What is there to write about once you get home? All of a sudden I wasn’t seeing new things every day, taking pictures, having adventures.

Well, not in the same way.

But it has certainly been an adventure coming home.

The last two months have been a crazy mixed up time of adjusting, catching up with friends and family, looking for a new job, finding a flat, pining for my house (my tenants are still in) and finally, deciding to move to London to live and work.

Phew.

Sometimes my trip seems a world away. Sometimes I forget to hang onto the lessons I learned. Like today, when the 62 bus driver was running ahead of schedule and decided he was going to crawl into town at 15 miles an hour. I drummed my fingers and rolled my eyes, completely forgetting the smile I’d had on my face while waiting three hours for the bus to leave the station in Udomxai, Laos. Or the seven hour bus trip with my spewing companion and live chickens.

But I have hung onto some of the lessons. One of the most important things I learned travelling was to let go and keep my eyes and ears open for interesting things happening around me. One travel buddy coined the phrase ‘to take what the road sends you’ and it’s stuck in my mind. While I’ve been job hunting during the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression, I’ve been the most relaxed I’ve ever been about job hunting. At first, there wasn’t much out there, but I managed to fend off the worry and maintain my belief that the road would send me something good, in time. And it did. I’ve been offered a job I’m really excited about, and I’m moving to London.

So in a small way, I feel like I’ve kept one of the really important lessons from my trip alive, and it’s given me something hugely valuable back here in the ‘real world’.

I’m excited about my next adventure. I’ve visited London lots of times – to visit friends, with work, passing through – but I’ve never felt the inclination to live there before. Somehow, right now, it feels like the right thing to do. It feels like time. So I’m going.

And I plan to be a ‘working traveller’ while I’m there, turning the pages of my guidebook as I take in the main sights, and exploring the streets and alleys known only to locals. Another travel buddy has a philosophy of life I admire greatly. For him, travelling is a state of mind. It’s about being open to experiences, to new possibilities, to differences of opinion and culture, and being ready to value those differences. Being ready to experiment and jump in with both feet.

Now which box are my wellies in?

Imagine the joy seeing your family for the first time in a year. Imagine the amazement watching your niece feeding herself, walking and talking, when she was just 7 months old last time you held her. Imagine the joy rediscovering your own city, a city you love, through travelled eyes.

I had imagined it while I was travelling, but hadn’t anticipated how quickly I would slip into the groove. Even at Heathrow, waiting on my flight to Glasgow, everything was astonishingly familiar; seemed recent. Within minutes of my welcome hug at Glasgow Airport, it felt like I’d only been gone a couple of months. Lugging my backpack out of the airport, for the last time this trip, I was welcomed by a light rain shower; the only welcome I was expecting from my beloved Glasgow.

For a few days, I basked in the warmth of my family, then began making arrangements to catch up with friends; beginning my brief sojourn as a lady who lunches.

Spending time with loved ones around Glasgow has brought such pleasure. Continuing in the tourist vein, I revelled in the displays at the People’s Palace, particularly the photographic exhibition from 1955. I followed the ghost of my student days around Glasgow University and West End lanes, taking a trip through the Mackintosh house and Hunterian Museum, chuckling at Glasgow humour in A Play, A Pie and A Pint at Oran Mor. I drove across the squinty bridge, compared the Armadillo to Sydney Opera House, ate a floppy sandwich on a bench in George Square, admired the new Silverburn shopping centre and inevitably, sat in traffic on the M8. I basked in intermittent sunshine in beer gardens, ate in favourite restaurants, chatted for hours over coffee. I took off into the countryside, introducing my New Zealand hiking boots to Scottish mud. I felt hairs stand on the back of my neck and head-to-toe goosebumps as I joined 60,000 Celtic fans singing ‘You’ll Never Walk Alone’ on European night.

I need to come home from a round the world trip more often.

Most of the time, I feel exhilarated by the possibilities ahead of me. I have no idea where I’m going to be living and working in just a few months’ time and that is exciting. I know what I want my life to be like, but don’t know how close I’m going to get. My life turns a corner shortly and I can’t see around the bend.

That’s exciting. But it’s also a little scary. Sometimes the uncertainty overwhelms me, making me freeze and stumble and think about it all too much. Sometimes this train of thought makes me feel distant from the people I love. I can’t quite communicate the immensity of the experience I’ve had, the growth I’ve experienced, the challenges I’ve overcome, the confidence I’ve gained. I struggle to explain the tumult of emotions, from joy to sadness, that have accompanied my return home. I try to explain the array of options I’m looking at and how I plan to make choices, the tingling excitement and stomach-churning trepidation as I try to second-guess which opportunities I can turn to reality. I try to manage my natural inclination to get things moving quickly, every cell straining to get on with it; try to allow a slower, more organic process of coming home, one that allows me to adjust.

