Saturday, May 7, 2011

May 6, back home

It's been two weeks since we came home from our travels, scent of uncapped freedom and bliss, grassy meadows, dirt road, and masala tea spices stuffed deep into our backpacks. We've been postponing this blog entry partly because of the readjustment chaos, but mostly because summing up five month journey renders the end of it definite. Brutally real. 


And the reality... bites right now. Getting back has been a mixture of logistical and emotional mayhem. We've been living out of boxes, looking for jobs, and easing post-travel blues with a compress from our family and friends. Reading past blog entries, organizing thousands of pictures, and  daydreaming about places we'd love to visit next has been healing as well - enough so to help us keep it together. We knew what we signed up for when we decided to go and we never expected life to instantly snap back to what it was upon our return. Fair enough then. We would make the same decision in a heartbeat.   


People have asked us what would be the first place we'd like to re-visit given the opportunity.  Honestly, any of them would be reason enough to pack a backpack, but India stands out at the front of the pack. It's fascinating. Challenging. Poetic. Magnetic. It grabs all of your senses. Frankly, it seems quite impossible to experience just once. 


For now, we hold tight a handful of unforgettable moments, sights and people...latest memories beating to M&S drum...


Thursday, April 21, 2011

April 17 - 18, Cape Reinga, Te Paki (90 Mile Beach), Opukete, and Waipoua Kauri Forest


Cape Reinga at the northern tip of North Island is considered by Maori a jumping-off point for souls as they depart on the journey to their spiritual homeland. It definitely has that surreal end-of-the-world feeling as we stare into the surrounding waters on a beautiful morning. This is where Tasman Sea meets Pacific Ocean.


 Cape Reinga

We get sand dune happy around Te Paki, close to 90 Mile Beach. Just like the rest of the Far North Region, this rough and beautiful area feels secluded and deserted, with barely any people, just cattle and sheep. In over an hour of driving we haven't passed another car on the road. 

Contrast is what makes these places amazing, going from lush green... 
...to giant sweeps of sand
 Te Paki sand dunes


Late afternoon we drive back south along the west coast. Small town of Opukete is captivating, tucked into a beautiful, lush mountain setting with sand dunes gazing back from across the bay and best fish’n chips we’ve had in NZ.  Surreal light conditions painted with voluptuous storm clouds and setting sun the color of flowing lava render vegetation saturated lime, making contrast with the sky eye-popping. By the time we get down to the beach we’re out of breath, trying to capture as much of this fleeting moment as possible. This is by far the best off-the-beaten-track corner of New Zealand we’ve accidentally stumbled upon.


 tasting of salt and sea this huge single portion of fish'n chips was perfection for $6 - and about half of what it costs anywhere else
Opukete - knocking off your feet beauty. New Zealand in a capsule. 





April 16, Hundertwasser in Kawakawa and Doubtless Bay

If we thought for a minute we could take vacation from our profession as we travel, we were wrong. Nowhere was this more evident than this morning in Kawakawa, when we walked into…public toilets - our excitement reaching that of school kids getting into a candy shop. Designed by Friedensreich Hundertwasser in 1899, the small enclosure, sandwiched by a bank on one side and a restaurant on the other, stands out from the gloomy neighbors like a happy kid on the block.  Outside, colorful assortment of glazed tile in organic shapes stacked as columns, stemming from the ground and pulling parts of the pavement with them, supports vegetated roof formed around centrally located tree.  Tiled exterior flooring flows inside, where edges of horizontal and vertical surface melt into one another forming a maze of recycled and reused materials - sustainable architecture at its best. We get several curious looks as we photograph every possible detail, fascinated with the use of glass bottles and morphing tile work masking sewage line, among other ingenious, if slightly idiosyncratic, applications. An architectural highlight of the month, it’s a design on sugar rush that just made us happy washing our dirty limbs…and reminded us about our fixation for life.


Phantasmagoric Hundertwasser in Kawakawa


Following SH10 north we stop at several beaches along east coast, arriving late afternoon at Cape Reinga dressed in concrete clouds and rain.  Shortly after scanning the grounds at the very end of North Island, we decide on walking parts of Coastal Track tomorrow and spend the rest of the day by the rugged coastline beach nearby. Staring into the waters where Tasman Sea meets Pacific Ocean,  it’s hard to believe our journey has come to an end - it seems as if we just left our apartment in Chicago, over packed but excited for the unknown. With its end-of-the-world aura, Cape Reinga fittingly sums up five months of our travels, plans for another venture already lurking at the back of our minds. 


Doubtless Bay
Parked for the night at Cape Reinga 

April 15, Te Henga (Bethells), sister beaches, and Cascade Kauri Forest

Another raw beach beauty, Te Henga [Bethells] in the morning, then a quick internet stop at the library and drive north until we reach camp passed Whakapara. 



It's another black sand beach with big surf and windswept dunes. Scenery from The Piano unfolds in front of us...
exposed by low tide
these just casually grow on the side of the road
Cascade Kauri Forest


Wednesday, April 20, 2011

April 14, Waitakere Regional Park: Katakare, Puhi, and Anawhata on Tasman coast


Balance of planning and spontaneity was the recipe we aimed for on this trip from the start. However, even though our itinerary was flexible and changed several times along the way, the realization we have bypassed initially planned visit to China was hard getting over right after coming to New Zealand. Such ugly can be unsatisfied human nature. Today, stepping onto a beach in Katakare, it hit us just how extremely lucky we’ve been having an opportunity to travel for these past several months. Any regrets seem irrelevant and it doesn’t matter what could’ve been. We’ve been having the time of our life.
And these beaches on the Tasman coast…rugged, untamed, full of character, swallowed us whole. 


Katakare and Puhi. Very different coastal scenery even thought two towns are stone’s throw apart.

Night at Anawhata, perched on a hill.