From the moment I walked into our new home for the next 5 days I was smitten. It was late afternoon and the sun was shining on our treetop view of Tasman Bay. It was Wednesday and the small sailboats were gliding out of the marina and assembling for race day. Our landlady was showing me around, explaining this and that, but I’m not sure I heard very much of it – I was in sensory overload. It was a seaside summer cottage (except it wasn’t; it was the top floor of a renovated old house built on the slope of the hill), beautifully designed with lots of nooks and crannies, views from everywhere, balcony, decorated in all the shades of blue that make me happy. The landlady is an artist as is her sister and both their artworks were all over the house – the hand painted fabrics, wall art, sculpture, as well as pottery and other pieces from other local artists. Shelves of eye candy magazines, DVD’s – all the comforts. We had barely unpacked when we were thinking of calling Dennis and extending our stay.

We had picked up the (right) car at the ferry terminal in Picton and taken the scenic route along the beautiful coast of Queen Charlotte Sound, then through the mountains to this small city of Nelson, which boasts the title among others of “Craft Beer Capital of New Zealand”. It could just as easily be called the capital of beach going, biking, vineyard visiting, studio cruising, restaurant eating, garden visiting, boat hiring, kayaking, hiking, Saturday morning market visiting, festival going, vintage movie house viewing, gallery gawking, book store browsing, wine tasting… Lots of day trips through the surrounding countryside, planted in vineyards, orchards and hops, and golden beaches on the way up to Abel Tasman National Park which is accessible by trail or water taxi along the coves.

Saturday morning market is a great place to go in Nelson to really get a sense of the place. It reminded me a lot of our market here, although much bigger in scale of course. But it still had that sense of small town, as local farmers and crafters displayed their offerings and neighbours paused and chatted. Cafes and restaurants are full and people stroll along the shops of the town streets. The day we were there a Buskers Festival was set up in a section of blocked off Main Street. It was great fun to stop and watch Bendy Em, the charming contortionist who had everyone laughing as she joked her way through a performance that culminated in her wrapping up her body into a 16” plexiglass box. Nelson is also a big back packing town and all that goes with it, as a start or end point for those multi-day hikes through the park or further afield.

We had a fine few days scratching the surface of this region but finally it was time to go and we headed to the airport to catch a flight to Auckland and connection homebound.

But Nelson had a few more surprises in store.

The flight didn’t leave until early afternoon so we had time to stop on the way at the World of Wearable Art & Collectible Car Museum (the WOW Art Museum) that many had told me was a don’t miss. This strange sounding partnership evolved out of an art project started 17 years ago by a woman and her friends in Nelson – a wearable art show. Originally, a show of entries by local artists, over the years it has grown until it has evolved into an international competition and award show extravaganza, now held annually in Wellington.

The Nelson museum was showing an exhibition of many of the 2014 winning entries, and when I walked into the darkened exhibition rooms with spotlit mannekins wearing over the top costumes so intense in colour and texture, my chest tightened and my eyes welled. Overwhelming and a huge surprise. Once again in a dark room off the side, I sat through a video of the actual show held last year. It is so much more than a fashion show, it is a combination of music, lights, dancers, acrobats – hints of Cirque du Soleil. The costumes are completely over the top, constructed of every material imaginable – but – all wearable, as the show video demonstrates. Someone claimed the WOW Awards Show makes Lady Gaga look like a librarian.

Too soon, but finally, time to leave. Traveling was easy. The small regional Nelson airport has no security lines, no security at all it seemed. No xrays, no officials, no hassle. Water bottle? Sure, go nuts. We flew out of Nelson with every intention of returning one day.

As a matter of fact, even before we landed back in the homeland we were already planning a return trip to New Zealand. Next time…maybe the South?

This smile-making sight greets you as you land in Wellington – a massive Gollum suspended from the ceiling, a reminder that Lord of the Rings is a major big deal here. Millions of tourists have visited New Zealand to see for themselves the breathtaking locations where these movies were filmed. Even before you reach the country, you are treated to the Air New Zealand pre-takeoff safety video where the flight crew are dressed up as Tolkien characters. Seriously. You can visit some of the movie sets, including Hobbiton, view costumes from the movie in the museums, take guided tours around New Zealand visiting the locations used (great scenery), visit the jeweler in Nelson who cast The Ring. I did none of this – my only memory of the Lord of the Ring movies I saw was their never ending length. The story is told of an eighteen year old Peter Jackson first reading Tolkien on a train traveling through North Island and imagining the landscape as that of Middle Earth; 20 years later he chose his native New Zealand as the backdrop to his series of movies.

If you don’t care to go on a tour of the movies’ location, there’s a great armchair article just out in Earth magazine, The Geology of Middle Earth, talking about how the team went about scouting, identifying and selecting locations, the logistics of filming in 100 locations across both islands and some of the challenges they faced.  A lot of pictures link the stories to the locales. Also appealing to this late-blooming geography geek, are descriptions of the natural history of the place, how the landscape was formed from the earth’s upheavals concentrated in these lands. The article almost makes me want to go back and watch the movies again. Almost.

