The Kepler track is one of New Zealand’s “great walks,” with impeccably maintained trails through classic NZ scenery and large plush hut accommodations. It’s a 4-day hike near the Fjordlands that starts out in lowland Beech forest, climbs to tussock-grasslands with sweeping views, then dips back down into the forest greenery. We chose this one in particular because it ends where it starts–no extra transportation necessary. Here we are, packs laden with supplies and ready to enjoy our tramp.

I absolutely loved the green mossy beech forest, studded with ferns. It’s what I imagine the Elves inhabit in Tolkien’s worlds. I think I love it so much because the greenery above and below feels like home. I’ve heard Kiwis speak about the open tussock lands with the same affection I feel for the green forest, because it’s their home I suppose, like Oklahoma is home to some Americans. But I certainly don’t identify with that barren exposed wind-swept brownness. To me, comfort is the green deciduous forest. The catch is that I don’t think beech trees are deciduous here!

It was 9-10 miles to the first hut, and my feet were glad to get there! Big, posh (for a DOC hut), with gas cookers, running water, and mattresses on the bunks, these accommodations were handsome.

Giggle! Two happy faces, playing on the beach.

Milo spent a good long time the first evening arranging the lake-side drift wood in the sand. Pizza was the creation of the evening, probably because we had just cooked and eaten some nice pizzas for dinner. I find watching him quite interesting, he’s getting very dextrous with his fingers.

Aw, what a happy portrait!

Milo always starts out the day walking, and one way we try and motivate him to continue making forward progress (past all the fascinating sticks and rocks that could be picked up and thrown) is to play hide and seek. This morning I was running ahead and hiking behind various trees and rocks, calling Milo to find me.

“I want to do it myself!”  Yes, we’re in that phase. Mama crossed without Daddy carrying her, so Milo wants to walk the log too.  Preferentially without holding Daddy’s hand, but he did compromise on that point.

We did suggest that if he wants to do things himself, he might like to carry Daddy’s BIG backpack….but after the photo shoot, he decided that he’ best leave that task to Dad.

Almost at the second night hut, but and M&M break and map check was necessary. As parents concerned with our son’s health, we tried having Milo eat 5 raisins for every one M&M, which does work (the nuts in the GORP get rejected out of hand). But the side effect that evening was the world’s messiest diaper, so we gave that up, opting for a constipated chocolate-stuffed child to a sloppy-poop one, at least while tramping,.

Another trail diversion, insects! We managed to snap a photo of this cicada before Milo thoughtfully shooed it off my shoulder.

Running to catch up to Mama and Daddy is another favorite trail activity for Milo. He’ll actually pause, motion us ahead, then run to catch up. Perfect trail for that, almost handicap accessible, with no tricksy roots or rocks.

Peekaboo! This hollow tree was still very much alive. I started to explain to Milo that trees are only alive on their outsides, but the detail was lost on him still.

We were glad for the screened windows on this hut, set in a meadow with thousands of “sandflies” (a type of biting black fly). Most people were hiking the track in the opposite direction as we were and had just come down a big hill to arrive at the hut. They looked at us carrying Milo, raised their eyebrows, shuffled their sore feet, and warned us of the steepness…..We would have been more concerned if they had all been young and fit, but since they were mostly in their 40s, 50s and beyond, we kept our rude thoughts to ourselves and managed the next day’s climb without incident. Getting old must stink….hopefully it’ll be so gradual that it isn’t a shock.

Milo loves wielding the camera, and sometimes his perspectives are interesting. I forget what it’s like to see everything from knee height. The Aussie guy in this photo was super kind and carried out Milo’s dirty diapers for us, since he was going the opposite direction and was only one day from the end of his hike. Phew, quite a generous offer!

We figured the climb was almost over once we popped out of the forest into the tussock tops (it happens in about 2 steps, no gradual transition but I haven’t yet figured out why). Actually, that cool ridge track was so steep in places that it was punctuated with over 200 steps.

