Tom & Chris Go To America

Did I mention earlier that we were planning to make a trip to the US? If not, we were, and we did. Now, after being gone for 5 weeks, we’re back into our basic New Zealand routine which goes something like this. Chris gets up in the morning and goes to work…I don’t. Next day, do the same thing. In between, there may be some meals, some fun, some personal paperwork-business or chores, a bit of socializing or our one regular activity…Wednesday night choir practice (more on that later).

The trip to the States went off without any hitches that were significant enough to remember. There were 2 weeks in Homer with a 1 day stopover in Anchorage to see our friends the Holmans, by way of S.F. to see our friends Rusty and Dia, and 2 weeks in Portland, including a couple days at the Oregon Coast for a wedding (more on that later, too). I’ll try to be brief on the particulars of the trip since this is supposed to be a blog about our lives in New Zealand and not just your typical self-promoting, narcissistic drivel found pretty much everywhere on the internet these days…well, OK, it’s a bit of that too.

In Homer, we have to good fortune to have enough friends off which to sponge, that we didn’t have to spend a single night in a paid accommodation or buy a meal. Naturally, my mind went right to thinking how to turn this into a viable, long-term retirement program.

Until we arrived, Alaska had experienced one of the crappiest summers in recorded history, or so our whiny friends made it sound. Their first, and possibly their only 5 nice days, with temperatures topping out at a steamy 60 degrees, occurred were while we were there. Luckily, four of those days were while we were staying at the Burgesses cabin on Hesketh Island with a variety of friends. We only spent enough time at our house to mow the shaggy lawn and fix a leaking toilet. Other than that, we didn’t camp there and there and suffered no real pangs of nostalgia.

In Oregon, weather was at the other end of the spectrum, with temps up to 104 degrees. Fortunately, we were staying in the 5 star home of Chris’s brother & SIL, Dan & Malin (who happened to be on the East Coast all the time we were in Oregon), which had everything except mints on our pillows (hint, for next time, Malin)…air conditioning, a pool and gourmet kitchen (though we did have to stoop to doing our own cooking). Chris’ mom, who was recovering from a broken pelvis, stayed there with us until even she got tired of us and wanted to go back to her own house.

The main reason for the timing of our trip to Oregon was for the wedding of good friends (and surrogate children) Aasta, who we’ve known since diaperhood, and Stefan, who we’ve know since he started grazing in our refrigerator a few years ago. Since I was the official, wedding official (I expect there’s a more appropriate word for this duty), I pretty much had to be there. It was a smallish

affair…about 30 friends and family…held between beach sand dunes in Manzanita on a foggy, but thermally comfortable day. Afterward, we retired to a rented house to overindulge in food and drink and present the newlyweds with a knockout, custom quilt coordinated by Chris and Abby, with squares made by a dozen-or-so close friends, assembled by Homer friend Gail, and “quilted” by a pro who had a fantastic eye for detail. The newlyweds agreed to keep it.

OK, now we’re back in New Zealand, where the weather had turned from winter to spring while we were gone. Not that winter in New Zealand was especially painful, mind you. I’d expect blank stares if I asked for a snow shovel, and I’ve never heard mention of parkas, snow pacs, blizzards, drifts or wind chill factor. Flowers continue to bloom right through it all, though the grass only need mowing once a month rather than once a week,

like now. Lots of trees are in bloom now, and flowers are coming up all over the place. Gardens are going in and the nectar-eating Tui’s (birds) are going nuts in our neighborhood. I wish I knew a way to attach an audio clip of them to this blog (of course, there’s a way, I just don’t know it). They sound pretty exotic.

As I mentioned earlier, our one regular activity is singing in a “World Music” choir. I’d heard the term World Music before, usually thrown around by the new-agey, granola set, and figured it must have something to do with anti-globalization or stamping out poverty in Africa, but as it turns out, at least in our choir, it refers to pretty much any song with words you can’t understand. Right now, we’re working on such ditties as Shir Same-Ach, Ovdovjala Lisich Kata, Es Fuhrt Uber Den Main, and Nada te Turbe. Even if they mean something like Kill Your Neighbors or Eat Your Babies, they all sound nice in four part harmony.

