A Slippery Slope

I may march to the beat of my own drum, but from here on out I will stick to the beaten path. What I'm trying to say is I HATE the literal act of trailblazing. Claudia and I just returned from a lovely stay with a wonderful couple in the Catlins, but it turns out doing conservation work is more up Claudia's alley than my own. Just as some people may not enjoy being thrust into the teacher's position in front of a classroom full of wee ones who do not speak your language with no lesson plan, I do not like being told to trek through the New Zealand bush with soggy feet and saw and have to make my own trail. Albeit, the bushwhacking was only one day out of six, but it was a miserable day. The Catlins is a beautiful basically uninhibited region of the south island that is unbelievably scenic with glorious beaches and lovely paths through some of the oldest surviving forests in the area (farmers have destroyed most of the old bush). I would compare the area to a summer in Maine. Unfortunately, we were not blessed with decent weather during our stay and went on a few soggy eco-tours, cleaned up and trimmed back a beautiful trail, did a lot of weeding, and counted penguins—all of which were fairly enjoyable, aside from the constant drizzle and occasional downpour. Sadly, the most memorable portion of the trip was trailblazing. We left early in the morning and had to follow some trail markers that a ranger had put up along a route that he wanted to actually become a path. Claudia and I were both equipped with belts that had shears in a sheath on one side and a saw in a sheath on the other. We were expected to clip back any plants in our way and saw down any trees or limbs that were too large to clip. Having had so much rain in the previous days and embarking into the bush with high grasses and other plants, my feet were soggy within the first thirty minutes. Within the hour I was walking in mini-marshes and this is when I decided I wasn't having very much fun. When we sat down for our lunch break, I realized just how wet and cold I was (did I mention it was FREEZING and we had both had to borrow long johns from the older woman we were staying with for the adventure?) and I decided not only was I not having fun, I wasn't enjoying any of it. Following lunch, we had to put back on our freezing and wet gloves and then started the ascent up the slimy, muddy, steep, steep path. The mud was so soggy that if there were no roots underfoot, the mud would just slide right down the hill bringing you with it. This is when I decided I was miserable. My arms stopped working so whenever I had to saw a branch it would take eons. The fact that the path was meant to become a path that rangers would use to set up traps to catch stoats and opossums (the opossums here are actually cute, not rat-like) to help save the rare yellowbird did nothing to encourage me. I would rather save the opossums and to hell with all their rare birds—they all look alike and you only get to look at them for three seconds before they fly away. I repeat, I only like freak birds like the emu, ostrich, kiwi and penguin. Oh, and the freaky extinct moa bird that is huge and pseudo-dinosaur-like (Hillary, you would love them…).  I also don't like hikes where you have to return on the same path that led you into the woods. What's the point? After four hours of trekking, we reached the point where the route stopped going uphill and started going downhill. Fergus, our main-man, asked if we were okay to go on, and I suggested a snack break. We sat and Fergus said that we would have to allow at least two hours to return and to me this meant that it was time to return. Six hours of unhappy hiking is enough for me. Once we finished our snack, Fergus said we'd carry on for another half hour or so before turning around. At this point, I thought I was going to start crying. I dropped the hint that I was losing feeling in my marsh feet and he said, "In that case, we'd better turn around." Thank god! I was trying hard to keep my bad mood to myself because I could tell that Claudia was actually enjoying herself, but I could not withhold the occasional "I hate this" whenever we made eye contact. The trip down was terrible on my crunchy knees and I fell about a million times, once landing completely on my back, causing Claudia and Fergus to stop to see if I was okay. All I could say is, "Just keep going," with no smile on my face. I was finally able to laugh at myself when I squatted down and surfed down the muddy slope on my feet for a good three yards or so. When we got back to the house I took a shower and climbed under my covers to thaw out for an hour or so until I could feel the warmth and a smile creeping through my veins. I went into the living and Claudia looked up at me, unsure of my mood and I said, "It turns out I HATE trailblazing," and we shared a good laugh.

I should not make this blog such a negative one, because we really did have a lovely time. The couple that we stayed with, Fergus and Mary, were wonderful former hippies who live in a tiny village where only twenty people live year-round, while others come to holiday in the summer. Again, very Maine-like. Fergus and Mary seem to do everything for the community as well as the environment. They have taken over maintaining many trails through the un-disturbed forests and in more than one place they have essentially saved a few colonies of yellow-eyed penguins. Mary was an unbelievable cook and provided delicious meals and even better desserts for us the entire time that we were there. Fergus knew the name of every bird, plant, shell and mammal in the area (I'm sure Mary did too, but she did not join us on any of our eco-adventures) and was very patient with Claudia and my way of laughing through any adventure. In addition to hosting conservation volunteers, they also rent out homes to eco-tourists and Fergus takes his guests out on many nature walks in the area. Claudia and I got to join in the walks, but were not entertained because the guests were oldies with canes. While they strolled along the beach looking at shells and rocks, Claudia and I stomped on crab shells and had battles with the giant seaweed that covered the beach. I would be interested to hear what the oldies thought of us—in one spot a man turned around and said, "Be careful here, there's a dead cow and he really stinks, I'd walk that way." My response was, "Claudia, go pose with the cow so I can take a picture!" I've gotten into the habit of taking pictures of dead animals, so beware of future photo albums. We also got to get super close to sea-lions dozing on the beach and actually got to crawl into penguin dens to check out their cute little chicks.

Oh, and we made a delightful artist friend. On our first day there, we went to check out a shop called The Lost Gypsy Gallery. The shop was actually set up in a sort of antique caravan turned into a store. The shop owner is named Blair and he specializes in creating automatons. Automatons are little trinkets that can be wound or twisted or pressed with the result of some funny or delightful action occurring. For example, there was one called "The Pleasant Nose Pincher" mounted on the wall. You twisted the handle and two hands clapped together at about nose level (above mine, but average nose level). There were many little ones that you twisted and it would allow little metal sea animals to move or flowers to bloom or walnuts to fly. Claudia and I spent hours wandering around the little shop pushing all the buttons, pressing all the levers and winding all the winders. We spent such a long amount of time there that the artist, Blair, finally offered us a beer. We accepted and joined him outside (where he was juggling hammers) to ask how he came up with his ideas and what his inspiration was. He said he liked collecting junk and all the automatons were made of recycled materials so that allowed him to make a career out of doing so. He told us that he had grown up vacationing in the Catlins and his grandfather had done much to encourage people to come see the beauty, including building a camp for students and a ropes course (what he called a confidence course). He said that he would show us the course if we had time. We opted out of joining the oldies on one of their afternoon hikes so that we could go on an adventure with Blair. The course was ridiculous and there were no safety clips or harnesses or helmets involved. Blair had been playing on the course since he was a child, so he made each challenge look like a cinch and then made us look like fools. I ended up being dragged through the mud by a rope after attempting to slide across a wire while holding onto said rope. Claudia was injured in the grand finally when we were told to swing on a rope into a giant rope spider web. All in all, this was a much better adventure than walking behind a woman with a cane on the beach. I also kind of fall in love (am intrigued by may be a more conservative way of putting it) with all artists, so I encouraged us spending as much time with the lost gypsy as possible.

So, despite the marsh feet, we did have a lovely time and hope that the rest of the trip will be just as wonderful.

 

Love in your face.