I think of my trip; trains in China, jeeps in Tibet, jeepneys in the Philippines, those wonderful Laos buses, Tuk Tuks in Thailand, motos in Cambodia, the Battambang Norry, the Champasak car ferry; it feels like a world away.

I think this is called reverse culture shock.

The coming weeks and months hold surprises for me; new opportunities, choices to make, different ways to learn and grow, to have fun, to be sad, to make happiness. The next stage of Jac’s Journey.

In the meantime, I’m a lady who lunches. Give me a call!

Better make it a good ‘un.

I was excited to reach San Francisco. As well as being a vibrant and interesting city, I would be meeting up with Bill, my travel buddy from north-west China. Within an hour of dumping my bags, he’d picked me up at the hotel and we had beer in front of us. Next day he took his tour guide duties very seriously and I saw more of San Francisco in one day than I’d hoped to see in five.

Bill took me for the best Dim Sum since Hong Kong, perfect pizza, burritos that would feed an army and delectable fusion food, the inspired blending of flavours that mirrors San Francisco’s eclectic ethnic mix. Wandering around, I indulged in Vietnamese beef noodles, strong espresso, deli eats and traditional American diners. In San Francisco you can take your tastebuds on a round the world trip without crossing the street.

Wearing flowers in my hair, I followed in the footsteps of the Beat Generation and spent a delightful couple of hours perched on a wooden stool in the City Lights Bookstore, immersing myself in poetry and stories that were born in San Francisco and influenced the world.

We went along to the Chihuly exhibition at De Young’s museum, a stunning display – I didn’t realise glass could be so beautiful. We strolled through Golden Gate Park, saw almost extinct American Bison and were drawn into a debate about Iraq by a passing San Franciscan. I marvelled at the Golden Gate Bridge, enjoyed views from just about every viewpoint in the city, thanks to Bill’s Honda, and was bowled over by the vistas spead out before me.

Shopping, wandering around, quaint cable cars and trams, pastel-coloured houses gleaming in the sunshine, steep hills rewarding me with glorious views, occasional fog unrolling over the city like a fluffy blanket; San Francisco captured my heart and added itself to my list of places I could live for a while.

On my last day, Bill took me up to Napa Valley and we spent the day tasting Californian wine and enjoying the scenery, followed by more great food and a steady stream of beer, laughs and travel stories. I kept saying out loud,

‘I go home tomorrow.’

But it refused to sink in. It was a meaningless, disembodied sentence.

It wasn’t until after midnight, in a bar called ‘The Bitter End’, listening to favourite tunes on a old juke box, that I said, ‘I go home today’ and it seemed real for the first time.

Next morning, rubbing my eyes and dosing the after effects of The Bitter End with strong coffee, I took an emotional journey to the airport, bidding a sad farewell to San Francisco, a very special city, and to my incredible year of travel. I felt them both pull me back, like an elastic band at full stretch, and tried to savour every moment, to experience every sensation of this, the end of my trip.

People are walking about wearing sandwich boards, handing me leaflets.

It really is almost over.

It’s impossible to describe this trip in a few glib words. How can I even begin to describe a year spent living my dream?

It’s maybe worth going back to why I wanted to travel in the first place.

Around the age of 18 I started to develop a serious case of wanderlust, but for various reasons, didn’t indulge my itchy feet. By my mid-twenties I had shelved the idea and filed it away as an impossible dream. Then things changed and I began to realise that little is impossible. There are only things we choose not to do; dreams we choose not to chase.

At some point I decided this one was worth chasing. At some point I began to make plans instead of dreaming. At some point my plans took shape and I had a ticket. I was going.

Often while I’ve been travelling I’ve met people who’ve told me I’m brave travelling on my own for a year. Most of the time, I haven’t felt brave. Most of the time, it’s been relatively straightforward. You decide to go somewhere. You find out how to get there. You buy a ticket. You go there. You find somewhere to stay. You explore. You move on somewhere else. It’s really just getting on and off buses.

But is it truly as simple as this to make a dream to come true? Because that’s what I’ve done.

I feel proud, I feel privileged, I feel fulfilled, I feel a huge sense of achievement.

