Orts, eggs, elephants and beer

Orts: noun. A scrap or remainder of food from a meal.

If you are a crossword puzzle fan, you will come across words that you become fond of, and you will only find them in crossword puzzles.  They are like old friends that you see after an extended absence.  Orts is one of our old friends, and there is a sense of joy when we come across him in the Thursday NYT puzzle.  What does this have to do with the price of tea in New Zealand?  Well, one of the things I have enjoyed about having an extended time as a stranger in a strange land is having the time to observe small things and try to understand where they come from.  These become my travel orts.  So here are some random observations, and as Paul Harvey used to say, the rest of the story.

Warm Eggs.
   Here, as in many countries, you will buy your eggs from the un-refrigerated shelves in the grocery store.  In the US, you will only find them in the cooler.  And yet, I don't hear of Kiwis dropping dead of salmonella due to eggs.  Are the chickens different?  No, the regulations, and therefore processes are.  Turns out, there are different views on the best way to keep us safe.  It also turns out, either system works.  In the US, the FDA requires all large producers to wash their eggs before shipping to remove the risk of salmonella being spread.  Once washed, the eggs lose their protective coating (cuticle), which keeps the salmonella and other bacteria out, so they must be refrigerated.  In most of Europe and New Zealand, regulations prohibit the washing of eggs, so they don't need to be refrigerated.

 

Flying Fox.
   At most New Zealand playgrounds, you'll see a flying fox.  We'd probably call it a zip line.  They vary in height and length, but all look like something any US school district would ban in a minute.  Why the difference?  My impression is that there is a different view on the issue of liability here.  Part of that is a mindset, and part is how the law has been set up.  In the 1970s, New Zealand started the Accident Compensation Corporation.  This replaced workman's compensation, and simplified things by covering all accidents, regardless of how or where they happened, and to whom.  This was funded by businesses that would have paid into workman's comp, as well as some funds from general taxation.  The savings come into play since there are no court cases... you can't sue anyone for expenses since there aren't any.  Lawyers are not as pleased with this arrangement.

I imagine every few months someone does take a spill, and may even break an arm.  They would then put a cast on it and get every one to sign it.  And life would go on.  In the mean time, generations of kids have had a great time flying down the hillsides and screaming. And no lawsuits.


Elephants and Beer.
Most afternoons, I walk to the top of Mt Eden.  It's a good workout and provides some great views of the realm.  There is a strange structure on the top, with various plaques about surveyors and geographers, all pretty boring stuff.  I decided to look it up, and found the rest of the story to be a bit more interesting.

In 1870, Prince Alfred, the son of Queen Victoria, traveled to Auckland.  As he was getting ready to leave, someone gifted him an elephant (don't you just hate it when that happens to you on the way to the airport?).  Tom, the elephant, stayed with him in Auckland for the month, and was put to work hauling supplies to the top of Mt Eden to build a trig platform.  Mt Eden is the highest point in the Auckland area and centrally located, so this was used to survey all the surrounding area.  Turns out that Tom was a fan of beer, so  he would be rewarded for his hard toil with buns, lollies and a few beers in the city's public houses.  There are reports in newspapers of the time of him sipping over 4 gallons in a sitting.  That's a lot of IPA.

And that is, in part, the rest of the story.

Labels

We had a great trip to the Auckland Botanical Gardens a few days ago.  I must have read the labels on well over 100 plants and trees, most new to me.  How many do I remember 2 days later?  Somewhere in the neighborhood of one.  A few years ago, that would have bothered me more, but I'm starting to let that go.  As Gary Larson so aptly noted... my brain is full (and leaking a bit) 

I recall  coming to a realization on while snorkeling in Kauai a year ago.  I was floating above a multitude of beautiful tropical fish, and I was hit by the urge to go look them all up so I knew what species they were..  was that a Moorish Idol, or a Saddle Wrasse?  Then it dawned on me.... Bill, you could do all of that work and proceed to forget them in a day, or you could just live in the moment and bask in the beautiful scene in front of you.  The scientist in me rebelled for a short while, but the photographer and realist in me was able to let it go and I just floated and enjoyed the amazing colors and grace of all those fish. 

A year later I don't remember any of names, but I can still picture the yellows and blues of the fish darting in and out of the coral looking for lunch.

Carpe diem, man, carpe diem.  Don't know how many of those diems I've got left, so I gotta carpe as much as I can.

I'm enjoying exploring new places and seeing new things, learning about the interconnections, but not so worried about putting everything into buckets and applying the correct labels.  There are several trees endemic to New Zealand that I see often enough that I will likely remember what they are for some time.

Fern Tree

Cabbage Tree

Sure, I'd love to be able to learn and remember all the genus and species of all that I see, but knowing that isn't likely to happen, I'll focus on what I'm more likely to remember.... the sights of all the different bark textures, the beautiful sound of the tui singing to me in the evening, and smell of the ripening feijoas.  That will stay with me.