We lunched at a shelter at the top of the ridgeline. It must be about the mid-way mark on the trail because it was the lunch spot of choice for folks headed the other direction too (the majority of the crowd). It’s fun to chat with them all, see their outfits, hear their accents, and exchange pleasantries. The young fit Germans arrived first, followed later by the older folks. We see “heaps” (as the Kiwis say) of Germans on the trails. They’re all cheerful, young and spry, with good gear. Completely not my stereotype of a stodgy sausage-toting “Herr Schneider.” That’s good, breaking stereotypes is a positive side-effect of travel. And the formation of new stereotypes is fun too, as long as we don’t take them too seriously.

Milo demanded some time out of the backpack (WAK!) so he trucked along for a few minutes after lunch, completely oblivious to the views but happy to be walking himself.

He may be oblivious to the views, but he still gives the thumbs up on cue!

We had super fine weather for the ridgeline part of the Kepler track. It can get windy, rainy, and downright nasty at times, but we strolled along with unhindered views and a light breeze.

The tiny alpine flowers and berries are a reminder of how harsh the weather can be up here–hunkered down low to the ground to let the worst of the wind pass them over.

Once upon a time this lake was a glacier, and somehow this outcrop survived the pummeling to stand as a magnificent viewing spot for generations to come.

Luxmore hut, set up on the tussock tops, was probably the most luxurious of the trek accommodations. It sleeps 54 trampers, and has big windows that afford panoramic views of the lake below. Milo certainly enjoyed it, and set about charming everyone he rubbed elbows with.

Here’s Milo, staking out his spot on the bunk. “Me, me, me!” he says as he pats his chest. Yes Milo, that’s your corner for sleeping.

There are caves near the hut, this one specially marked out for hikers to take a casual look. Milo was pretty nervous going down there, which surprised me. When did he learn to be afraid of a dark damp place?

Water dripping through the rock left white limestone deposits, and a few ornate stalactites. Thinking back on it now, I can’t remember why there were some years in my life when I found caves fascinating. Since then I’ve most definitely become a creature of the light, and the lure of strange formations and white creatures of the caves is completely gone.

This is such a Kiwi attitude. They believe anything non-native is bad. I guess I don’t love stoats, they’re the bad guys in Wind in the Willows after all. But face to face, they’re cute little ferrety buggers, and if they eat native bird eggs, it’s only what they do to survive…..same as people clear land and plant crops. Native birds are naive enough to make nests on the ground, which is only what they do because they didn’t evolve with predators, and haven’t learned any better. But now people are going to great effort to reverse the evolutionary trend and keep the kiwi and other native birds alive by massive predator trapping and poisoning programs. Seems like an uphill battle to me, but New Zealanders believe it’s worth fighting.

First spot of rain during the night and early morning, but it made for an interesting sunrise.

We’re suited up and ready to go, keeping the little guy warm and dry.

This hut even has a helicopter landing pad! “Hut” seems like a misnomer. It’s more appropriately termed a back country lodge.  Though unlike the back country huts in Argentina, you can’t purchase a bottle of wine and dinner up here.

A few hours down through beech forest and we reached the lake where we ate lunch. The sandflies were so thick that we tucked our pants into our socks and didn’t linger over the meal.  There’s a campground down there, but I’m glad we didn’t tent there!

Finished with hiking the Kepler track, and we’re all still smiling! It was a magnificent hike.

Last week we headed down to the southern part of New Zealand’s south island for a week of hiking. The “highways” are all what we’d term state route roads, windy two-lane jobbers with hairpin turns, passing through the occasional small town and plenty of farm country, including the bastion of Merino Sheep stations and Icebreaker’s source of wool. Down on the low lands we see various other sheep breeds for meat and coarse fibered wool, but apparently the drier high lands are home to the Merinos because they don’t get foot rot up there….it certainly looks quite dry and brown on these hills!

Look at this cool cat! Milo actually did super on the long car ride to Queenstown, 6 hours from Christchurch. Only one throw-up, and I finally mastered the technique of catching it in a cloth diaper to keep it mostly out of the car seat. We all learned our Raffi songs and listened to Rumpole stories when Milo napped.