Would I feel that way simply getting on and off buses?

There have certainly been some challenges this year. There have been times when I’ve missed my family and friends badly. Those times were tough. There have been times where I’ve been travelling in a place I didn’t like much, or around people I didn’t like. At these times I felt confused and would sometimes question how I could change what I did to try and get the most from the situation. I was a bit hard on myself because some of these places just weren’t that good and some of the people weren’t worth making an effort with. As my trip progressed, I got a lot better at spotting this early and moving on.

But all in, these challenging times add up to perhaps 3 weeks out of a year. Most of the time, I have been living the dream; on tropical islands, diving beautiful coral reefs, exploring vibrant and interesting cities, climbing mountains, trekking, awestruck by nature’s marvels. I’ve discovered the beauty of the world and the beauty of the world’s people. My horizons have broadened, my knowledge and understanding has expanded, my opinions have changed and my sense of what’s really important has solidified. I feel truly privileged to have learned as much as I have. I feel privileged to have met so many great travelling friends, some of whom I hope to keep in touch with and perhaps meet again somewhere in the world. But even if I don’t, the time we spent together was special and the magic of our brief interaction has contributed to the joy I feel when I think back across this, my year of travelling and adventure.

I’ve worked out some stuff for fun and chosen some moments that stand out for me. Hope you enjoy them…

Jac’s Journey

• 1 year and 1 week
• 10 countries
• 22 flights
• 13 inter-city train journeys
• 18 ferry journeys
• 43 inter-city bus journeys
• 2 hire cars driven 5000km+
• 29000 hits on my blog.

Things lost to the travel fairies

• Several items of clothing, the most mourned being one favourite shirt hanging on the back of a chair in Laos, an angora wool hat left in a restaurant in Dunedin and a cosy fleece lying on a bench in Auckland.
• 4 pairs of sunglasses
• 2 sets of iPod headphones
• 1 swiss army knife
• 2 torches
• 1 mobile phone
• 1 camera

New skills I’ve learned

• Scuba diving
• Thai massage
• Thai cooking
• About 35 Chinese words
• How to use a squat toilet on a moving train without touching the walls.

Worst moments

• 3 successive ear infections that almost put a stop to my diving.
• Scalding my face with boiling water in Singapore.
• A broken tooth from an excessively crusty bagel in Kashgar, China.
• Falling off the edge of a rice terrace in Banaue, Philippines.
• The bitter cold of Guilin, China, when I couldn’t get warm anywhere.
• The couple who had sex in my dorm – while I was there!
• 3 bouts of homesickness.
• Cockroach and spider-infested rooms, and filthy bed linen.
• Toilets in China. They must be the worst in the world.

Random Amazing Things and Wonderful Moments (there are so many it’s almost impossible to choose!)

• Hiking the Great Wall of China and seeing the Terracotta Warriors.
• Visiting Everest Base Camp.
• Drinking brandy and gazing at the Himalayas from the Best Pub In The World.
• Travelling on the highest train in the world (Tibet) and the fastest train in the world (Shanghai).
• Travelling on the Champasak ‘car ferry’ and the Battambang Norry.
• Riding around on the back of motorbikes across Asia, watching families of five travelling on the bike beside me.
• Exploring Angkor Wat in Cambodia, the largest religious building in the world.
• Facilitation in flip flops in Phnom Penh.
• Diving the Great Barrier Reef in Australia.
• Swimming with sharks for the first time in Thailand.
• Winter trekking in New Zealand.
• Dancing in the sea at New Year in the Philippines.
• Kayaking, Scottish country dancing, travelling by local bus and eating deep fried insects in Laos.
• Being interviewed on camera by the BBC at Karakul Lake.
• Getting my hair cut by a Cambodian lady-boy diva hairdresser.
• All those fabulous, tasty meals – Asian food is the best in the world.

Above all, meeting so many wonderful new friends, so many brave and inspiring people, having so many incredible experiences, in so many beautiful places around the world.

Arriving into LA, I was greeted by sunshine, warmth and loud Californians. Before I’d got my bearings outside the terminal building, I’d been overwhelmed by friendliness, then asked for a donation to charity and fended off an attempt to convert me to the path of Christ. After ten hours beside a ‘Messenger of Christ’ between Fiji and LA, and I wondered if the big guy was trying to tell me something.

That evening I headed over to West Hollywood for a Fiji reunion. Incredibly, four of us from Taveuni were in LA at the same time and we had a ‘Long Time No See’ Fiji reunion, which was just as much fun as all our Fiji evenings had been. Alia and Tuukka had work the next morning, but that didn’t stop them staying out ‘til 2am.

