It's a bit of a convoluted story and will take a little while to tell, but I will now tell you the tale of how Bill and I returned to the United States and celebrated our 1 year marriage anniversary by crouching in a friend's bathroom and having a miscarriage.
This story starts back in Tasmania in April 2017. You may have heard this particular story before: young couple quits their jobs, travels the world with careless abandon, knowingly has unprotected sex on multiple occasions and gets pregnant. So yeah - that's our story too. Not terribly original, I know. But I have to say, we were pretty smitten with the idea of returning to the US to tell our friends and families that we had a gift from Tasmania and that the gift was a baby. I thought that would be a pretty cool present for my mom.
On April 28, 2017 we boarded a plane from Hobart, Tasmania and flew to Brisbane which is on the southern end of Queensland. We took a train another hour south and arrived to Mermaid Waters. Yes, that is the real name of the suburb. My college friend, Leslie, and her boyfriend (actually now fiance - they got engaged yesterday!) live there and work as veterinarians. True to the spirit of nearly every one we met on our trip, Leslie and Courtney graciously accepted us into their homes and took us to local beaches, eateries and even to the wildlife sanctuary where Leslie volunteers. We saw oodles of sleepy koalas in the most hysterically uncomfortable positions and could not get enough of them.
From Brisbane, we purchased a 1-way hop-on-hop-off train pass on the Queensland Rail and set off north to make the 1,048 mile trip to Cairns.
Our first stop was to Beerwah - the town made famous by none other than Australian super star Steve Irwin. RIP Crocodile Hunter. I had just finished reading his biography, written by his wife, Terri Irwin, and was keen on seeing what the Australian Zoo had to offer. In fact it was a very lovely zoo, but watching the trainers feed crocodiles made me more anxious than impressed.
Our next stop was to Noosa Heads where we met up with Kerri and Owen - an older couple we had met while traveling in Tasmania who had offered to let us stay with them as we traveled north. They live on a gorgeous property set in rolling green hills with a playful cattledog and a few horses wandering around.
The second day at Owen and Kerri's house I woke up with breasts at least one cup size larger than I had gone to bed with the day before and realized I was 2 days late for my period. Suspicious doesn't begin to describe it. I texted my sister in Colorado so that she was also aware of my atypical symptoms and as expected, she also found this to be highly suspicious.
Kerri and Owen drove us to the near by beach town of Noosa (many of you might have heard of this town because of a Colorado-based yogurt company that underwrites heavily for NPR) where we planned to camp for the next 3 days. We had an unsuccessful attempt at surfing that ended with my thigh looking as purple as a prune from another beginner surfer who couldn't really control his long board as it careened into my body.
Looking back, Noosa was the beginning of our really really lazy and beach-heavy month in Queensland. It was a harbinger of what was to come: lots of sitting, so many books, and meditating to the sound of crashing waves.
From Noosa, we took the train to Rockhampton - a town that I've yet to hear a positive thing about. Every single person we talked to said that they were only there for work and would be happy to leave when their project was over. I think Rockhampton is sort of like the US version of small town Kentucky - isolated, under educated, Walmart rules and the average BMI of each resident is 10 points higher than the more urban hip centers of the state like Brisbane.
We had planned to take a ferry out to Great Keppel Island so we needed to stock up for 5 days of supplies. Inside the Coles supermarket I purchased pasta, cereal, veggies, fruits and a pregnancy test. Alone in a dirty super market bathroom in the scuzzyiest town in Queensland my urine made a + appear on a white plastic stick. If this isn't the romantic "pregnancy reveal" you've always imagined, then I don't know what is.
Stunned to silence, really, Bill and I walked with groceries to the bus stop to wait for our bus and spent a lot of time looking goofily at each other like the way 13-year-olds look at each other across the table while sharing a milkshake for the first time. Being parents felt like a fake reality at that moment.