It seems that in these later years of my life I tend to be living or hanging out right on ground zero of the Ring of Fire. Philippines, Vancouver Island, and now New Zealand.

It’s hard to get away from the realization that New Zealand is a very dynamic place, a real hot spot on a planet trying to shake us loose. The cover article in the New Zealand Geographic I picked up at the airport states dramatically that the Auckland Volcanic Field has erupted 53 times.  The islands sit precariously between 2 colliding tectonic plates. In Wellington, visiting the hilltop Botanical Garden oasis in the middle of the city, I read in the info center that the side of the hill I’m staring at, is actually the region’s most active geological fault line that runs right through the city. This Wellington Fault, is where the Pacific and Australian Plates meet, their collision causing the Pacific plate to subduct below the other. If this isn’t bad enough, this is only one of several lurking active faults around the city.

In the Te Papa National Museum (which is a don’t miss, must see) wonderful multi-media displays tell the fascinating geological story of New Zealand and includes a replica of an ordinary living room where you can stand inside and feel and hear what a 6.8 earthquake feels like. There are cautionary signs by the ramp into this display, warning people who survived the 2010-2011 Christchurch and Canterbury earthquakes that this exhibit might cause distress.

So there we are in Wellington. Feeling lucky? For 2 days we walked around, checking things out, lunching at the harbour, dinner somewhere on Cuba Street. Nice city. Fantastic museum, great bookstore, downtown galleries, cable car up to parkland. We were staying in a loft apartment in a converted building, very central, very urban, walkable to most things. Then we noticed The Sign.

On a noticeboard above the building mailboxes off the front lobby, was an official looking notice dated 2010. It advised all and sundry that this 65 year-old building had been inspected and was NOT up to current earthquake safety standards. As a result the owners had until 2020 to either bring the building up to code or demolish it. It would appear that we were living in a condemned building. That was it for a further good night’s sleep.

The failed earthquake inspection happened the year of the first Christchurch earthquake, September 2010. Six months later, the whole downtown and suburban areas of Christchurch (and other towns in the region) were destroyed or badly damaged when a second quake hit, collapsing many buildings that may have been already weakened from the first one. Lots of people died. From my perch on the 4th floor of this downtown building that day in Wellington, I looked at many other rooftops of buildings of similar vintage and wondered. We all walk precariously on this earth one way or another.

The owner of the condo lives elsewhere and appears to be making a bit of a living on this place through AirBnB which I guess is as good as he’s going to get. You can’t sell the place, after all, although it was with great amusement that just before leaving as I was reading the comments in the Visitor Book, I came upon a line that said “Let me know if you’re thinking again of selling” (one born every minute). Several pages later someone wrote “On our last night we felt the earthquake…”.

I was happy enough to pack up for our next and last stop, heading for the 3-hour ferry to South Island. The Wellington ferry terminal happens to be located at a central transportation hub. Here is where the raised main highway on concrete pillars crosses the railroad terminus, which is beside the ferry terminal. Genius. It’s all absolutely directly above the Wellington fault line where even as we speak the plates are grinding together as one slips below the other, pushing it upwards. We walked on board, settled into seats by the windows, in the forward cafe, Eventually the ferry pulled away and we headed out of the harbour to make our way over to the South Island. Escaped with our lives.

Leaving the big city behind, we headed up to Northland in our large “upgraded” rental car, which is car rental company speak for “We can’t be bothered honouring your reservation request for a small car and never had any intention of doing so – here’s what we want to get off our lot – an ‘upgrade’!” Aside from fuel efficiency concerns, there was another reason to want a smaller car – think narrow, hilly and mountainous, switchback roads with no shoulders! I spent most of my white-knuckled passenger time clutching the side of the door in a valiant effort to keep the car from sliding into the gullies a mere 6 inches away or scraping the side of the cliffs. (Well maybe not 6 inches, after all New Zealand is metric, and exaggeration is possible but from my point of view, perched on the wrong side of the road, highly unlikely).

Two hours out of Auckland we stopped in Wharangei, the region’s largest city, for lunch and supplies then continued on another 40 minutes along turquoise water beaches and through forests of tree ferns into the rolling farmland hills, shades of green and now mid-summer brown. Everywhere along the roads, purple and white  Agapanthus bloomed wild, a favourite.

When we reached our hilltop which was to be home for the next few days, I poured a glass of New Zealand’s finest and sat out on the terrace, absorbing the views and the quiet. The silence and solitude, after the traffic drive and noise of the city, was initially disorienting. No cars, no voices, no machinery, nothing – just outstanding views and extraordinary beauty. The shoulders relax, the breath deepens. On these rolling hills I could make out specks of dark and gray – herds of cattle and sheep, and here and there, glimpses of a country road and farm outbuildings and houses.