I quickly came to realise that LA is beyond massive. People had been telling me this, but having spent time in some really large cities, I put this advice in the same category as when a Singaporean tells me the weather’s cold.

In a dark room, sometime in the early 20th century, motor industry magnates and US government leaders agreed to invest in highways not railways. The system of highways is exceptional, roads are wide and long and it’s fairly easy to navigate once you get the hang of the main artery roads.

LA has developed the way it has because of the car. I was surprised at how low-rise it is. I was expecting a sea of skyscrapers, but everything is flat, which means it extends very, very far. There’s no city centre as such, just a series of neighbourhoods that are actually more like cities unto themselves, their edges fraying into one another.

As I faced a choice of walking for hours and getting not very far or open-wallet surgery in the back of a cab, I cursed that bunch of men in suits 100 years ago.

There is a complete dearth of public transport. There’s no centre, so no logical place to be the hub of a transport wheel. This makes planning public transport harder, and it’s less likely that routes will be helpful to people. So they’re not profitable. So they don’t run many buses, which makes the buses that do run inconvenient because you need to wait too long. So people take the car. It’s a vicious circle.

With ever-increasing prices for oil, I reckon LA is facing a transport crisis. The average number of cars per family is 3, and unless billions are invested in a mass rapid transit system that gets people where they need to go, the city is going to grind to a halt at some point in future.

It’s like London, stretched out over even more space, without the underground and with hardly any buses. I couldn’t conceive that there would ever be a city that size with no public transport to speak of. So now I will listen more closely when a Singaporean tells me the weather’s cold…

With a grimace, I opened my wallet and faced the inevitable exorbitant fare, taking a long run through Hollywood, Bel Air and the Hollywood Hills to the famous Hollywood sign, passing the enormous, extravagant homes of the stars. I then pounded the pavements from Hollywood to Beverly Hills, stopping for tours of the Kodak and Chinese theatres, following the path of the Academy Award hopefuls, looping around the famous Hollywood Bl, Sunset Bl and Santa Monica Bl, wandering round the shops and finding wonderful food and great service in delightful restaurants.

I enjoyed my brief time in LA. People surprised me with their friendliness – I’ve become used to a level of unfriendliness in large cities, but in LA people will interact with you and are interested in talking to you. I’m glad LA exists because it’s obsession with the silver screen has produced some of my favourite movies. It’s an interesting place, with a high-level excitable energy that I could taste and touch during my whole time there, like the energy of an aspiring actor waiting impatiently for their lucky break. The energy there runs to a different beat from me – I don’t think I could live in LA. But the city is built on chasing dreams, on working hard to make them come true.

As someone who’s a big fan of chasing dreams, how could I not identify with that?

LA

Having arrived, I didn’t know the first thing about it.

Because Fiji was almost at the end of my trip, I didn’t research anything before I left home. I knew there’d been a military coup a while back. I knew that there was some great diving. I knew about an island group called the Yasawas that everyone seemed to go to, and that was about it. I knew nothing about the culture, about the people. I didn’t know where I wanted to go.

My first evening in Nadi was spent reading a borrowed Lonely Planet and chatting to people who knew a bit more than I did. One of the things I’ve learned about how I like to travel is not to choose somewhere because it’s the ‘place to go’ but to choose somewhere that suits what I like to do, and more than that, somewhere that suits the particular rhythm I have at that time.

And my rhythm was looking to sloooow dooown.

New Zealand had been non-stop activities and I’d driven over 5000km in six weeks. I was tired and needed a rest. But I still wanted to experience Fiji, to experience the exotic of the South Pacific.

After my evening of reading and chatting, I chose to head to Taveuni, a fairly large island to the east of Fiji’s island group. Known as the ‘Garden Island’, it’s particularly lush and green, which means a bit more rain than the other islands, but that didn’t put me off. Hey, if I can take New Zealand in winter, I can visit Fiji’s slightly wetter Garden Island!

With some of the best diving in Fiji, Taveuni also has some lovely walks and interesting attractions, not least playing host to the International Date Line that bisects the centre of the island, exactly opposite the Greenwich meridian.