Queenstown is the adventure sport capital of New Zealand, where the commercial bungy jump was invented. We stopped in to watch the adrenaline-addicted junkies dive off this bridge, but we didn’t indulge ourselves.

Here’s the womens’ toilet sign at the bungy lookout….and we actually did see one woman jump with a skirt on (over leggings, thankfully). The dress doesn’t stay that tidy little triangle when you jump! And the bungy is handicap accessible–or so I suppose, since the handicap bathroom sign had the wheel-chair figure hanging by a bungy as well.

We got to Queenstown in time to take the gondola up to a sporting and look-out complex perched on the mountainside above the town. Milo thought the ride was cool, of course!

The paragliders take off from up here, sailing out over the town and up the valley on windy days. Queenstown is snugged alongside a big deep glacier lake, 50 miles long and almost 1400 feet deep. Makes Lake George seem small in comparison!

Yes, that’s Jeremiah hooked to that paraglider! He splurged and enjoyed an exhilarating ride down the hillside, came back very happy.  I’ll get to go some day….could have been this day if I wasn’t so darn cheap!

A ride on a cart with Audrey and Noah, what fun! On Tuesdays I take Milo to Playcenter. It’s like a parent-coop-preschool, where you can bring your kids and they can play with the cool toys and do messy stuff like paint and glue and scissors. It’s not a childcare center–parents stay there with the kids for the most part. We met Laura there with her two kids, Audrey and Noah, and have become buddies. Laura is headed back home (Alaska) in a couple weeks, and when I mentioned to a kiwi mom there that I was sad to see her leave, she callously advised me to make new friends. She was just trying to be helpful, so I know I shouldn’t let the comment niggle me….but it does.  When you’ve just moved, spent a long time being lonely and then finally found a new friend, the last thing you want to do is repeat that whole process. 

Milo and I spent a couple hours in Hagley Park this week oogling over the flowers. This rose is impressive, no? This one looks the same all year round, but we also enjoyed some seasonal blooms and a week-long display of flower arrangements.

Most of these rose blossoms in the formal garden don’t actually have any appreciable scent, but that doesn’t stop Milo smelling them! Thankfully that’s all he does, because I suspect that the gardeners carefully hand clipping the grass edges wouldn’t be amused if he started picking petals.

“BIG” and “small” are two of Milo’s favorite descriptors right now. Since most of these dahlias fit into one or the other category, Milo was happy to browse the extensive collection with me, exchanging superlatives.

Look at these crazy things! I do love plant variety collections! Why we as humans like the extremes, the tiny pincushion blooms cheek by jowl with the enormous dinner-plate frizzy ones, I don’t know…..but take a look at any dog breed book (or chicken breed, or pig breed, or cat breed…you get the idea) and you’ll see that strange habit played out in the flesh.

There were a bunch of little “cottages” set up with different floral themes. They all had a big open viewing window just Milo’s height. It was the undertakers association, strangely enough, that sponsored this portion of the displays.

Milo and I lowered the average age of the flower arrangement audience by a good 10 years….or so it seems.

It must be a British sense of humor…..for some reason there was a whole display of decorated outhouses. I think this part of the flower show started as a way to poke fun after the earthquakes, when the sewer systems weren’t functional, but they were so well loved that they were brought back by popular demand. This one showed all the neglected garden plants surrounding the outhouse, casualties of the earthquake devastation, while the port-a-loo is brimming with color. Perhaps they’re saying how rich human manure is as a fertilizer? Well, whatever the intended message, Milo was impressed.

“Waddle waddle waddle!”  That’s how Milo says “Penguin,” and these fellows were the biggest ones he’s ever seen.

Our friend Damien turned 40 last week and celebrated getting old by heading up to Lake Clearwater and renting a “Bach” — Kiwi for a cobbled-together camp dwelling, varying in sophistication from outhouse-rustic to basic hot showers, but nothing much more fancy than that. We joined them for the weekend. Unlike lake houses that we’re used to at home lining the water’s perimeter, this collection of camps is arrayed in a concentrated little “village” and the lake itself is left open for trout fishermen and the like.