                                                                   Bark Textures

 

Twin sons of different mothers

I've visited Australia and New Zealand several times, and am struck by the stark differences between the two countries.  There are many similarities, but the two countries can also look so very different.  From the US, we often assume that they are more or less the same;  the accents are hard to distinguish, so how different could they be?  They both insist on putting pictures of the Queen of England on their money, and play really boring sports like cricket.  Many people I've talked to in the states seem to think New Zealand is a region of Australia (even though it is over 2000km offshore).  If you ever really want to piss off a Kiwi, ask them where in Australia New Zealand is.... they don't take it kindly.  There is a sibling rivalry going on, and New Zealand is clearly the little brother in the deal.

To begin to understand the differences, you have to dig deep... as in the earth's crust.  Australia is the lowest, flattest, and oldest continental landmass on Earth...  If I remember my Geology 101 correctly, it was the core of the ancient super-continent Gondwana before all those plate

Uluru/Ayers Rock.

tectonics broke things up and moved it all around.  We're talking really really old (samples of rock 4.4 Billion years old have been found)... and not changed much by the tectonic forces that have shaped all the other continents.  Because of the continent's great age, extremely weather patterns, and geographic isolation, much of the flora and fauna are unique (and strange to us).  About 85% of flowering plants and  mammals, and 45% of birds are endemic to Australia.  As I mentioned in an earlier post, most the fauna here seems to be trying to kill us, and it turns out they've had a very long time to learn how to do it.

New Zealand is primarily made up of 2 large islands.  These islands emerged from the largely submerged continent of Zealandia, which came into existence about 83 million years ago before sinking about 20 million years ago. The landmass we see today is the result of volcanic and tectonic uplifting, so it is geologically very young.

Before the arrival of humans around 900 years ago, the only mammals that were here are the ones who could fly or swim, and there aren't too many of them.  This made it quite a paradise for birds, who didn't bother selecting flight as an important evolutionary trait.  This has not worked out so well for several of the flightless avian varieties once the rats and men arrived on ships.

Moa... extinct

Kiwi... endangered

So, Australia is one of the oldest landmasses, next to one of the youngest in New Zealand.  Humans are believed to have arrived in Australia over 48,000 years ago, while New Zealand was not inhabited until about 900 years ago (this date is debated).  With those different origin stories, I guess we should be surprised that they have anything in common at all.

In Tasmania

Maria Island

It occurred to me today that I've truly been island hopping... From the North Island of New Zealand, we flew last week to Melbourne on the island continent of Australia, then on to island state of Tasmania, where we then ventured on a day trip to the natural preserve of Maria Island just off the eastern coast. Kind of like the Russian nesting dolls of travel.

Jeannette was invited back to teach a 3 day class in Hobart, Tasmania so I decided to tag along. When we were here a year ago, we couldn't visit the west coast due to vast wildfires and dense smoke, so we thought another visit was in order to allow us to explore the west coast.

Tasmania is an island off the southeast coast of mainland Australia, the smallest of Australia's six states. 45% of the state is in reserves or parks, and contains an amazing array of climate zones in a relatively small land mass. It is the southernmost part of Australia: if we were to head westward from Strahan, the first landmass we would hit would be Argentina, making this the longest uninterrupted expanse of ocean on the globe. If we were to head eastward and manage to skip over the south island of New Zealand, the next land we would reach would be Chile. When the weather hits here, it is coming from a long way off.

When they arrived 200 years ago, early settlers to Tasmania noted : “The swans were black, not white. The trees shed their bark but kept their leaves. The seasons were reversed. They called it ‘The Antipodes’ – the name means ‘direct opposite.”  As we have visited different landscapes here, Jeannette and I will take turns commenting to each other "I don't think we're in Kansas anymore".

Cradle Mountain boardwalk trail

Cradle Mountain

Rainforest

Painted Cliffs

In my favorite book about Australia (In a Sunburned Country), Bill Bryson writes:

“It has more things that will kill you than anywhere else. Of the world's ten most poisonous snakes, all are Australian. Five of its creatures - the funnel web spider, box jellyfish, blue-ringed octopus, paralysis tick, and stonefish - are the most lethal of their type in the world. This is a country where even the fluffiest of caterpillars can lay you out with a toxic nip, where seashells will not just sting you but actually sometimes go for you. ... If you are not stung or pronged to death in some unexpected manner, you may be fatally chomped by sharks or crocodiles, or carried helplessly out to sea by irresistible currents, or left to stagger to an unhappy death in the baking outback. It's a tough place.”

I think he may have been an optimist... I think some of the minerals are probably out to get us as well.   Sadly, we failed to photograph the 6" Huntsman spider that Jeannette found crawling up my arm as I was packing the car to leave... somehow ripping my shirt off as quickly as possible seemed more important than the photographic record of the event at that time.

Maria Island Wombat

But then there is the Wombat. It is not trying to kill anything. It is built like a squat, furry tank. How could you not love a wombat? Jeannette has been wanting to see one in the wild for many years, but we'd only encountered them in the zoo. This time we succeeded in tracking them down during a hike in Cradle Mountain National Park. Well worth the wait. A few days later, after dinner at a friend's house just outside Hobart, we were visited by a group of wallabys (technically they were pademelons), and two different kind of bandicoots. I think I've decided that my future rock star moniker will be 'Billy and the Bandicoots'.