I arrived in Taveuni on a wobbly 18-seat propeller plane. The safety spiel was given by the co-pilot who then jumped into her seat and helped the pilot take off. There was no door between the passenger cabin and cockpit so I could see the pilots, all their controls and out of the front windscreen from my seat in the second row. Flying across the stunning Fiji islands, humps of leafy green edged with golden sand, I grew excited seeing the distinctive green hues of coral reefs hidden underwater. I spotted the famous Rainbow Reef where I would be doing most of my diving and as we approached the runway at Matei, I watched over the pilot’s shoulder until we bumped onto the tarmac.

I booked to go diving with Tyrone, a well-known local dive instructor who has notched up an incredible 15,000 dives. It was a privilege to dive with someone who knows the local reefs and marine life so well, and can read the ocean like a book. I decided to finish my advanced diving certification, and learned so much from him in the process.

Fiji has been dubbed the soft coral capital of the world and the reefs are truly stunning. Soft corals are living creatures that open up their tentacles to catch nutrients passing in the current, so they flourish in tropical waters with lots of movement. This creates a bigger challenge for diving, as trying to move against the current can at times be impossible. I couldn’t have hoped for a better instructor than Tyrone. The water around Taveuni has some serious currents but when the current is strong, the soft corals are fully open to feed and at their most beautiful, which makes diving in currents well worth the effort.

I visited 7 beautiful dive sites, but the one that really stood out was the Great White Wall. We descended through a chimney (a vertical cave) emerging at the bottom to see a huge wall of lavender-white coral stretching off into the distance and down to the deep. It was like nothing I’ve seen before. We swam along the length of it, one moment moving up close for a detailed look, the next swimming backwards to get the big picture. At the end of the wall, we ascended through another chimney to finish our dive around a beautiful coral garden.

One evening, while chatting with some new friends, I was invited to a local school for a fundraising concert. Naselesele village recently built its own school, but it’s a temporary building and they’re trying to raise funds to build a permanent home. The kindergarten children put on a show of traditional Fijian singing and dancing and their mums cooked a feast of delicious traditional Fijian food. The cuteness of these kids was beyond belief, almost upstaged by the blonde American toddler who was beside himself with excitement and started squealing and dancing, his faced wreathed in smiles. Together with the numbing effects of kava, the local brew, the evening was delightful.

My time on Taveuni was a mixture of diving, gentle walks, reading and spending evenings with new friends. A series of buffets introduced me to the delights of Fijian food and gave me ample opportunity to become better acquainted with Fiji Bitter. By the time I left, I was ready to get energetic again, which was just as well as I was heading to California…

Fiji

Heading north from Rotorua, I couldn’t resist lunch in Hamilton; from Hamilton, Scotland to Hamilton, New Zealand; I couldn’t pass it by. A large, commercial city, it took me by surprise. It dwarfs another one I know…

With the pedal to the metal, I came across my first proper motorway as I approached Auckland; the City of Sails, a huge place, home to over a million people, a quarter of the population of New Zealand. But I kept going. I would be back this way again. The motorway petered out as the landscape reverted to rural loveliness, catching me by surprise. For the first time since South Island, I found myself stopping the car to gape at the view and snap some pictures. I realised with a degree of annoyance that Northland is spectacular, and that I’d only left myself four days to enjoy it, three of which I wanted to spend diving. The ‘Next Holiday In New Zealand List’ got a few more scribbles on the bottom.

Arriving into Leigh, a tiny coastal village beside Goat Island marine reserve, I found a treasure of a place to stay and bedded down for the night. A delicious meal, comfy bed and dive from Goat Island beach next morning was a joy. A couple of phone calls later, I discovered bad weather was forecast and all diving was cancelled next day, so I wouldn’t get to dive the Rainbow Warrior wreck as well as Poor Knights. I headed for Poor Knights and relaxed while waiting out the weather.

The diving at Goat Island and Poor Knights Islands was really special. The weather was chilly – the air temp was about 10 degrees and the water temp was about 12. My wetsuit was blessedly thick, although this does make it a bit of a performance to get in and out of – especially when you’re shivering.

Poor Knights in particular was fantastic. The second dive of the day was at a site called Blue Mao Mao Arch, and is the dive site that Jacques Cousteau listed as no 7 on his top ten dive sites around the world. Worth a little shivering…?

I swam into the arch and was immediately surrounded by wall-to-wall blue mao mao. They’re beautiful fish; a silvery-blue colour with a rounded mouth giving them a very pretty face. I swam through the middle of them, they parted around me and closed up again behind me. The arch had a hole in the side and sunlight came streaming through, lighting up the reflective blue mao mao, the brightly coloured sponges and splodges of lichen on the rocks. Hanging in the water looking back was a classic Cousteau photo, with the arch framing a picture-perfect view of a diver or two silhouetted against the shoaling fish, the streaming light bouncing off coloured rocks and the crystal clear waters heading off into the blue.