We arrived to Great Keppel Island by ferry and walked through the white sand to our tent site. The owner of the camp is an easy going American who has lived on the Island for 30 years. Apparently in its hey day, Great Keppel used to be the Lake Powell of spring break - it was full of drunken 20-somethings and was a non-stop party. Since the early 2000's however, the largest hotel on the island shut down and is now a great place to find gigantic spiders and their webs since no one has torn down the complex nor taken the time to check up on it. Now, Keppel is a relaxed environment where no one looks at their watches and everyone shares communal meals and can truly check out. We met some lovely people from France, Tasmania, Canada and other countries who we shared the next 5 days with. I still felt well enough to hike 8 or 9 miles a day before attempting to snorkel in cloudy water and to our dismay I don't think we saw any fish. The wind currents and the recent cyclone had made the water visibility on this part of the barrier reef no more than an arm's length away.
After Keppel, we hopped on the train again and this time got off at Airlie Beach. Airlie is the place now that is known for partying. A local in Rockhampton told us, "If you don't have fun in Airlie then there's something wrong with you." I think there's something wrong with us. While everyone else was enjoying their $5 tequila shots, Bill and I found a super bargain on a 3 pound Australian pregnancy book at a used book store and hunkered down to learn about what was going to be happening to my body in the next few months. Like I said: Party City.
We took another ferry out to South Molle Island, one of the cluster of small islands that make up the Whitsundays. Typically the Whitsundays are also a party location with clear water and amazing reef snorkeling, but again, because of Cyclone Debbie, the islands were absolutely destroyed - leaves ripped off trees, boats still resting awkwardly in parking lots and more sand still making the water visibility 2 feet at best. The cool thing was that we were literally the only people on South Molle Island for 3 days. I've never been the only person on an island before. Again we hiked around all day, tried to snorkel, then failed at snorkeling. Read book after book and got really good at smiling at each other because we knew we were going to be parents. Also, Bill pretty much never wore pants. He Donald Ducked the whole time.
We had an interesting 16 hour train/bus ride from Airlie Beach to Cairns. The train was 2 hours late to start with and then when we were almost to Cairns, we were informed that there was a bomb threat on the tracks ahead and that we would all have to be evacuated to buses and then in order to preserve our safety we would take a 3-hour detour to circumvent the possible danger. It was on this 3-hour bus ride that I was introduced to my new friend Morning Sickness.
Once in Cairns, we spent the night at a bare bones hostel in the middle of the downtown partying scene in Cairns. I can think of no better place to be when you are 6 weeks pregnant, nauseated and wildly fatigued than a bare bones hostel in the middle of a downtown partying district in Queensland Australia.
Actually, I can think of like a million better places. I had to get out of there. So where's our happy place? Back in The Van.
We rented a van, slightly larger than the one we had in NZ, and took it around the Atherton Tablelands for 8 days. We drove north to the lush rainforests of The Daintree and camped on beaches where a year ago a careless woman had gotten eaten by a crocodile. All the while I mostly slept, decided I absolute despised the smell of Chai Tea and we settled into a routine where Bill cooked, cleaned, organized, read books about fatherhood and summoned endless amounts of love, support, empathy and thoughtfulness. This was the first time in our 5-years of coupledom that I could envision Bill as a genuinely helpful father. Our personal connection strengthened during these weeks more than I knew it could.
When we returned to Cairns, we rented an Air BnB outside of town so that princess Taryn could have a quiet place to spend her time curled in a ball, belching endlessly and watching Lord of the Rings before our flight back to the USA.
We did make it out to the barrier reef and I managed to avoid vomiting on the boat ride out. Two strangers on the boat were the first people who found out we were pregnant after I had to check "yes" on the pregnancy question to assess whether I would be able to SCUBA dive or not. Well, the two strangers and my sister.
On the 32-hour, 3 airplane extravaganza from Cairns to Los Angeles I cried after watching Project Runway because I was just so proud of what they had accomplished. Impressive HCG levels.
When we arrived to LAX on May 31, I was fatigued but felt okay. The following day I started to feel even better. My nausea subsided to what I would call a 2-3 out of 10 and I was able to go on short jogs without feeling terrible. My amazing breasts were still larger than I wanted them to be and at 8 weeks pregnant I thought I might be through the worst of the Morning Sickness.
After a week in California and after getting to tell our families about their impending grandchild/niece/nephew (which by the way, no one seemed very surprised about - well maybe Brooke) we shoved Toby back into our old car and drove to Colorado so that I could interview for a possible job near Vail.
