I am posting this from New Zealand, in the midst of a once-in-a-lifetime trip to this far, far away country. It’s a luscious, green land – very much like Scotland – with beautiful scenery, pleasant people, and rain, even in the summer.

My picture of the Wanaka Tree is as good a snapshot of the scenery as any. (Do be careful how you pronounce it! For more information, see here.)

I might do a longer post about the trip after my return. For now, I offer the following selection of standout memories beyond the scenery, the people, and the weather. These may not be the ones the New Zealand Tourist Authority would promote…

• Red traffic cones. We’ve been doing a lot of driving. The journeys have been pleasant, but I have never seen so many damn roadworks in as short a space of time as I have on this trip. Even now, in tiny Franz Josef, there are roadworks and a community of red traffic cones at either end of the place!
• Roadkill! Along with the driving came lots of dead animals littering the roads. (And I do mean lots.) Somebody really needs to give the poor things a primer in road safety.
• No safes. So far, not one of the places we have stayed at has had a safe for valuables in the room. This may be due to the low level of crime, but this is untested. Certainly people were happily reassuring us that nothing would happen to our luggage if we temporarily left it unattended.
• No tipping culture. Only in a small minority of places have we been prompted to add a tip to our bill. I cannot imagine that state of affairs will endure too long.

So, it’s a nice country and we’re having a nice time. And we’re very grateful that we’re getting the opportunity to experience and enjoy this trip. We are blessed.

[I am going to keep this post politics-free. That content will probably feature in a later post.]