After sitting there for awhile, it became apparent that it wasn’t a silent place after all. As my ears became accustomed to the lack of human noise, I started to hear the birds, insects and bees, the breeze through the trees close to the house and even from miles and miles away, the sounds of a rooster and occasional sheep or cow.

The following morning we were ready to explore and descended from our hilltop paradise to make our way to a “tramp” as they call a “hike” there, through Bream Head with its views and coves and beaches. It was 11:00 am. On the way we came upon a police roadblock, stopping traffic in both directions on this small coastline road. A very pleasant female officer informed us that it was a breathalyzer stop and all drivers had to state their names and blow into the machine. (“Oh damn, wish I hadn’t had those 6 beers for breakfast!”) The incident became the source of many jokes during the next weeks. What kind of place is this where the locals are pissed by 11:00? More likely, preventive maintenance – send an early message so people will think twice later on.

There’s a lot to explore in Northland but we soon decided to explore our immediate surroundings instead of doing a lot of driving to go further afield. We’d look out at the view and choose – what do you think that estuary is like, how do you suppose we get to that cove, what is that beach off in the distance. As navigator I was hopeless and kept us completely off-track, missing turns all the time. No matter. Missed that cove? There’s another beauty just ahead. It was high summer in New Zealand and the kids were still off on summer vacation but nowhere was it crowded. Most beaches and coves had at most one or two other families on it, and sometimes no one at all. Our exploration of the estuary was memorable –  as we turned to go back to where we parked we found ourselves totally outnumbered by a bunch of sheep that had made their way down to waters edge and were nibbling at something on the beach. Too much excitement. We never made it back into town. Lunches were at the local pub on the water and dinners were light on our hilltop watching the sunset.

Off shore within view of our place were a group of islands and one day we decided to get out on the water to check it out instead of just gazing at it from the beaches. An hour’s drive up the coast was Tutukaka and a “Perfect Day”.

Perfect Day was the boat and non-diver sister program of Dive! Tutukaka, one of the dive operations servicing Poor Knights Islands, the islands we could see offshore. Jacques Cousteau had apparently said at one time that it was “one of the top ten dive sites in the world”. I don’t dive anymore but if it’s good enough for Jacques Cousteau…

There were quite a few people on board including several children, this being summer holidays and all, but it didn’t feel crowded. There were a few divers among them, who suited up and entered the water before everyone else, but I suspect they were part of non-diving groups. I did notice several other dedicated dive boats anchored not far from us, so no doubt it is a popular dive location. The crew were as expected, young, friendly, fit, tanned and good looking; the captain and tour narrator was a bit of a stand up comic.  On board Perfect Day for our day trip to the islands were wetsuits, masks, flippers, kayaks, paddleboards, showers, lunch…I went snorkeling twice along the cliff shoreline, bobbing along in the small waves and currents, watching the kelp sway and peering into the shapes and movements of life below. “Remember this” I told myself. “Remember this”. I hovered above a mass of bubbles rising to the surface from well below me, glittering in the sunshine. Divers below. I wished I was still there.

Poor Knights Islands was named by Captain Cook during his exploration and mapping of these waters for reasons unfortunately he did not record at the time. Around 1820 there was a Maori settlement there, where the people farmed and fished, until one day the warrior men went off to fight their enemy tribe, leaving the women, children and elders at home. While they were gone, another group of enemy bad guys, alerted to the fact that the settlement was undefended, landed on the island and murdered most people. When the men returned it was to this scene of sorrow and destruction. The settlement was abandoned after that, it was a sacred place in their story and no one was to live there again.

In more recent times the islands have been designated as marine and nature reserves and no one is allowed to even land on them. As a result of these many years of isolation, as well as its own micro climate where warm ocean currents converge, the islands have a unique ecosystem, far from introduced plant species that become invasive (agapanthus?) and animal and human predators. They are a nesting refuge for many migratory birds including some that travel back and forth from the Arctic, pausing here to nest. Among the many and varied species on the island are the world’s largest insect as well as – wait for it – the world’s only surviving dinosaur, the tuatara, Or so they say. As I said, we weren’t allowed to land.

What we could see from the boat as we traveled around and through the islands before heading back to shore was a landscape of huge cliffs emerging from the sea, with many archways and tunnels and caves at its edges. We entered what was described as the world’s largest sea cave to see up close the walls streaked with colours and shapes from its erosion by the salt sea below and the dripping through from the land above for however many years since this island erupted and cooled.

Back on land at the marina after, yes, a perfect day, I watched as the boats were cleaned, gear was offloaded for cleaning, crew and dive instructors headed for the bar where groups of divers were hunched over their log books pen in hand. It took me back.

After four days in Northland and some pretty heavy duty relaxing we headed back down the highway to Auckland airport and a short flight to Wellington where we were to stop for a couple of days before taking another boat over to South Island and more good times.