Gosh, it's a gorgeous country. In fact, I can only think of Tahiti as a place that aces it in the beauty stakes, but at least in New Zealand you don't have to endure the French. Enduring the Kiwis? Mmmm, yes, well! Of course, Keith's family is all extremely bearable already, so all I can say about the rest is that they probably only need a large amount of international travel and a small amount of sharp slapping to turn into a totally bearable people.
Can't say we did much for most of the time. Like, here's the closest we got to Auckland city:
Most of the time, we stayed at home, rugged up against the cold (OK, that was just me!) at Keith's dads place.
Couldn't be helped. Keith, along with Paul and Reuben, helped his dad buy and set up a new computer - his old one was from 1992 or something - which was a long and involved "boys toys" process that took maybe five whole days. It's like watching paint dry, isn't it! However, Helen was lovely and gave Janice and me enormous stacks of New Zealand House and Garden magazines, so we lounged around for almost all of those five days, reading, lusting after a bach (that's a beach house to the rest of us) and pondering why Kiwi yuppies all wear black but have everything in the rest of their lives white - or rather "alabaster" as I now know it's called - including their pets and kids, who all seem to be named, regardless of sex, after dead American presidents.
Tried to do a bit of shopping too. Joke! Lyn from Fiji has a legendary story about a shopping spree she took in Auckland twenty years ago. With high expectations, she emptied her entire bank account in anticipation of a massive blow-out but, by the end of the week, had only managed to buy ... a bottle of shampoo. And here it is, twenty years later, and all I bought was ... a bottle of organic shampoo, organic conditioner and a biography of Marianne Faithfull. I'd like to think Hong Kong has spoiled me for shopping anywhere, but I think even Fiji spoils you for shopping in Auckland.
Oh, and Keith also bought himself a yogurt-maker. Lois is such an enthusiast Keith caught the bug and has now decided that's his new big thing, making lots of natural yogurt with all his own blends and the rest. (Secret hippy, isn't he! But then we always knew that about him.)
Apart from those five days in Auckland, we spent three up North, at a former hippy commune in the beach hinterland near the marine reserve on the Twin Coast Discovery Trail. Stunning place.
And don't you just love old hippies? This commune was set up in the early '70s and today still has five of the original hippy folk still living there (but with a heap of kids and grandkids however, who don't live there - naturally having moved into the cities to enjoy a more materialist and capitalist way of life - but all around for Christmas and, particularly Rick and Teri's lot, looking so Boho-chic it was like Woodstock all over again) and they're just gorgeous folk, all of whom still hold onto their old values, only now with inside toilets, hot-tubs and land worth an absolute fortune.
It's the way we all should have gone, isn't it. "Turn on, tune in, drop out", buy a heap of land no one wants somewhere very pretty and inspirational, live off the land, do your art ...
Womble's "Memories of JFK"
... raise a heap of emotionally kick-arse kiddies, wait for fourty years, and voila! the rest of the world has caught up with you and suddenly you're "rich as" and able to hie off unwanted blocks of land, sell them for unimaginable sums and use the money to go out into the world again revisiting all your old haunts on the old Marrakesh to Kathmandu Hippy Trail, only this time in comfort.
Oh, and buy yourself hot tubs.
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