Lit Stream
A stream through the Gunpowder Falls State Park.
Matt Feldman PhotographyInspiring you to get out there, in the distance, and see it for yourself.
Matt Feldman Photography
A stream through the Gunpowder Falls State Park.
I ride a school bus every morning now. Again. A big yellow one. With green vinyl seats you peel yourself off of in hot weather. With the fold-out STOP sign. With the flashing lights. With the windows that only slide halfway down, enough to only tease riders about relief from the stifling environs. But my lunch hasn’t been stolen (yet), so things are still good.
Having acquired some kind of cold in Marrakech, I’ve started to cough. I hoped that good food and the warm air would snuff it out before it (and I) became a nuisance. No such luck. I awake today to begin a two-day mountain trek with a full-blown hacking cough.
After the insanity of Marrakech, our first stop is the village of Imlil. Because, when in a hot, desert country, what better a thing to do than climb a mountain without any of the appropriate equipment?
As I write this from an internet cafe in Auckland, I am awaiting lunch, awaiting my bus to the airport, awaiting my flight home (fingers crossed for a cancellation). New Rule: Buses loaded with Japanese tourists, faces pressed to the glass, all holding cameras (some holding two), can appear at any time, in any location.
It began this morning in Taupo with a 5 am wakeup call for the bus ride to Tongariro National Park. The bars were still bumping and thumping with New Year’s festivities, but I suited up with cold weather gear, attempting to be prepared for the Tongariro Crossing, billed as New Zealand’s most spectacular one-day walk.
Abel Tasman National Park has golden beaches and water so clear that kayaks in shallow water simply appear to be floating in space. I bask in the sun and climb some of the 57 km of trails that wind and twist through dense trees. I wander beaches and explore tiny side trails.
The miserable cold and rainy weather of last night is still in full force this morning. It doesn’t look good for heli-hiking. I figured that I would destroy my budget and take the rare opportunity to go on an absolutely extravagant excursion (as if this trip wasn’t already).
It’s been some time since there’s been internet access and an equally long while since things like paved roads, gas stations and towns with populations in the triple digits. We reach the relative metropolis of Fox Glacier by midnight, despite our little car fiasco.
Two hours from Christchurch, through low, grass-covered hills, we swing around a bend. The road stretches out across a massive plain of grass and flowers and sparse trees, sliced in two by the grey road — a straight shot that stretches out until it disappears at the base of the Southern Alps.