Travels with George

by Vivien Fallows

  After two hours it was back on board the boat for a gentle drift back to Aitutaki. The resort itself is just as wondrous as it should be in such surroundings. I sat on a sun deck overlooking the beach glugging a refreshing lemonade and bitters and thinking ‘this is the life’. Half an hour later it was back to the bus and judging by the general foot-shuffling, the effect of a day in the blistering sun was beginning to take its toll as a now bedraggled party meandered its way over a small bridge heading for the bus. Glancing down, you could see clusters of the most enormous clams – and I do mean enormous. Judging by the corals growing on them they must have been ancient. Equally ancient, our transport stood ready. This time it was a brightly painted wooden frame perched over, we were soon to discover, a spring-free chassis, which hit each and every bump in the road with a spine-shaking thwack.

  With the backs of my legs beginning to feel a tad painful I climbed onto the bus where, as one, we began to inspect bits of our bodies that were suffering from sun burn. Having liberally doused myself in increased factor – factor 25 I had forgotten the backs of my legs and as a result they had fried to the point of bien cuit by rays of the sun bouncing off and being magnified by the gleaming white crystalline sand. Ouch, ouch, ouch. The drive back to the airport completed the circuit of Aitutaki. Arriving at our destination it was soon apparent that all formalities had long since been dispensed with; no sign of check-in or customs just friendly chaos and a chap playing the electric organ and belting out Country and Western songs with the occasional Polynesian contribution. I’m not sure that we were capable of stretching our faces to bestow smiles of appreciation. But I guess he’d seen sunburn before.

  After some lengthy milling about our flight finally arrived from Rarotonga and inbound and outbound passengers were swept up in the now anticipated mêlée which, like the Red Sea, parted suddenly, as each group set off in the appropriate direction. Back on board, wondering what damage the belated globs of sun lotion on the backs of my legs would do to the leather upholstery, we were greeted by Ingrid. An extremely welcome beer and nibbles appeared only to disappear in rude haste and in no time we were bouncing back to earth on Rarotonga.

  How remiss! I have forgotten to describe our guide for the day, (another) George. Built like a rugby prop forward, or whatever, with slim ankles holding up bulging calves topped by enormous solid (I imagine) thighs and shoulders that Atlas would have envied: a solid inverted triangle. George was a mine of information, always jolly, a dab hand with a coconut and blessed with the most amazing singing voice. Accompanying himself on the ukulele he flashed teeth as white as the Aitutaki sand as he pledged his love to Tammie, who I think was rather smitten. Wonder if they kept in touch? When he climbed into the cockpit for the return flight a wag in our party quipped, “By George, he can fly too!”

  At seven in the evening I arrived back at the hotel and went straight to my room where, as if attacked by a cattle prod, I jumped into and out of and danced around the shower, trying to keep the water away from the backs of my legs. A tub of Aloe Vera provided a soothing respite and barefoot I plodded back to the restaurant area and bought a toasted focaccia filled with camembert, ham and cranberry – is this the Cook Islands? – and slithered my way back to my room to munch in solitude. By nine o’clock I could keep my eyes open no longer and headed for bed, expecting sleep to elude me, but as it was suddenly four in the morning that obviously hadn’t been the case. The heat radiating up from the sheets could have reheated the leftover portion of my focaccia so I cooled things down with a further liberal dose of assorted creams and lotions, trying to massage some life back into my very red skin which had become so taut I was beginning to dread what the next stage of my sunburn might bring: it would be no chrysalis to butterfly moment.

  Consequently, as others feed one-armed bandits, so I fed the slot on the hotel’s ‘mini mart’ vending machine… feeling as if I had struck ‘three cherries’ when yet another tube of after-sun thudded into sight. Back in my room, I further depressed myself by realising that my new camera had a sun, sea and sand setting which might have been rather useful in the sun, sea and sand setting of Aitutaki.