We stayed in the Denver area with our friends Marcy and Jordan who deserve a 5-star rating on Trip Adviser. The unending kindness and hospitality we experienced in Australia just continued as we received meals, a warm bed, hot showers and friendly gay golden retriever. The Midwifery Clinic where we had decided to get our prenatal care was able to get us in on Tuesday June 13 for our first OB visit at 10 weeks. We met Jen, our midwife, who was fantastic, but who could not for the life of her get a heart beat on the doppler. She offered to ultrasound my belly but said she really wasn't worried about not hearing a heart beat - I was young, healthy and there wasn't much to worry about. I agreed and then 20 minutes later stuck in Denver traffic I really regretted not getting the ultrasound and I hated not knowing whether the fetus in me was okay or not.
The next day on June 14 we hit the road to make our glorious return to Salt Lake City. Nearly half way there we stopped in Helper, Utah to get coffee at the only decent place to get a cup between Moab and SLC. While using the toilet, two large blood clots fell out of me and into the toilet bowl. The air left my lungs hollow. In an instant the facts added up: I felt so much better as soon as I arrived at LAX, no heart beat on the doppler. I realized I was having a miscarriage.
From Helper, Utah to Spanish Fork, Utah Bill and I intermittently teared up and sat in silence. I called the Midwife, Jen, who walked me through next steps and then called Audrey, my Ob/gyn friend in Salt Lake. Both were perfectly compassionate and brilliantly intelligent and prepared for this situation which I was not.
Another friend, Kelli, who is an ultrasound tech, helped me with her medical knowledge and she and her boyfriend, Dave, gave us a comfortable place to sleep for two days.
On June 16 we decided to give Kelli and Dave a break and moved into the basement of our friends Audrey and Phil. Audrey is the Ob/gyn who walked me through first steps when I first realized I was miscarrying. Phil is also a doctor and we met when I was his student during my PA rotations in 2013. Their two kids, aged 14 and 17, are wise beyond their years and so much fun to hang out with. I often forget they're kids because their conversation skills are so adult (or maybe I only have the capacity of a high-schooler and these kids make me feel comfortable and normal?). In any case, the kindness and generosity of this family cannot be enumerated with any amount of vocabulary that I currently possess. I'm honored and humbled (sometimes to welling of tears) that this family (and so many others) see Bill and I as deserving of such unmitigated generosity again and again. We will spend the rest of our lives trying desperately to give back to the world the kindness we've received in the last 6 months and most especially in the last week. I cannot think of a more appropriate place that I could have possibly been than in the home of a caring family with years of medical expertise in the exact thing that I was suffering from. It seems like it was always kismet.
On two occasions over that weekend I attempted to go for a hike with friends to take my mind off of things and to get some of that fresh Utah air - and on both of these occasions not only did I not complete the hike but usually I ended up gingerly making my way down the mountain only to spend the next 30 minutes rocking myself in a Chevron bathroom. Womanhood.
So that brings us to Sunday, June 18th - the one year anniversary of our marriage and the one day anniversary of our first miscarriage**. Like I mentioned, we attempted to go for a hike with our friend, Van, and like I mentioned, we had to end the hike early because my pelvic cramping inhibited me from standing in an upright position. Van, such a lovely man, went and bought us lunch and dropped it off after Bill had to take me home.
Audrey and Phil were home and Audrey went into amazing physician AND mother role at the same time. Ibuprofen, saltines, heat packs, Disney movies and more. Bill and I were in the bathroom for about an hour while the worst of the cramping left me completely uncomfortable in any position. I'm pretty sure this was a fun little preview to what I can look forward to in full-on child labor. Bill couldn't do much aside from being there but wow, I had no idea the extent to which being naked and vulnerable in front of someone could make you feel that much closer to them. After the worst of it, we settled in a comfy corner of the couch and almost immediately realized the tragic irony of the way in which we were spending our first anniversary. But if deep appreciation, connection and gratitude are a good way of celebrating a marriage - then we 100% nailed it.
Through the idea of being parents and then through the process of losing that idea Bill and I have grown emotionally closer than ever. Our partnership at this moment is the most comfortable, productive and supportive that I can remember. I think this was the point of our "Big Trip", right? We wanted to take this adventure to learn about ourselves and to improve our marriage and in ways that I didn't really predict, that is totally what happened.
