10/27/18: lessons 1 and 2

I’ve done enough motorcycle trips, both with others and alone, that I think I know the lessons they can teach: you’re stronger than you think, you’re capable of more than you realize, everybody sneezes in their helmet eventually, the trip will be on its own time and you need to go with that, and while rain gear is great for keeping the rain out, it’s even better at keeping extensive amounts of body heat in.

I was particularly grateful for this last piece of wisdom yesterday when I discovered the little 12-volt or whatever it is cigarette-lighter-plug on the BMW doesn’t carry enough current to power my heated jacket. It wasn’t exactly hot—50 degrees and cloudy—and so on top of long johns and a sweater and leathers, I threw fashion to the wind and put my rain suit on and was snug as a bug for the whole of the ride. (Heated grips for the win, my goodness you spoiled heated-grips people!) I also sneezed in my helmet several times, as New Zealand is basically ground zero for allergies as EVERYTHING appears to be constantly growing.

I’ve also traveled enough, on bikes and off, to know that—for me—travel isn’t about learning about myself or gaining any key insights into who I am or who I want to be; travel for me is about getting out of my bubble. I’ve been enormously fortunate to have a privileged and comfortable life (the constant disappointments of Brian Cashman aside), and I look to travel—like art—to show me what else is out there, what else the world is like. I chose New Zealand and Australia for this trip because I had the time to invest, I wanted to be on a bike, and these two places seemed like they’d have decent weather, excellent roads, and new-to-me scenery/experiences/people. So far, all boxes check-check-checked.

Because this is my diary, some things I want to remember:

• I’ve seen maybe 5 stop signs in NZ and traffic lights are very limited. Every other intersection is marked with a sign that reads “GIVE WAY,” and I gotta say? It totally works.
• Driving on the left requires constant attention at intersections. Constant!
• This is maybe the third hotel I’ve stayed in that doesn’t have an outlet for a hair dryer in the bathroom. Why, New Zealand?
• Electric kettles heat up so FAST—how does that work??? But this doesn’t make up for your lack of understanding of coffee, New Zealand.
• The roads here are in ridiculously good condition. Maybe 5 times I’ve seen a sign that is the equivalent of “rough road” (it’s a picture that kind of looks like two speed bumps?) and the “rough road” has turned out to be maybe 25 feet of patched up pavement.
• Route 1 from Christchurch almost to Invercargill is kind of lame—lots of straights and a decent amount of traffic. This is why I was s-h-o-c-k-e-d to turn off of 1 and onto any number of completely empty, completely insane roads. Just mile after mile (ok, kilometer after kilometer) of perfect motorcycle roads, going through a landscape so constantly changing as to be completely overwhelming. I keep vacillating between the ride and the view, and today I finally pulled over a few times to try to capture some of this on camera (spoiler: I am not up to the task).
• Speedo and all signs are in kilometers (as is their right, I realize) and though I’ve done the conversions a hundred times, numbers just fall out of my brain. But I think I’ve finally figured out how to translate posted limits to gears (if the posted limit is 50 then stay in 2nd gear, that kind of thing) and how to use the “suggested speeds” to gauge my own adjustments. For example, most of the time these lovely back roads at marked at 100 kph, with suggested decreases of 85, 75, 65, 55, etc. at various points.  I’ve learned to take the 25 kph post very seriously, but 85 kph can be completely disregarded, wheeeeeeeeeee.
• That said, unless you’re in a straight, the roads here require constant attention. It’s absolutely exhausting and exhilarating.
• It pains me deeply to write this: not all cheesy scones are the same. I was served one in a semi-place called Ranfurly that was a disgrace to the name of the cheesy scone, and now I am leery as fuck around cheesy scones because I won’t make that mistake again.
• I’m sure everybody knows this, but NZ doesn’t have a lot of people. Leave a “town” and it’ll be a minute before you see anything resembling civilization again. Some of the settlements marked are just a house or two, and often the speed limit doesn’t even bother to drop going through them. I have learned to be smart about gassing up when the opportunity arises.
• Yesterday I did a decent ride; today’s was shorter as (real) rain* was in the forecast and indeed I made it back moments before the first drops. I’ve been camped out in Dunedin for a couple of days and it’s been lovely, but I’m ready to move on. Tomorrow I leave for the long way—the coastal road—to Invercargill. Weather is iffy again BUT Invercargill is the home of Burt Munro and there are several motorcycle shrines so it should be an interesting place to visit.
• Because today was a short ride, I stopped a few times—one-glove-off stops, but still—and finally tried to make friends with some of the locals. Spoiler: I got a lot of butts in return.

Bryan (thanks, Bry!) turned me on to listening to podcasts on the bike. I just finished Serial Season 2, and it was absolutely fascinating. It’s all about Bowe Bergdahl, the soldier who walked off his post in Afghanistan, and the show does an incredible job teasing out so much nuance and context and perspective around this one single action—it was riveting. My main takeaway, likely colored by where I am right now, is that this world in which we live is at once so extraordinarily simple and mind-bogglingly complex. Hardly a revelation, I know, but hearing this story challenged me to think about my own actions and their consequences in another light, and even gave me a fresh look at the dying baby seals. All these things just happen, and so many of us spend so much time trying to figure out why and who is responsible and what could or should or might have happened or been done differently. And yet: these things happen. Those baby seals are just a fact. Bergdahl walking off is a fact. What happened afterward and the person he was when he did that versus the person he became immediately and then after and then after and after and after--those are all separate things from that one fact: he walked off. There was one solider interviewed toward the end of the podcast who made some comment about how Bergdahl made his decision in a moment that was the result of a huge confluence of factors, and that moment could have been completely different--but it wasn't. So he did what he did, and the rest of it followed, and the way this podcast traced the evolution (or lack thereof) of people's experiences with and reactions to that--beautifully and thoughtfully done. 

I love a lot of things about riding around on a motorcycle, not least of which is that there are physical challenges and mental challenges but there aren’t really emotional challenges. There’s a line in The Song of the Lark that I can’t remember perfectly but describes a character’s time in the desert as wiping her mind clean, and that’s what the bike does for me: I come home happy, empty-minded, and exhausted. I can think about the baby seals when I choose, but for most of the day I’m living exactly and completely in the moment. It’s a rare privilege, I know, and I promise I will continue my quest to kill all of the bugs in New Zealand in appreciation of this opportunity.

Pictures.

Ranfurly is not a place I would advocate for, BUT...this property comes with nine goats included. !!!

The blue on the left is the pacific ocean. This is the road over Mount Cargill and [heart emoji face x 100]. Notice also the dotted line...

I keep trying--and failing--to get pictures of the roads here. There aren't generally shoulders, so here I am stopped where there happened to be a foot or three of verge. This is a one-glove-off stop, so I cleverly used the selfie camera (is that what that's called?) to get the view behind me as well.  

Here's another try at roads--I think I'll give up on this genre of photography and instead get back to my distance-education sheep farming course.

This is the view from the north side of Mount Cargill, and yikes I need to google how the water can be that blue. 

These are some...deer??? That someone is clearly raising/fencing in. At first they sent some emissaries to look at me, then those guys chickened out and pulled back, and then then last pic is all 200 or whatever of them running away from me. I felt...scary. 

Then it got worse. 

 These guys came right up to the fence, and they were all like "HELLO!" and then I took two steps forward and...butts. Again.  

It's all good, sheep/deer things. I'm killing all the bugs and you are WELCOME.