  Wednesday 27th March: hello to Mr Picasso

  Unsurprisingly, I enjoyed a quiet day with the morning taken up by writing my journal whilst sitting in the shade. Lunch was a refreshing Greek salad, eaten whilst perched on the very edge of my chair. In the afternoon I pottered back to my room for more libations of Aloe Vera and a snooze. At three I awoke fearful that a day on this glorious island was passing by without any participation on my part, so mask and snorkel at the ready, I headed off to the beach and settled on a spot still further away from the hotel, where the water looked a little deeper.

  Picasso Trigger Fish… small, territorial and not afraid to nip…

  Face down in my watery wonderland, all smarting thoughts of ninth degree burns disappeared and I found myself face to face with a small, colourful fish who peered at me through round bright eyes perched, seemingly, half way down his back (I had never registered the position of fish eyes before). Stripes, splashes and spots of just about every colour under a tropical sky made him look particularly beguiling. I looked at him, he looked at me. But this wasn’t the gentle eye of the Wrasse eyeing the intruder. The fish darted from view and then reappeared on my right side, he then darted towards my feet and began – this sounds so silly, he was tiny, the size of a small sardine – chasing me, and all I could think was, ‘He can’t be serious.’ But he was. I took a few minutes to react, watching his antics enthralled, but I finally got the message: I wasn’t welcome. So this was the dramatically coloured, aptly named Picasso Trigger Fish, small, territorial and not afraid to nip. He won and I moved off to explore elsewhere.

  At sunset I headed back to my room, showered, squeezed the last drop of Aloe Vera from the tube and indulged in a supper of Fosters and peanuts before settling down to the travellers’ task of postcard writing, with just the rustle of lush green leaves swaying gently outside my bedroom window for company. Not a bad environment in which to write ‘wish you were here…’ messages home.

  Whilst on the subject of home, emailing to those still hoping for the warm arrival of an English spring, I thoughtlessly enthused:

  Next came the crystal clear waters and sparkly sands of the Cook Islands. The excellent snorkelling was a welcome relief from the heat and humidity but I should have thought to buy a disposable underwater camera as no one will believe my descriptions… the clams really were HUGE. Against a background of grey coral, the multicoloured fish gave the coral surface a Jackson Pollock paint-spattered appearance. I would also have liked to photograph the Picasso Trigger fish as he so small and me so large, but still he managed to scare me away from his territory – full marks for his bravery and zero for mine.

  Thursday 28th March: sob, sob – a last day in Paradise

  Not much to report today. Spent the morning photographing my surroundings and remembering to use ‘night setting’ for the beach scenes (think that helps counteract the glare – we shall see). Went into town to check emails and search out the museum, where sadly it took all of thirty seconds to view the Cook Island Maori artefacts as all the good examples have been spirited away to the British Museum. However, what I did find was a faded poster which named all the fish I had seen and quite a few I hadn’t. With piscatorial names floating in my head, drifted back to the hotel on the one-twenty bus and caught up with more informed journal writing. Phew, now up to date, but for how long?

  As a reward, I went off to play again with the marine life. Oh, how I will miss this. Which reminds me, must be careful as there are strong currents. At first I hadn’t been aware of them, but on Wednesday afternoon they were running very strongly. So, for exercise, I swam up against the current and then hung in the water like a large piece of blubber and let the current carry me back down towards the hotel, which it did very rapidly. Was thoroughly enjoying the ride until about the fourth
go when the current swept me close to some coral which was home to sea urchins with very long spines and, basically, I panicked! I didn’t fancy picking spines out of my burnt legs, so that brought the day’s fun and games to a halt. Although the currents were running gently today, the water had become murky due to the churning motion of yesterday’s tides. As a result, I kept coming up against ‘things’ unbeknown to me and after a time I began to pine for an aquatic chum to go oooh or eeek with, but I wasn’t really complaining about my lone water activities. And should I admit this? When head down in the water, I do hum to myself. Not sure why, but it’s just automatic. The fish don’t seem to notice.

