Does February + Red = Valentine’s Day? Not when you’re on vacation in New Zealand!
We’ve been in New Zealand for almost four weeks. It’s a warm and colourful break from home (Calgary, AB, Canada) where everything is white, grey and brown and the overnight temperatures are stubbornly plunging well below zero (minus 40 degrees Celsius last night). It’s also why I’ve disconnected from blogging, tweeting and browsing for almost a month (more on that in another post).
Anyhow, as we’ve travelled the South and North Islands, I’ve kept a lookout for things that are red and are somehow representative our experiences here.
1. Pohutukawa Flowers – Summer in New Zealand is slowly winding down and it’s well past Christmas, but just outside our treehouse accommodation near Kaikoura on the South Island, I spotted some small Pohutukawa trees still blooming. These New Zealand “Christmas Trees” burst into bloom in December as a colourful, natural form of holiday “decoration”.
2. Amazing Food – We’ve savoured wonderful meals throughout our trip and we’ve tried a lot of food that’s been new to us. One thing we’ve observed is that there’s a very strong and consistent emphasis on locally sourced, organically grown produce; these are often highlighted on the menu, which can change daily to take advantage of the freshest ingredients. One night we enjoyed a tomato salad made with tomatoes picked off the vines growing in a greenhouse I’d wandered through that afternoon.
3. The Unexpected – We’ve had a lot of surprises on this holiday, almost all of them good. One such surprise was on the first day we had a rental car. Mr. GeoK was driving us from Queenstown to Franz Josef. Our eyes popped when we spotted a fence line decorated with bras! It reminded us of the hat fence along Highway 22 in southern Alberta, but with a New Zealand twist. There were several red bras hanging on the wire.
4. Signage – No matter where you travel in the world, red on a sign means “pay attention – important information or instructions”. In this particular case, the DANGER warning is for the very steep cliffs at Cape Kidnapper, which raise almost straight up from the turquoise blue sea.
5. Geology – The geology of the North Island includes a lot of volcanoes. The lava flows include a lot of iron. One result is striking red craters, including this Red Crater in Tongariro National Park and Mount Ngauruhoe just behind it (which was Mount Doom in the Lord of the Rings trilogy).
As usual, I’d like to bring this monthly post to an end by thanking P.J. over at A ‘lil HooHaa for hosting the monthly photo blogging challenge. Click here to “see red” in P.J.’s world and the list of links to other bloggers taking part in the challenge.
This marks the one-year anniversary of the photo blogging challenge. Maybe you’d like to join the challenge for year two, which gets underway in March!
Great photos. I especially love the red flowers. Interesting looking.
These are fantastic finds for Red! The bra fence required a double take and a giggle! I love the flower in the first shot…looks like it’s on fire. And I love the shot of Mount Doom!
What a wonderful set of images. And almost four weeks? So jealous! Well done this month and keep having fun!
What a great selection of photos! I wonder what the bras hanging on the the fence is fall about.
Those bras on the fence were in the middle of no-where. Apparently the first four appeared between Christmas and New Year’s in 1999. All the bras have been removed at least a couple of times since then, because it’s a “safety hazard”. But people keep sending more bras to be hung along the fence, so it’s still there.
Wow! these photos are fabulous!
Thank you! I had a lot of fun trying to share some of the character of New Zealand this month.
Great shots this month. You’re so lucky to be where you are and able to escape the so-called Polar Vortex back in Canada.
Believe me, don’t I know it! We’ve been monitoring our home via video camera and reports from our NEST thermostat. Lots of snow and the furnace has been running for 8+ hours/day. The people looking after our house wish they could magically trade places with us, and I don’t blame them. It’s going to be a shock to the system when we land in Calgary in a couple of days.
What fabulous shots … the flowers, the tomatoes, the bra’s …. and Mount Doom!!! I just love your photos.
Thanks – that hike through Tongariro National Park, right past Mount Doom, looks to make our “top 5” activity list for our month in New Zealand. Even our 17 year-old son really enjoyed the day.
Wow! Great photos! I’m just joining in. Love your take on RED this month.
It’s always great when someone new joins in, as the participation rate seems to ebb and flow a little each month. For me, the optimal number of participants seems to be around 10 or 12, so that we get to see a good range of interpretations of the theme. Welcome!
Wonderful set of shots. Did you get to tour any other of the Lord of the Rings sites while you were down there?
And secondly, any idea as to the reason behind the unusual fence and did contribute to the fencing accouterments? And no, you don’t have to answer the last one. 😉
We had the chance to visit several other Lord of the Rings sites, including some battle sites, places where Gandalf rides his white horse through the woods, the location of ???? house and also where the Hobbits escaped in barrels down the river. We have one more in LOTR stop scheduled for the day after tomorrow…a visit to Hobbiton. Our youngest son is under strict instructions from his classmates to “bring back photos of the Shire” so we’ll do our best to make that happen!
As for your second question, we were taken by surprise when we saw it and we packed super light, so you can probably safely draw the right conclusion. 😉