Right now, we are planning to work in Salt Lake City for the summer and then hopefully moving to Colorado in the Fall. I'm pretty sure we'll be parents someday. Just not this year. We are just so stoked to be partners in life and in all of the convoluted situations and stories that make up our reality.
So that's it. That's the end of this blog. We got married, lasted a year, learned to live in a van together and then got so much more out of it than we anticipated. Thanks to the 10 people who read this blog. Big hugs. Taryn & Bill
** I know miscarriages are an uncomfortable topic of conversation. I wanted to write about my experience because I feel like miscarriages are so normal and so common and yet, like death or sex or any other "taboo" topic we avoid even saying the word to avoid the discomfort. Current statistics indicate that 20% of positive pregnancy tests end in miscarriage and I suspect the number of total miscarriages is actually higher since many people miscarry in the first 4 weeks of pregnancy and then their miscarriage is presumed to just be a normal period.
Bill and I have both physically and emotionally recovered really well from this experience. My body still thinks it's pregnant because my HCG levels haven't come down to normal yet, but I feel fine (aside from still larger than normal boobies). We have recovered emotionally because we know that none of the miscarriage is our fault and that there was nothing we could have done to have prevented it. We are in fact grateful that our little fetus self-aborted when it did so as not to result in very complex and difficult decisions should it have lived to 20 weeks or even to term and not have been a healthy human. We know that one miscarriage has no effect on our fertility or ability to have kids in the future and we are so grateful that my body successfully and healthfully expelled the fetus without any complications. I was so lucky to be surrounded by the most loving husband and friends (family by phone) during my miscarriage and couldn't possibly have been in better care.
In conclusion, I'm not ashamed to talk about my experience and am in fact happy to discuss it and how normal it all was in the scheme of womanly life experiences. Similarly, I acknowledge that not everyone recovers in the same way and that it can be much more difficult for other families (most especially later term miscarriages). I simply wanted to share my "normal" experience - which is the most common one - and "normalize" this experience since if you asked your friends and family, the odds are 1 in 5 of them will say that yeah they had that experience too.
Wednesday, June 28, 2017
Friday, May 12, 2017
Cycle Touring Tassie: Part 2 - Better Late than Never
Well, I suppose you're wondering what happened on the second half of our cycling trip in Tassie (Australians love to abbreve). 
I got distracted and forgot to finish the saga and now we're nearly 2 weeks beyond our Tassie trip and half way up the Queensland coast.
Where I last left off, we were enjoying day 10 of our cycle tour of the forgotten state of Tasmania. We had passed through Cradle Mountain national park and rolled through Deloraine and Sheffield and were heading East towards the sunny tropical coast.
We enjoyed a short day in the second largest city in Tasmania, Launceston, ("Lonnie" for short - see what I mean about the abbreves) and were surprised to find the city covered in green painted bike lanes and booming with 7 successful, thriving cycling shops in a town of 70,000. Pelotons of morning cycling groups passed us as we left the city and one lone cyclist told us that there's a group leaving the city every half hour starting at 530am.
We had a bit of climbing to do before we ended up in the tiny, but now world famous town of Derby. Just four days before we arrived, Derby had hosted the World Cup for Enduro racing. The town had been packed with thousands of caravans filled with racers and spectators from around the world. Tiny Derby was there for everyone to see. The trails in Derby are only two years old but are world class. Derby won a grant proposal from the Australian government to help revitalize dying towns in Tassie that once boomed with logging and metal mining companies. Derby was struggling to maintain a single pub and its residents of less than a few hundred were hardly making ends meet. A visionary imagined that they could use the old mining and logging land to make mountain bike trails and they won the proposal. Fancy trail builders from Mainland Australia came down and built an impressive network of swooping single track and epic downhills with themed names reminiscent of the town's mining days. Old rusty equipment lines the trails as well so you don't forget the heritage. The town now boasts 5 or 6 bike-themed eateries with microbrew beer, espresso coffees, wood fired pizza and all the other cliche things that cyclists love including rusty old bikes used as coat hangers and flower pots. It's a tiny little Bend just waiting to happen.
While in Derby, we took our rickety little hard tail touring bikes with 2" suspension on the front for a jaunt on the trails and had a great time on the fabulously groomed, winding singletrack.