  Eventually, as the light faded and the evening calm began to settle over the water, I retreated from the beach for one last time. I walked towards the hotel with mixed feelings: I had so enjoyed my magical visit to the Cook Islands but tomorrow’s dawn would bring the start of a new adventure as I was heading to North Island, New Zealand. Back in my beautiful room, I packed my bits and bobs, squirreling away a bar of the soft soap, and ‘dressed’ for a dinner of bland tuna, that was only so-so when compared to the delicately spiced curry.

  On my final night sleep did evade me, so I got up at four and breathed my last gasps of heady tropical air before preparing for the next leg of my travels. The earlier twinges of solo uncertainty had vanished and after the luxury of relaxing in the sun and the sea, I was now eager to tackle the energetic challenges of extreme New Zealand.

  North Island, New Zealand

  Friday 29th March: dry those tears and welcome to Extreme New Zealand

  A very short day! Left the hotel as dawn was breaking and chatted to a couple from Richmond, Yorkshire. He had taken early retirement from British Airways two years ago and was delighted that he had, because now they were travelling as real fare-paying passengers – staff standby having long since lost its appeal. As, likewise, an ex BA employee (of several decades ago) I couldn’t resist taking a quick scoot down memory lane, but they didn’t reciprocate my gabbled enthusiasm for the days of ‘trying a little VC-tenderness’, with ‘the world’s favourite airline’. Perhaps it was the hour of the day.

  Unfortunately, they seemed equally unimpressed about their stay on Rarotonga as neither snorkelling nor sun-bathing were their thing. What, I wondered, had they imagined they might do on a tiny tropical island? However, they were one up on me as they had discovered the botanical gardens which proved to be the highlight of their stay. I missed the gardens which was a great pity as they were probably awash with exotic splashes of tropical colour. But you should always leave something unseen and then you have a reason to return. Perhaps next time I ought to bring my now convalescing husband with me…

  Hot cross buns for breakfast on the flight reminded me that it was Good Friday. Just four hours fifteen minutes after our early morning departure we were suddenly circling above a sea teeming with tiny boats before coming in to land at Auckland – on Easter Saturday. The International Date Line seems a bizarre concept.

  Saturday 30th March: a drive north to Whangarei, Bay of Islands region

  Auckland looked stunning from the air. Built on seventy-one (how did they count?) volcanic cones it is one of the few cities in the world to have two harbours on separate major bodies of water: the Pacific Ocean and the Tasman Sea across which white sails fluttered in all sea-going directions. Anxious to explore, I swiftly collected my upgraded red Mitsubishi Lancer (thank you very much), hefted George into the cavernous black void of the boot and was away – heading north accompanied by the rhythmic thuds of my case sliding about in its unfettered domain. I quickly decided that at road level Auckland looked too large and sprawly to be tackled in the time I had available, so next visit (there would surely be one) I would plan to spend at least two days in the city before picking up a car.

  The journey north was more tiring than I thought. The maximum speed limit is 100kph, but everyone hangs annoyingly on your tail as obviously no one but a tourist drives at 100kph. The frequency of curves, dips and bends kept me alert and my suitcase busy. And all around the weird primordial vegetation offered a stark contrast to the tumbling profusion of colourful flowers that I had left behind on the Cook Islands. This was every shade of green, with wild Pampas grass swaying in great clusters and palms which looked like ferns growing out of telegraph poles, commonly known as tree ferns (that’s the sort of imaginatively descriptive name I could come up with).

  Not many towns on my route and those I did whiz through were… dead; Easter holidays and no one at home. Met a few showers, nothing much, and the temperature was comfortably warm. Sadly, I passed very few stopping places and the large loose stones on the supposedly ‘hard’ shoulder were uninviting, so found it difficult to pull over. When I did, my camera failed to record the scale of the scenery. How unfortunate because the countryside I was driving through was breathtaking in its beauty, but obviously the road planners didn’t think that drivers might like to stop and admire it, so there were no strategically placed scenic photo spots.

