Kia ora! I am back from a month in New Zealand! I prescheduled a few posts to publish while traveling, including three long overdue quilt history posts, which were the whole reason I started this blog in the first place. We never know how life will surprise us – the blog turned into something completely different, and the trip to New Zealand brought me more surprises than I could have imagined!

A year ago, when my husband and life partner of 40 years was planning his exit from a more than full time career of work in the medical field, he wanted to go far away for a long time. New Zealand had been unattainable to us because he always had to check in to work, even when on vacation. New Zealand is 21 hours ahead of Oregon. Today there hasn’t happened yet here – almost like time traveling! We booked a tour with an adventure hiking company for the first two weeks, and planned independent travel for the second two weeks, then let it all rest in our internet files until the January 2020 retirement date arrived.

We were on the South Island of New Zealand from January 23rd to February 23rd, and enjoyed every minute! Every day brought new surprises – mountain landscapes, active glaciers, active earthquake faults, metamorphic rocks, fiords, foliage, birds, whales, volcanoes, rainbows, different groceries, different stars, different social norms; all keeping me alert and invigorated with daily doses of novelty to wake up the slumbering brain cells of the gray Oregon winter.

It will take me a long time to fully process and write about it all, as we rejoin life on our side of the world. It was a completely refreshing experience, in a place I could never have imagined, and now will never forget!

Earthquake damage

tree fern

Castle Hill

Paparoa

Rata

Nikau palm

Pancake Rocks

Franz Josef glacier

Lake Wakatipu

Doubtful Sound

Kepler Track

Kepler Track

Waihoaka, Southland

Remarkables from Ben Lomand

Kea, Ben Lomand

Poetry in Queenstown

Moonrise over Lake Ohau, alpenglow on Aoraki Mt Cook

Aoraki Mt Cook

Aoraki Mt Cook, Lake Punakaki

Onawe Pa, Akaroa

Mt John

Lake Tekapo

White Bluffs, Lake Tekapo

Dunedin Train Station

Royal Albatross Center

Blue penguins

Aramoana beach

Aramoana beach

St Kilda’s

Moeraki

Kaikoura

Sperm whale

Oh the geology! Kaikoura

Fur seals, Ohau Overlook

Rainbow, Cloudy Bay

Queen Charlotte Sound

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