Chris is reveling in her new-found techno expertise. She’s had an I-pod for a few years, but it was loaded with music by others and she’d grown tired of all the latin and hip-hop tunes that the others had chosen for her. So she bit the bullet and suffered the slings and arrows of having to remove and replace lots of music with stuff more to her liking, and even discovered that you don’t have to play the songs in the same order each time you turn it on. That explains why she thought there were only 20-or-so songs in the thing. She even added our world music songs so she can practice her soprano part while walking on the beach. I imagine people who see her think she’s either pretty happy or kind of wacky.

There used to be a saying something like, “Never trust anyone over 30.” I recently learned not to trust anyone under 50. We had some new friends, Peter and Nicky, over for dinner the other night; Peter is probably in his mid-40’s, but looks suspiciously fit. It so happens he’s a member of a newly formed mountain bike club and invited me to go on a ride with the group the next day on the Rameka Track. He indicated it was an easy ride, mostly downhill, and if he could do it, I certainly could.

I should have known when I showed up at the meeting place the next morning that I’d been misled, if not outright deceived. Out of the 12 riders, nearly all had mud-encrusted, full suspension bikes, clip-in pedals and tight, black bike shorts. Two had miniature video cameras attached to their helmets. I had the only shiny bike, and not having had any time to prepare, showed up with one flat tire and one, low on air with no air pump or extra tube. Not an auspicious start with my new group of “mates”. One of the under-30 guys gave me a new tube and even replaced it for me, then we hopped in cars to drive 40 miles to the start of the ride.

I sat in the back seat with the next oldest guy besides myself who was about my height, but I couldn’t help but notice, had thighs about the size of my waist but all his other visible parts were height-appropriate. The youngest rider was about 13 and skinny, so I figured I’d stick with him. What Peter had neglected to mention was that the first 12 miles, from where we parked to where the actual single-track mountain bike trail began, were totally uphill…not a flat spot to be seen. For me, on my best day, that would have been a full-day outing, so by the time we got to the trail, I was already whupped. Fortunately for my pride, the 13 year old had to stop and walk the last couple hundred meters to the top, so when we caught up with the group, I could pretend like I was looking after him.

The entire day consisted of me catching up with the waiting group, and soon I realized they weren’t stopping to rest, they were stopping to discuss CPR methods and where to land a helicopter in case they had to med-evac me. It reminded me of taking a walk with a group of puppies. I’d huff my way to the waiting group only to find that some of them were killing time by climbing up the steepest banks they could find and jumping whatever rocks or cliffs that would allow them some air time. Other times they’d be riding back and forth across particularly rocky streams to see who could do it the fastest without falling…all the time waiting for me to catch up. It turned out, too, that the 13 year old only had a problem with climbing…on the muddy, rocky, root-strewn trail, he was a maniac like all the others. None of them witnessed my multiple spills including a couple over the handlebars.

After the first 20 miles, we came the downhill Peter had alluded to. It was a 4-wheel drive, dirt and gravel thing (calling it a road would be giving it too much credit), which I figured we’d all coast down while chatting about stuff and checking out the scenic view. Hah! These guys weren’t content to just cruise downhill; they’d pedal furiously except at sharp corners that required one foot dragging on the ground to maintain balance. I’d call it a nail-biter, except that if I’d even attempted to move a hand to bite a nail, I’d surely be dead.

I actually survived although my butt still hurts as do many other parts. My new mates were very nice afterward and told me I’d done pretty well and they’d see me on the next ride. I’m not so sure, but memories do fade more quickly than they used to.

I'm attaching another photo that has nothing in particular to do with anything... evidence that steam power is making a comeback...at least in our neighborhood.