Saturday morning Damien and Jeremiah puttered around the lake trying to temp the fish with fake flies and spinners, and Milo enjoyed running around the path examining flowers and bugs.

The bug catcher came out later. Milo is an excellent little imitator–which means I must look pretty funny when I’m catching him a butterfly. He stalks and pounces, one knee down, then holds for a second or two just like Mama does while she makes sure the insect crawls up into the cage.

We caught moths, butterflies, bees and even a spider, but the flies were too quick for us. Fortunately for the insects, Milo likes releasing them as much as he likes catching them.

Here’s Milo’s self portrait, using the camera timer up in the living room of the bach. The camera provided a long stint of amusement on the drizzly Sunday morning.

Milo tried to feed the porcelain bunny a carrot, but it wasn’t too interested. Bunny has a bit of carrot juice on his whiskers now, but that is the extent of the action. The carrot actually disappeared, but we found it again in the trash–a friend played a little joke on us.

Just up the valley from Lake Clearwater is the Rangitata river basin, a massive gravel plain partially covered with vegetation. The road back there has been improved (widened) though it’s still unpaved, and tour buses filled with avid Tolkien fans wend their way back there ever since the filming of the Lord of the Rings has put the valley on the map.

Mount Sunday in the background was used filming the Lord of the Rings (Edoras, and a battle scene), so the area has enjoyed recent tourist fame and sports and nice wiggly bridge. No fish in the stream though.

The Mount Potts station owner (a station is a huge hill country ranch, this one is 1200 hectares or 3000 acres) has opened a cafe that feeds the tour-bus customers to the remote valley, and the proceeds from the restaurant business must swamp anything he got from giving film crews access to the valley. Our crew enjoyed a cup of coffee and a couple beers before reluctantly setting back out to Christchurch.

You can squint all you want, but you’ll never find us in this photo–I just took it off the Buller Gorge marathon website because that’s what the race was like–well over a thousand runners filling up half the road in the scenic Buller Gorge, Westport, New Zealand. We had driven this way just after Christmas during torrential rain, but this weekend’s weather cooperated perfectly. And no, we didn’t actually run a marathon, we ran the half.

The half marathon started just downstream of this tunnel bit–the marathon runners got to go through it. Buller Gorge River looked sparkly and tame when we were there, but we’ve seen it muddy, fast and treacherous too.

I pushed Milo for the race, and here we are just coming into Westport, almost finished. There were so many people at the start that it took us 2 minutes just to cross the starting line, but after a few miles it thinned out. Being the only Mama pushing a pram in this race, we got lots of comments, all in good humor. “What does a ride cost?” “Can I trade places with the baby?” I told them they could ride with me on the down hills, but they’d have to push on the ups! For whatever silly reason, I found it particularly fun to pass guys. “You know it’s bad when you’re passed by a baby!” they’d say.  Though truth be told, at 1 hour 50 minutes, we didn’t pass any of the fast runners, either men or women. Still we had fun!

Jeremiah beat his previous personal record on this run, coming in about 1 hour 28 minutes. Molly didn’t beat any records, but felt good nevertheless.

This guy has a hard-core beard! One of the most enjoyable parts of running with a big group of people is admiring all the shapes and sizes. And if you ever thought you couldn’t run a half marathon, all you need for inspiration is a glimpse of the people that do. Anyone can make it. Folks with sinewy legs in their 70s, women with jiggly tushes flopping around inside spandex tights, middle-aged guys with pot bellies….and fit old men with bushy beards!

There was a kid’s run in the afternoon around a couple blocks in town and through the finishing shoot. Milo had a blast watching them come in (“More, more!” he kept asking), and I have to admit, the varied running styles and stamina strategies were more interesting to watch than the adults.

We camped for the weekend at one of those drive-up campgrounds with kitchens, showers, and playgrounds. Milo was thrilled to sleep in a tent….or at least to play in a tent. He had the usual tough time settling down to sleep the first night, so the second I tucked him into his car seat, turned on the new Raffi CD from Omi and Abi, and lost myself in a novel. Just the car seat restraint let him relax and fall asleep, no fuss no muss, and no frayed tempers. Brilliant.

