Tracking the Higher Ground

A Nice "Track"

In New Zealand they speak English, but you have to be careful, because it is not always the “English” that you are used to. I think that once they got so far away from the home of “English” they decided to tweak the language to their tastes.

There are many examples of words that have taken on slightly different meanings down under. The one that I noticed was the word “track”. Down here it means trail, as in hiking or walking trail. Regis and I have been making good use of the New Zealand tracks during our explorations.

We have always enjoyed walking and hiking, and when on the cruise ships, I have often looked out from the ship and seeing a high point on the land, think, “That would be a good spot to get some pictures.” As a result, we often find ourselves searching out trails leading up to these high points of land. Here in New Zealand these trails are often called “tracks”. We have found a few of them.

Instead of purchasing the high priced Ship Approved Excursions, we often just walk off and explore on our own, and often on these self-guided tours we find these New Zealand “tracks” calling for our attention. They have proven to be very worthwhile side trips.

Our first “track” was in Hawaii, where we hiked up to the top of Diamond Head, but I already

A Great View!

told you about that, and on Hilo, (Still Hawaii) we hiked to the Akaka Falls. On Pago Pago we tried to find the trail to a National Park, but never found it. On Dravuni Island in Fiji, we hiked to the highest point on the mountain for terrific views over the whole island. In Easo Lifou, New Caledonia we found a track up to a lovely little church on a cliff overlooking the island. In Noumea, New Caledonia, while walking around the town I discovered stairs leading to a track again up to a high point giving another excellent view of the town.

Once we reached New Zealand we discovered that what we were doing was following

Climbing in "Stile"

“Tracks”, and I already told you about the great tracking we did in Port Chalmers, where we found two tracks that kept us from visiting Dunedin. Then in Akoroa after a morning exploring the town we found a track leading up a hillside occupied by “Haggis on the hoof” where we found another Noordam couple enjoying the beautiful view over the town’s harbour.

Switchback to get to the top

By this time we were really getting into this “tracking” around, and in Picton, New Zealand we headed directly to a marked track that led up a mountain to look-offs and down to Bob’s Bay, named after a man who created this track by hand many years ago. This was probably the longest track we took and led to fantastic views out over the area. Wellington had wonderful views but we took a tour and the bus took us up the ‘Tracks”, and although we had a track all mapped out in Napier, we ended up in Jail (Just a tour; don’t fret!).

It was worth the climb

By the time we reached Auckland, we were ready for some easier tracking and I was only too happy to allow my cousin and her husband to drive us up the tracks to get the views over Auckland.

However, after all our tracking over the South Pacific Islands, I think we managed to counteract the wonderful meals on the cruise ship . . . . our clothes still fit.

Bringing the Beer

Walking in Suva

It was raining in Fiji. Well, not raining all day, but in the afternoon it pretty much rained constantly. As a result, after a pleasant self-guided walking tour of Suva in the morning, the rain in the afternoon convinced us to stay on the ship. As well, the ship’s “Location Guides” did not make the location sound very safe with warnings to ‘Not go out alone.”, “Not to wear any jewelry”, and “Definitely DO NOT walk anywhere at night.”

Suva, Viti Levu, Fiji Islands, is a large city, and the ship docks in a VERY busy container pier. Our balcony overlooked the acres of containers on the pier and the city beyond. Fortunately it was a Monday and there was a container ship being loaded and unloaded behind us, so I entertained myself for a while watching this operation. You do not often get a front row seat for this as it is normally hidden away from the public,

The Container Ship Show

and although everyone would not find it interesting, I loved watching the containers being sorted, moved and loaded. One end of the ship was being unloaded by the ship’s cranes and these containers were being stacked for delivery on the island, while the other end of the ship was being loaded with the large pier crane. It was amazing how these containers going in every direction ended up going to the correct destination.

I then discovered that four of these containers were parked under our balcony being unloaded and restocking the ship. In many ports, tractor-trailer trucks bring supplies, but obviously here, these containers arrived on ships previously and were waiting for us. Two were refrigerated units containing frozen food and two were

Bring the Beer

regular containers with other items.

It was interesting to watch this process. Workers inside the regular containers were using hand carts to move items moved to the door where fork-lifts transferred everything into the ship’s hold. I noticed a number of managers of departments down there making sure that their needed supplies were being handled correctly. I saw the Cellar Master who is responsible for all the beer, wine and spirits inspecting his incoming cases of bottles, and insisting they were handled correctly.

Loading the Ship

Opposite these regular containers things were not going as smoothly. The fork-lifts had to actually drive right into the container to get these larger pallets of goods. Because of the rain, things were slippery, and the small ramp used to allow access to the container was proving too much for the hard rubber tires on the machinery. They were spinning and slipping and unable to get into the container. When they could not solve this problem they decided to try pulling the pallets out so they could pick them up without actually going inside. Unfortunately this did not work as the pallets twisted and jammed instead of sliding out. Finally they figured out that if they drove one fork-lift up until it started spinning, they could push it the rest of the way with the other fork-lift. Not the most efficient process, but it worked. A lot of waiting and maneuvering, but everything got unloaded and put on the ship. 

Good to know that the beer coolers and wine cellars are once again fully stocked.