It was exactly what I’d been hoping for, and departed Poor Knights wishing I could stay longer, with a promise to return one day.

But no diving 24 hours before flying, so it was back to Auckland for a day of chores and planning my next destination.

It’s only a few weeks ‘til I get home. New Zealand has been incredible. I’ve packed a massive amount into the six weeks I’ve been here and wish I could stay longer. I’m a little tired from all the dashing about and activities I’ve been getting up to, so I’ve decided Fiji will be about relaxing rather than island hopping, finding a nice spot to settle for a week rather than getting ferries every couple of days.

Mmm. Bliss.

Northland

Auckland

Also, here are my Rotorua photos

Rotorua

‘I could just take a quick swing by Marlborough wine country. They make really nice wine there. Or maybe walk the Queen Charlotte track?’

‘Not on your nelly’, replied my legs.

I did as I was told and bid a sad farewell to my trusty hire car at Picton and caught the ferry across to Wellington. I’m told this is a beautiful crossing, but it was dark, so I didn’t get to see anything. Well, apart from witnessing a ferry full of Kiwis watching the All Blacks play the Wallabies at Rugby, and win.

Faithful South Island Hire Car

Arriving into Wellington, I pitched up at the YHA and ended up joining a group of girls down on a wild weekend from their home near Hastings. Great fun.

Wellington has a strong arts scene sitting alongside the politicians and bureaucrats. A good arts scene needs good cafes and great nightlife and Wellington has plenty of both; lots of innovative and unique little places; a real delight to explore around funky Cuba Mall and Courtenay Place.

I took in the top attractions of a trip to Kelburn on the red cable car, with its great views across the harbour, strolled around the city and visited Te Papa, the flagship New Zealand museum.

But my feet were itchy and I quickly collected my new hire car and headed north.

Wellington

I was looking forward to Taupo, a town on the banks of the biggest lake in the southern hemisphere, and the jumping off point for the Tongariro Crossing, an 8-hour alpine trek dubbed New Zealand’s finest day walk. But it’s winter, and mountains don’t really care that I’m waiting for a nice day to get up there, so they do their usual; draw cloaks of clouds around themselves, invite the winds from the four corners, pile their snow and ice deep, and the guided walk, complete with crampons and ice axe, was cancelled due to bad weather every day I was in Taupo.

While waiting around to do the Tongariro Crossing I explored Taupo and surrounds, and my favourite thing by far was Orakei Korako. This has been described as the best thermal area left in New Zealand and it was a delight. I thoroughly enjoyed walking through the park, steam pouring from holes in the earth and from pools of bubbling and boiling water and mud, gazing at rainbow-coloured silica terraces, stopping to watch geysers spew forth, climbing down to the mirror cave, where wishes come true, and up to several lookout points.

After my final disappointing call to the Tongariro Crossing people, I decided I could wait no longer and added this trek to my ‘Next Holiday In New Zealand List’. Yes, I have one, and it’s quite long…

Taupo

Orakei Korako

Huka Falls and Craters of the Moon

Rotorua was next on the list. Rotorua is a city nestled in the crater of an extinct volcano. Standing on the viewing platform of the museum, I could see the rim of the crater, resembling hills surrounding the city. Sulphur lingers over the town like a stubborn fart. And it really does smell like everyone in town has been overdoing the beans. I can think of a few folk who would blend in well in Rotorua…

Geological forces usually resident deep beneath do their thing on the earth’s surface around Rotorua; spouting and gurgling heat, steam and gas. It’s been a tourist destination for many years, wealthy Victorian tourists being drawn by the curative properties of the thermal springs and the magnificence of the pink and white terraces. Sadly, the pink and white terraces are no more. They were destroyed during the eruption of Mount Taranaki in the 1880s. The pictures of these terraces look spectacular. If they had still been there, you would have had a gushing blog to read…

I indulged in a massage or two, took a dip in the hot mineral pools, visited museums, thermal villages and went along to a Maori concert, which was excellent. Yes, it was very touristy and hordes of people were there, but it was hugely enjoyable and I learned a lot more about the Maori and their interesting, poetic culture.

Unusually, I’ve written about three places in one blog; over a week’s worth of travelling. It just feels like the right thing to do. Wellington, Taupo and Rotorua are nice places, but they didn’t really grab me. I didn’t feel their magic. It didn’t help that I was driving a bucket of a rental car between Wellington and Rotorua (when I finally called time and asked for a swap) and managed to put my back out in the process.

