Half Way

Paradise shelducks. We always see these in pairs. The male is on the left (with one of the small furry ducklings beside it) and the female is on the right.

As we reach the halfway mark on our 7 week exploring journey thru New Zealand we recall the many blessings that we have for being safe, healthy, and actually reaching our ½ way point in our scheduled itinerary. After covering the southern part of the South island (including Milford Sound and Stewart Island) we will continue up the east coast before crossing to the North Island ending up back in Auckland.

We thought at this time that we should give you some miscellaneous info about this great country.

• The only native mammal remaining here is an almost extinct bat. This means that there are no natural enemies for mammals brought into the country and this has caused problems. Example: The Brushtail Possum was introduced in the mid 1800’s to raise them for the fur. Now there are over 40 million of them and they are really a serious pest damaging forests and bird life. One good thing is that hikers do not have to worry about bears, mountain lions etc. In fact, they don’t have to worry about poisonous snakes and the only thing to watch out for is a poisonous spider in some coastal areas.
  
• In looking at the change in our pockets, we noticed that we do not have any pennies or nickels. The coins here are 10 cent, 20 cent, 50 cent, 1 dollar, & 2 dollars. The paper money is in $5, $10, $20, $50 etc. denominations.


• Things that are opposite from the states and Canada:
  o Hurricanes in the southern hemisphere are called tropical cyclones and spin in the clockwise direction
  o The light switches are reversed (on is down, not up)
  o Driving is on the left side of the road and it seems that most people walk on the left side of the sidewalk when passing someone else


• The farthest point inland from the sea at any point in the country is only 128 Km (80 miles).


• There are over 200,000 working sheep dogs in the country. These are mostly border collies (which don't bark unless really excited) or the the very intelligent locally bred Hunterways (mixture of border collie, lab, etc. which do bark)


• The economy has been hit harder here than back home. Even though the price of oil has dropped worldwide, the price has not fallen much here because the value of the New Zealand dollar has been falling. And with less than 5 million people in the whole country, there is not much of a tax base from which to draw.


• As opposed to many law enforcement agencies back home there is only the one national police + the national fire, and EMS services.


• Many of the rivers are crystal clear and are a fly fisherman’s ‘paradise’ for catching trout, bass and salmon
  
  
• Brushtail possum (pictured here eating a bird’s egg). Photo taken in a visitor centre.

Commode flush buttons (the one on the left only uses ½ the water)

Electrical outlets which are 220/240 volts here. Note that each outlet has an on/off switch.

Universal plug converter so that we can plug our 110/120 volt plugs into

Plug and socket (on the right) to plug the Campervan into at a holiday park. The socket is usually mounted on a post about 5 ft tall.

Twenty dollar bill. Notice a much younger Queen Elizabeth and the Kea bird. Also note the clear oval & fern. These are some kind of see-thru plastic.