Suburban Pademelons

Settling In

Our New Year's Eve flight out of SFO had us arrive in Auckland, New Zealand on January 2^nd, having missed the 1^st thanks to the International Date Line. Since we have a deep sense of foreboding about 2017, missing the first day of it seemed somehow fitting.

Why are we here? See previous post.... because we can. We first came to New Zealand about 25 years ago to visit a family who had lived near us during their sabbatical in the US. We had a great visit there, so when they proposed a house swap 20 years ago, we packed up our two boys and headed off, exchanging houses, cars, and pets (a keeshond, cat, and iguana). One car and the iguana didn't fare so well, everything else survived. Jeannette has been back to visit and teach art there almost every year for the past 15 years, and I've joined her every few years. When they proposed another house swap, we jumped at the chance. While Bill and Sue are very intelligent individuals, the fact that they have twice now agreed to doing this so that we get 3 consecutive summers while they face 3 consecutive winters makes me wonder a bit. But I feel little guilt in taking full advantage of it.

We're living in the village of Mt Eden, a residential area on the outskirts of Auckland. This is a very different trip than 20 years ago. We aren't trying to get the boys enrolled in school and figuring out where to buy school uniforms. We know the house and neighborhood well, and Jeannette has a multitude of friends here.

volcano map of Auckland

Mt Eden (Maungawhau in Maori) is a dormant volcanic cone... one of 53 in the Auckland area.  It is a great spot to get one's bearings on arrival, so we usually schedule a hike to the top soon after arrival. Auckland is New Zealand's largest city (population 1.5M), and is located on a narrow isthmus. With all the hills and water around, it reminds me of San Francisco (also at about the same latitude, but S instead of N). It also means traffic is a bear at rush hour since the public transportation isn't developed enough to keep up with the population growth, and there isn't room for more roads. All this has little impact on me (and after all, that is what matters), since Novation Inc Australasian headquarters is at the top of the stairs, and the village of Mt. Eden is just a short stroll up the street.  Nearby is another volcano, One Tree Hill (as in the U2 song).  Most of these volcanic cones are surrounded by parks, many with grazing sheep or cattle.

Mt Eden from the village

downtown Auckland from Mt Eden

Mt Eden from One Tree Hill

One Tree Hill

Why Travel?

Some time ago, a friend asked me “why do you like to travel so much?”. Snarky Bill almost responded with a “that's a stupid question”. But the Slightly More Evolved Bill thought for a moment, and realized it is actually an interesting question, one that I hadn't given proper consideration. Why do I like to travel? There are a multitude of reasons, and I often don't think of the why of travel, just the how.

Why do I like to travel?

1)  Because I Can. At least for now. I can still get out of bed in the morning under my own power, and that may not be true next year/month/week. I know that this life is a limited engagement, and want to squeeze as much out of it as I possibly can. I remember growing up, hearing my grandfather's stories of the places he wanted to travel, but he waited too long, got sick, and never went. I don't want to be that guy. When visiting my Mom in her final years, I noticed that the people around here that seemed to be the happiest were the ones that had interesting stories of adventures they had been on. I want to continue to build those memories while I still have any memory left.

I have generous flight benefits thanks to my son's airline employment, and that may not be true next year/month/week. I want to use the benefit while I can. I feel a moral obligation to fill at empty business class seating heading to Amsterdam from PDX when I see it calling me from the web site.

2)  Differences are Fascinating. Different people, customs, food, plants, animals. I enjoy observing the differences in how people live and what they think about this world we all share. Those differences usually make me look at things a bit differently once I return home. Ours is not the only way to do things, and often not the best.

Sometimes the more minor the difference, the more interesting I find it. On a trip to the UK in the 70s, I noticed that at all the B&Bs, they always unplugged the TV at night, out of a fear that a late night power surge would blow up the TV and burn the house down. In New Zealand, all outlets have on/off switches next to them, and everyone is careful to turn them off when not in use. Not a bad idea, but why don't we seem to worry about such risks in the US? Someone in Tasmania just commented yesterday that they were nervous on a trip to the US when they found that the outlets all around them were unswitched, as if the electrons were going to sneak out and get up to some mischief.

Grocery stores are a favorite observation platform when in foreign lands. In Colombia, all produce is priced and measured in kilos, but potatoes are priced by the pound. Why? Never got a good answer on that one. In Sicily, the 4 aisles of the super-grocery store dedicated to pasta in every shape and size was no real surprise, but it was a sight to behold!

I enjoy meeting people from other places, to learn how they view the world. We have very seldom found anyone in our travels boring. The people who would interact with us always seem to possess a curiosity that I sometimes find lacking in the US. I would much rather hear about your father arriving in Capetown after a long sea voyage from Wales, alone, at the age of 12 and making a go of it than I would to hear about how much your neighbor is paying for their 4 year old's birthday party. Just saying....

3) The Obvious: Many trips are driven by a desire to sit on a warm tropical beach, to see friends and relatives, to visit world class museums, or view natural wonders. These are often why we plan a trip, but not always the most memorable part of the adventure.