So with a sore back, cancelled walks and places that were nice but not joyful, South Island was seriously kicking North Island’s butt.

Until I arrived in Northland…

Rotorua

On South Island, that just might be true. The magnificence of the mountains, rivers, glaciers, coastline, high passes and wildlife is beyond anything I’ve experienced. There is so much diverse natural beauty in a small space.

As I arrived at the northern end of South Island, I could feel the superlatives melting away. The scenery dropped into the common or garden variety of beautiful. Words like lovely and pretty became more appropriate than magnificent or awe-inspiring, which don’t even fully describe some of the places I visited on the south of South Island.

It was here I would do my longer trek. Ideally, I would have tackled the Milford or Routeburn tracks, but with snow-laden alpine crossings on all the major southern treks, I had to pass because I’m not an alpine climber. I don’t have the experience or skills to survive overnight in wintry snow and ice, in a hut that’s officially closed and has no heating. Brrr.

So, the Abel Tasman track it was.

It felt a little like second best. But nonetheless, I was looking forward to a beautiful trek; a relatively flat 50k along the coast of the Abel Tasman National Park, with no snow survival skills required. The weather forecast was for a little rain, but nothing dramatic.

Day one was lovely. After a leisurely breakfast I drove from Nelson to Marahau and started my walk after lunch. On the way to Anchorage, I wandered past curving bays of golden sand, through lovely forest, alone with my thoughts, the call of birds and the splash of waves, plodding steadily with 15 kilos on my back, most of it food and water.

The Department of Conservation huts are pleasant. Bunk rooms are just that; mattresses side by side on wooden boards. Evenings are spent in candlelit conversation with fellow trekkers, while you make your meal on a camping stove and wonder who’s on the mattress beside yours.

The second morning dawned. This was going to be my long day; 7 hours trekking to Awaroa hut. It was forecast to be the wettest day. But nothing dramatic, remember?

The rain started as I set out from Anchorage. And. Did. Not. Stop.

The raindrops were big, fat, wet, globs of water. They dripped off the end of my nose, they ran down the back of my neck, which was clever, because I had my hood up. To take my mind off how wet I was I set about coming up with the lots of different ways to describe the rain.

In the end I decided it was whingeing rain. It was like being locked in a room with someone who was whingeing, loudly, incessantly, and you had no way to stop them. No matter how firmly you stick your fingers in your ears and la-la-la to drown them out, their whingeing creeps into your soul.

I was just beyond half-way, 4 hours into a 7 hour walk, and I was wetter than I’d ever been in my life. Never-ending, whingeing, big, fat, globs of rain had gotten everywhere. My backpack was waterlogged and felt 4 kilos heavier than when I’d set out. Rain had run down the inside of my gaiters and was swishing about in my boots, creating a foot spa effect with each step, which was more pleasant than you might imagine. Water dripped from everywhere, had seeped in everywhere, nowhere was sacred –not even inside my waterproof pack liner.

Wild horses couldn’t have dragged me any further. I’d arrived at Bark Bay hut and although my booking was for Awaroa, I was prepared to sleep on the floor if all the mattresses were taken. I prayed they wouldn’t be; I mean, it’s winter, just how many nutters walk the Abel Tasman track on a day of incessant, whingeing rain?

I stripped off wet layers, amazed at the volume of water I wrung from my clothes. I blessed my investment in quick-drying thermals and stuffed my boots with loo roll to try and absorb some of the mobile foot spa.

There were a dozen of us in Bark Bay hut that night. We couldn’t get near the fire for the wet clothes hanging around it but it was a fun evening, including a surprise reunion with someone who’d been on my Great Barrier Reef dive trip.

Another new friend declared, ‘I don’t like tramping!’ It was her first multi-day trek and she was – I’m amazed it was possible – even wetter than me. Wrapped in her sleeping bag as all her clothes were dripping in front of the fire, she announced her intention to get the water taxi outta there next morning.

She thought I was a madwoman as I set off to walk. She’s probably right…

Day three was lovely. It wasn’t possible to get further than Awaroa hut because of the tidal crossings, so it was another short day, just 4 hours, and I took my time. Because I could look up without getting whingeing rain down the back of my neck, I was able to appreciate the curving golden bays again. I chuckled as I thought of my view-appreciation-techniques from the day before:

Stops. Stares. Mutters. Another beach. Grunts. Starts walking again, cos you get more wet when you’re standing still.

