Week 47 One week – THREE Countries

Rotary Engagements since July 1                              311 - no change- no wait – make that 31!!

No apologies folks - second week of our travelogue and yes, three countries this week and not a Rotary meeting or engagement in sight.  Although perhaps I should add one or two to the count for the emails answered?  OK, let’s make that 313 then! Oh and another couple for the Rotarians we met.

Started the week in Hawai’i, on the island of O’ahu, in Honolulu.   Time to get out of the city & see something, well, real.  There’s no mistaking the fact that Waikiki, resort playground, is a bit of a cultural and reality desert.  It’s actually really quite regrettable that in the 120 years since the US added and abetted (mostly American) commercial interests to overthrow the Hawaiian Royal family it set on Hawai’i on the path to statehood in 1960 and a probably terminal decline in the indigenous culture, language and traditions. 

 

However, we went on an excellent tour of O’ahu, home to the state capital Honolulu, got into the countryside, saw the beach where “From Here to Eternity” was filmed and stepped back in some ways to a time when life was slower.  Shame it’s been spoiled by over-commercialisation.  We visited a Dole pineapple plantation (and commercial tourism opportunity of course).  Dole and his fellow farmers were responsible for the immigration of thousands of Chinese and Japanese workers, brought in to swell the labour force (and unwittingly help in the dilution of the Hawaiian culture).  At the time of the Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbour 40% of the Hawaiian population was of Japanese descent – somewhat of a cause for concern at the time!

All of the islands are volcanic in origin and have contrasts between the lava-based mountains and the very fertile plains below and between.  On the Leeward side of the mountains the average rainfall is around 20 inches per year – in the mountains and on the Windward side it goes up to 230 inches per year.  Agriculture is probably second to tourism as the major industry – and the fruit is great!

So, then, glad to have seen Hawai’I but not sad to leave it and haven’t brought the guidebook with us – we won’t be back.  Wouldn’t want you to think that we didn’t enjoy it because we did, very interesting to see aspects of history and culture that we haven’t experienced before, it’s just, well there are just so many other places to go.  (But it has increased the number of US states visited to 35 – just 15 to go!).

And on to Tuesday or was it Wednesday?  Well actually it was both!!  Having lost 11 hours between London and Honolulu we departed for Fiji in the knowledge that it would be Wednesday when we arrived.  We had a bit of a hard time understanding how this works so let me go through it slowly for you.  We left Honolulu at midday Tuesday and flew just over three hours to Christmas Island (Kirimati) where it was now 3:15 pm, Wednesday afternoon.  Yes, Wednesday afternoon - we’d crossed the International Date Line, that imaginary opposite to the Greenwich Meridian!  (Actually if the dateline was a straight line we wouldn’t have done by then, but it isn’t, it does a big kink and has a timezone of GMT +14 here! And it's one of the first places in the world to celebrate each new day).  On Christmas Island we were the one flight of the week, and yes there were about 20 passengers getting off and a similar number getting on – apparently “bone-fishing” is the big attraction, but from the look of the passengers luggage, camping gear is also required – no hotels here.  Delayed departure after refuelling due to the internet connection being down!  - big reliance on satellites here – no fibre optics in the tropics.

And so to Fiji.  And a confession to make – we managed to survive 36 hours here without ever changing any money.  Picked up at the airport by our resort (thank you to First Landing Resort) we had an extremely lazy Thursday whiling away the hours we’ll pretty much nothing, which we felt we’d deserved given a fairly hectic schedule in Honolulu (and all the months that preceded it!).  So we can’t express much of a view on the culture, but the people seemed very friendly and genuine.

Next we made our way to Auckland, way up in the North Island of New Zealand.  Just a stopover for us changing planes to go on to Christchurch but very green and looking well, like Kent really.  Lots of nice friendly native English speakers – cars driving on the left (as they do in Fiji to be fair) – very, well, familiar, and strangely comforting.  And finally to Christchurch where we were met at the airport by our friends Doug & Barbie Holborow, who we were seeing for the first time since, well quite a while ago really, actually the last time we saw them neither of us had children and now our children have children, so let’s just say it’s been a while.  Just a brief taxi stop for them – they took us into the centre of Christchurch, to our hotel next to the Cathedral, in the heart of the devastated centre of the city, of which more in a minute.   

Recommended stopping point here, the Heritage Christchurch – super apartment style accommodation – frankly we could have lived there with our fully kitchen and laundry quite happily for several days.

Saturday saw us with our friends on a leisurely stroll around Christchurch on a gorgeous autumn day – temperatures nudging 20 degrees C.  But, oh, poor city – the heart just ripped out of it in February 2011 and now still the scene of resultant devastation in so many ways – the shattered cathedral, the empty shells of buildings with an uncertain future, will they be repaired or will they be demolished, the endless empty areas where buildings once stood. 

For those of us old enough to remember London in the 50’s & early 60’s and the endless numbers of bomb sites turned into car parks – there’s echoes of that here.   

But the centre is being slowly reborn – a shopping mall of containers, a cardboard cathedral – be interesting to see how long these temporary structures remain – again harking back to the post WWII period, the ‘prefabs’ lasted well beyond their expected lifespan.  And then out into the Port Hills for magnificent views over the Canterbury plains and over to Lyttleton, the port for Christchurch with views that rival anything the Scotland or the Lake District can display.  A privilege to see how a city can dust itself off and keep going!!

Sunday and the start of our adventure over to the West Coast of the South Island with frankly no idea how this will end up – our intention is to drive down the coast and then through the Haast pass to Queenstown.  Except there’s the little matter of major earth & rock slides that have closed both that and Arthur’s pass.  We hope they’ll be cleared before midweek.  We’ll let you know how we get on!  But we got over to the coast on the excellent Tranz-Alpine Scenic train – modern rolling stock on a venture built over hazardous terrain more than 100 years ago.  

 

 Such a treat to see all the scenery going by with someone else doing the driving!  (Met a Rotarian from San Francisco also on his way to the Convention as well – count another meeting!)  And all four seasons in one day.   

We left Christchurch with the temperature barely above freezing but beautiful sunshine but low cloud and mist as we climbed across High Station country, to sleet and snow on the top at Arthur’s Pass, then down through driving rain to Greymouth, where we were greeted by hail, and on by car to Hokitika in a gale strong enough to take out the power – our hotelkeeper doing the rounds with candles and matches!  Met another Rotarian couple from Florida over dinner - all of us with our coats on because of the howling gale making it impossible for the restauarnt to heat the room!

Tomorrow we’re supposed to be taking a scenic flight over Mount Cook, the Fox and Franz Josef Glaciers and down to the fjords and Milford Sound – the forecast is good, but after today it just seems a little unlikely!  You’ll have to wait until next week to find out won’t you!!