Milo was nervous about the waves when walking on his own, but when on Mama’s back he thought it was a good joke if we had to hustle back from the encroaching water.

The camp ground was right across from the beach, though you wouldn’t catch me in that cold water. We enjoyed an evening beach walk and Milo bid the sun goodnight.

The park where the race ended had a nice kid playground….built for giants, but Milo wasn’t a bit nervous climbing that tall ladder.

A half marathon only takes the morning, so in the afternoon we went walking at Cape Foulwind. Unfortunate name, Captain Cook probably had some misadventure there. Though it was a strong spunky wind that snatched at our hats, it wasn’t stinky the day we visited.

The ever-present sheep made their appearance once again, much to Milo’s delight. They even left poop on the path, just for his amusement.

In case you need directions…..we’re a long way from home.

We stopped at Reefton on the way back to break up the 4.5 hour ride, taking a walk though this friendly beech forest. Starting out on the old mining road it felt like a logging road at home, ferns fluttering on the shady bank, a creek burbling down below, and even a few big-leafed maple-like trees at the side.

Milo has been two for a whole week now. We celebrated his birthday at the Hagley park wading pool (central park in Christchurch) with an international bunch of friends–two families of Brits, Canadians and Americans. We’ll make the most of these summer birthdays while we’re in the southern hemisphere! The breeze made it a little hard to keep those candles lit, but we managed.

How many kids does it take to blow out two candles? Just kidding! Blowing out the candles was a group effort.

COOKIE is Milo’s favorite word, so when Jeremiah sent out an email invitation to his birthday party, he grabbed an internet photo of cookie monster cupcakes as an embellishment. Then a couple of his work colleagues said they were coming because they wanted those Cookie Monster Cupcakes….he had created an expectation that needed to be fulfilled. And he sure fulfilled it, they looked professional!

Jeremiah spent three evenings creating these impressive Cookie Monsters, after researching construction techniques on you-tube. I was pressed into assistance to provide never-ending frosting and googley-eyes, but my main project was the train. Phew, if it takes this much effort for a two-year-old’s birthday, just think of the enormity of effort required at year five!

I had my qualms about bringing the new birthday boat to the pool because I didn’t have boats for all the kids….and Milo did find it very hard to share the new love of his life with his friends. But they were good spores and it worked out fine.

February 6th is Waitangi Day, commemorating the treaty with the Maori signed in 1840, considered New Zealand’s founding document. I don’t imagine the Maori celebrate the day with quite the same pleasure as we did…. We celebrated the day off from work to go hiking with some friends. Jennifer on the left is an American friend Jeremiah met at an engineering conference. Jen on the right and her husband Dustin and son Tristan are Canadian buddies that Milo and I met at the wading pool. The Canterbury plains stretch below us, dotted with the inevitable sheep and cattle.  We usually hike alone, so it was really nice to have company and it’s exciting to have new friends.  Plus, us three women got in some good girl chat, a real treat!

Lunch at the summit was punctuated by parental remonstrations to the boys to be gentle, throw rocks AWAY from people only, refrain from pushing, etc. Milo and Tristan actually get along quite well, but also constantly test those standards of conduct. Time out seems reasonably effective at this age.

Here they are, trotting along, oblivious of the view but having a blast. Tristan walked the whole ridge line and he’s just a year older than Milo, so I still hold out hope that by the time Milo is too heavy to throw on our backs, he’ll be ready to do at least some amount of walking on his own two legs.

Look, a railing, perfectly slanted for ease of climbing! No one fell into the water this time, but it wasn’t for lack of trying!

Here we are, picking the fruits (yes, that’s botanically correct) of our labor. I’m not sure if Milo remembers poking these seeds into the ground back in the spring, but he sure enjoys picking them. Too bad he doesn’t enjoy eating them….he leaves that to Mama and Daddy.