Day three brought another reward. People had been telling me about Awaroa Lodge, a posh resort half an hour’s walk from the DOC hut, and their lovely coffees. As I got closer, I was imagining a frothy cappuccino with chocolate on top, perhaps with biscotti on the side, licking my lips in anticipation.

Arriving there, tired and happy, I realised how ridiculous it would be to buy coffee. I was carrying coffee in my backpack. Awaroa Lodge sells beer! And I had the best beer I’ve tasted in a very long time.

So my 50k walk was shortened to 37k, as people were expecting me back in Nelson next day and I didn’t want to be reported missing. I couldn’t resist another night at Rob and Lesley’s lovely motel, and sat chatting with them over a cuppa, describing the delights and trials of the Abel Tasman Great Walk. With their warm welcome, care and hospitality, and later, restorative red wine and pizza, I was ready to face the fact that it was time.

Time to leave South Island.

Abel Tasman Walk

When I was in Beijing in October, the countdown clock was excitedly ticking the days down from 330. Here’s a picture when I was in Guilin – at 195 days. Now, the countdown clock will show 1 day.

I’ve not been close to the news in recent weeks, but on the odd occasions I’ve had the internet time or – and this is rare – watched telly, I’ve caught snippets of the rising attention being focused on China’s preparations for the Olympics as well as her human rights record.

And oh, how my thoughts and feelings are mixed.

As you know, I spent time in eastern and central China, I spent time in Xinjiang, I spent time in Tibet. I experienced, albeit in a limited way, as a tourist, many different aspects of China in a short time, and it was such a rich and rewarding experience.

I saw firsthand the oppression of the Chinese system; on their own people and on ethnic minorities. I witnessed the closure of Drepung Monastery after celebrations following an honour given to the Dalai Lama. I witnessed the divisions between Uighur and Chinese people in Xinjiang, the veiled tension rippling below the surface of people’s everyday lives. I talked to Tibetans about their lives. I talked to Chinese people about their lives. I developed my understanding and changed my opinions as a result.

The protest banner raised in Beijing yesterday carried with it the best of intentions. But you can be sure that Tibetans in Tibet will feel the heel of the Chinese military as it stamps harder to prevent subsequent uprising. George Dubya meant well when he was talking about political prisoners and abuses of human rights in China, but as the man in charge of Guantanamo, his words were fouled by hypocrisy.

The unfortunate by-product of these, and other, misdirected good intentions is that the ordinary Chinese man and woman in the street believes the rest of the world is anti-China. They don’t understand why. They just see anti-China action being taken, words being spoken. The distinction is not being made that protests are against Chinese government policy, not the Chinese people themselves. It’s a very important distinction and it’s a worrying omission.

Anti-China sentiment increases patriotism in China. This is currently sky high anyway; Chinese people are so proud to be hosting the Olympics. Increased patriotism leads to greater acceptance and less questioning of the actions of the CCP. As Chinese people perceive anti-China sentiment to be rising across the world, the CCP becomes stronger, winning more support from their people, keeping a firmer hold on power, and may take greater risks with future policy.

It is right to criticise the policies of the Chinese leadership. I did it here myself. You can do it here. But it is important to remember that the Chinese people are hearing these words, and thinking the rest of the world means them; is criticising them. The concept of ‘face’ is so important in Asia, and by criticising their government in the same manner as we criticise our own, we make the people lose face.

Chinese people so want the Olympics to go well. They want China to be appreciated for her beauty, her organisation, her athletes to achieve greatness. China is on the world stage for an incredibly positive reason and this is a major watershed for Chinese people. It really isn’t helpful to have international journalists running around with pollution monitors, slagging off everything that’s wrong. It’s true, Beijing has high pollution, but this is not news. The IOC were aware of its pollution problems when they awarded the games. The Chinese people are taking this criticism personally. Culturally, there’s no other way for them to take it.

My little corner of the cyber-world is not read too widely, but I do have readers in China.

I want to add my voice to the millions currently talking about China; be clear that I love your country. I love the people I met there. I admire the strength and determination and energy I found across all of China.

When I criticise, I comment only on your leaders and their damaging policies. I don’t address my criticism to the Chinese people, just to those few old men in suits who have so much blood on their hands.

I hope your Olympic Games run as smoothly as possible and are a cause for celebration and pride in China. I wish your athletes the best of luck.

And best of luck to the British team.

Bring on the Olympics!