some tea and a muffin and plugged in my dying phone. What I really needed was the WiFi, though--I had no idea where I was, due to missing my stop, and only a vague idea of where I needed to go. It was pretty exciting, come to think of it. Turns out I wasn't too far off from the hostel, but I was enjoying the familiarity and security of the Starbucks, so I stayed for a while.

A quick note on NZ electrical outlets: you have to flip the switch for power. It isn't your adapter or your power cord. Switching out devices and jiggling cords repeatedly won't help. Neither will relocating to a different outlet while everyone stares at you. Flip. The. Switch. You're welcome.

Aotea Square: waiting for me right around the corner from Starbucks

Right, so it took me a while to decide that I was ready to step outside the door onto Queen Street and face this entirely new city, but once I did, I cannot tell you how lovely it was. First thing, I ran into a student from Denmark named Frederich, who was with a group campaigning against deep sea oil drilling off the NZ coast. He noticed my ukulele sticking out of the top of my backpack, and a minute later he was playing the intro to "Sweet Child of Mine" on it.

 
I don't remember what my plan for the first day was, besides get to the hostel and of course skydiving, but I ended up in Albert Park pretty quickly. It had just been a green patch on the map that I figured I might kill some time in, but almost as soon as I laid eyes on it, I knew it was much more. Spread out on a steep hill overlooking Victoria Street, it is a wonderland of enormous, twisting trees, spaced far apart but still blocking out the sky due simply to the massive reach of their branches. It took me a full walk round the path to get up the courage to venture among the trees themselves--they seemed too sacred for me to be allowed to go near them. I sat in the ivy that covered the ground, letting my feet finally breathe among the leaves and taking occasional photos when I wasn't playing my uke. When I left, it was more because it was check-in time at the hostel than because I really wanted to go.


 
 
And then it was time. Time to jump off the tallest building in the Southern Hemisphere: the Sky Tower. The original plan was to jump out of a plane, but the runway was closed for repairs, so 630 feet would have to do (sarcasm). I grew very nervous as the moment of truth approached, and even more so when there was conspicuous mention of "death by falling" in the waiver that I signed upon arrival. The entire staff was incredibly friendly, though, and I asked the girl who suited me up if she jumps off for fun all the time, half out of curiosity and half to reassure myself. She said she does, and between that knowledge and how chill yet methodical the guys at the top were, I decided I would love it. The process and verbal commands/responses at the top reminded me a lot of rock climbing, so I felt secure.

Plus the British lady in front of me had just jumped and was back for seconds. She went off backwards.

So, with my Converse laced extra tight and a GoPro strapped to my wrist, I held the poles on either side of the walkway, leaned out over the edge, and let go.

I FLEW. The rush was immense, and I fell long enough that I actually had time to adjust to the stomach-lifting sensation and enjoy the view.

I had the mother of all wedgies when I landed, but I remembered to bend my knees. And I didn't die, so that was good. I was so disoriented, though. I guess falling over fifty stories'll do that to you.

From there, I found my way to the harbor in an attempt to beat the sunset at the Harbour Bridge.

A quick snap along the way that turned out to be one of my favorites so far

I found, however, that the view was better from the Heritage Landing, which was much closer and had no noisy car traffic. Bonus: yachts that probably cost more than most houses (of which I, for some reason, didn't take any photos).

After sunset, I walked back along the harbor and Quay Street, bought some Hokey Pokey ice cream that's apparently an NZ favorite and that I have already developed a devastating addiction to, and then walked back up to the Sky Tower to redeem my free Sky Deck voucher (for not dying?). The view of the city at night, so alive with countless lights winking up at me, was remarkable. There is a peace that exists up there. I walked on 32mm-thick glass, through which you can see the streets fifty-three floors below, and somehow felt as if I was cheating death.

I laid low for a lot of the second day because I was fairly tired, but I did end up in Albert Park again, with my breakfast.

After eating and climbing around a little bit, I pulled out my big, beautiful, green notebook for the first time (I bought it months ago in anticipation of that moment) and wrote the foreword to my trilogy, followed by the first page of the prologue. It felt wonderful to just sit and write, away from distractions or any inkling of what time it was.

After dinner, I went down Queen Street to Event Cinemas to see Age of Ultron, which did not disappoint. I may have rubbed it in a little bit to my friends back home, who had to wait another week to see it.

The experience of going to an NZ theatre was as different and interesting as I hoped it would be. For one, the cinema had self-serve kiosks where you could buy your tickets and select your seat. And yeah, all the seats were assigned.

Secondly, we went up two escalators to get to the actual theatres. American theaters are all spread out, with long hallways, but this one was laid out vertically.

Finally, Kiwi audiences just laugh more. I don't know if it's because they're more laid back, but they laugh long and loud where Americans would probably just chuckle. The sheer volume of the laughter made the audience sound even larger than it was. Each bout of audible joy that I released was less restrained than the last, until I felt that I was finally reacting honestly rather than making any attempt to stifle myself. Being in there somehow made me feel free.

And last but not least, one of my favorite and most unexpected moments in Auckland:

I was walking by on the street with my camera resting in my hand and they said, "Take a picture of us!" 

So I did.