  So what was I looking at? It always seems wrong to compare somewhere to a place that’s known, but to say it reminded me a little of Devon might give a hint of what the view was like. But if Devon is squished up – this is spread out with bigger horizons. Then again, if I think about the geology of this section of North Island, surely the hills are too jagged signifying their volcanic heritage to be likened to the rounded, well-worn Devonian landscape? Yet it’s not quite the pushed up mountains of the Tyrol (there are a lot of Germans here – I think living, rather than tourists). Point proved – it is wrong to compare places. Instead, I shall just enjoy the unique scenery of New Zealand as it unfolds before my steadily advancing Lancer.

  Stopped at a tiny coffee shop in the middle of nowhere for a drink and a sarnie and unwittingly sampled my first portion of southern hemisphere beetroot: it crops up in all sorts of dishes as a, none too subtle, purple garnish. Happily I like beetroot. Sated, I then pushed on to Whangarei, where I did a few circuits of the town before finally finding the Quality Hotel. Checked in at about two-thirty in the afternoon and then spent the rest of the day absolutely whacked: in ‘extreme New Zealand’ should I be concerned about this apparent lack of stamina? Not too tired to launder some clothes and then potter, potter, potter. Roast pork for supper, with that ubiquitous garnish, provided a short-lived energy boost before tiredness swooped in and it was shutters down. Further note to self: am I recording too much eating? I do seem to do be doing a lot of it. Plus the beer consumption is continuing at a steady pace.

  On leaving my palatial quarters in Rarotonga, I knew that it might be some time before I again experienced such opulence. Although I was hardly staying somewhere which required me to carry my worldly goods strapped across my stomach, the drab brown room which George and I now occupied did not live up to my expectations of quality in a hotel named Quality. Certainly adequate though. And a bit more back-packer like.

  Sunday 31st March: putting the Lancer through its paces

  Up early and on the road just after nine, although it did require a few more circuits of Whangarei before I finally found the road north. Hopes to fulfil a full day’s pre-planned agenda were soon dashed when I realised that distances and travel conditions were conspiring against me. Headed first for Russell, via the Opua ferry, and arrived at this delightful white-washed town once renowned for its seedy reputation. It started life as a pioneer settlement and whaling station, swiftly gaining a reputation for lawlessness, thereby earning the sobriquet of the ‘hell-hole of the Pacific’, a label hard to imagine as the neat buildings twinkled innocently in the sunshine. Apparently all twenty-four brothels, in a town no bigger than – well, somewhere quite small – were kept busy by a testosterone fuelled clientele of deserting seamen, runaway convicts, grog sellers, as well as the less itinerant settlers and traders.

  The bewitchingly eclectic Russell Museum was crammed with all sorts of memorabilia from the p
ioneering days, plus whaling, fishing and sailing bits and bobs and a one fifth scale model of Cook’s Endeavour. Really, anything and everything that represented life in Russell one hundred and fifty to two hundred years ago, was on display, including the many Rules for Teachers, circa 1915 (Kate, are you paying attention?): ‘You may, under no circumstances, dye your hair… You may not loiter downtown in ice cream parlours… You must wear at least two petticoats…’ Perhaps the town’s ‘hell-hole’ reputation required the board of educational trustees to be particularly cautious regarding the moral well-being of their female teachers.

  Amongst the memorabilia were whalebone scrimshaw artefacts, such as a pipe rack and knife handle. Scrimshaw being any handicraft produced by sailors idling away their (I imagine) rare spare moments and for those men on the whaling boats, whalebone would have been a readily available material. I picked up an information sheet which bore the following short saucy poem – it describes what could have been a gift from one of Russell’s miscreant sailor’s to his sweetheart:

  Accept, dear girl, this busk from me;

  Carved by my humble hand.

  I took it from a sperm whale’s jaw,

  One thousand miles from land!

  In many a gale, has been the whale,

  In which this bone did rest,