Later that night, we chanced upon some vacationing locals in their tricked out campervans when they invited us to join them at their campfire. Heather and Dick live on 160 acres of eucalypt forest on the East Coast and Alan and Dinah live on an apple orchard south of Hobart. We shared a lovely evening with the four of them swapping stories and learning about history of the area. We were given unsolicited advice to not have children and then were invited to stay at their homes when we inevitably passed by on our push bikes.
A few days later, after enjoying some of the best ice cream I've ever had in Pyenganna and after some of the best downhill rewards I've ever earned, we arrived to St. Helens and the glistening tropical Eastern Tassie coast. I keep saying to Bill, "I hope I remember this in 10 years!" after we finish an exhilarating 5 minute nonstop winding mountain road of amazing downhill. It, along with saying "We're Doing It!" became the constant mantras of the trip.
We spent a night north of Binalong Bay at a picturesque ocean side camp site called Cosy Corner and fell asleep to waves crashing and woke to the sun rising out of the sea. The water was crystal clear and the red lichen on the rocks was so brilliantly contrasted with the sea that it almost looked spray painted on.
We cycled south from there along coastal roads with incredible cerulean water at every turn.
Eventually, we cycled up St.Mary's Pass and arrived to Heather and Dick's property high in the coastal mountains near the adorable small town of St.Marys. They and their two daughters welcomed us to their amazing property which is miles from any neighbor and completely self sufficient and off the grid with wood burning stove for heat, solar panels and rain catchment for water supply. They cooked us a lovely dinner and showed us their adopted sheep, aviary and the Bennetts wallabies that she raised as joeys who are now wild but still hang out to say hey.
Heather even took us to see her friend who is an Animal Carer and had a house full of injured and nursing baby wombats, kangarooos, possums and wallabies. We got to hold little squirmy wombats and pet the soft silky fur of young joeys.
We spend a rainy few days at Freycinet National Park and had a lovely walk around the famous Wineglass Bay. I think we missed the "post card shot" because of the overcast skies but nonetheless enjoyed the continued theme of endless white sand beaches with turquoise water and not another soul in sight.
A rainy night in Swansea was a well deserved rest day where we essentially spent the day in a completely empty hostel (creepy?) eating everything and watching Seinfeld reruns on the couch.
Our last stop was to Maria Island (pronounce it like Mariah Carey. Not like Jesus' mom). Maria was named after Van Dieman's wife and although it has a sketchy history as a famously brutal penal colony, it is now a national park and one of the best places in Tassie to see wildlife. We saw so many wombats roaming the island that they became as commonplace to see as squirrels in Central Park. We saw cape barren geese and forester kangaroos and even a wild Tasmanian devil. The island was so quiet and devoid of busy tourism it was a lovely respite despite the wind and rain.
On our second day we walked to a quiet beach (which was also white sand, cerulean water and deserted - surprise, surprise) and decided to have a swim. We stripped off our clothes and went running into the sea naked and free. Not two minutes later a group of twenty or so tourists with backpacks emerged over the dunes just 50 meters down the beach. We had no choice but to exit the water and bare it all. We like to think they got a nice show of our by now pro level tan lines. Later as they walked by us, I lowered my head to avoid eye contact while Bill waved wildly and shouted hello as if they hadn't just seen my boobs. There are no pictures of that event.
True to the unending kindness of Aussie hosts, Heather and Dick showed up in our story once more and offer to pick us up at the ferry depot and drive us back to Hobart so that we don't have to suffer another windy rainy ride. Yes, Please! We had second breakfast at a lovely historic town called Richmond and enjoyed a beautiful drive through hillsides of vineyards turning yellow with the change of the season.
Back in Hobart, we sampled local beer and most especially had a memorable evening at Hobart Brewing Company when the brewmasters welcomed us over to a huge bonfire where they were roasting chestnuts to be used in a nut brown they were starting the next day. Around the fire with the crisp winter air of southern Tasmania we sipped smooth porters, noshed on roasting chestnuts and chatted about the evolving microbrew culture in the city.
We had 24 days in Tasmania. More than most tourists who might give it 10 days if their feeling generous but likely only 4-5 days. We got to see more of the state than most and experience small towns and genuine local hospitality. We saw and smelled more by way of the bike than we would have in a car and earned every piece of cheese and glass of wine by pedaling the get there. We absolutely loved our time in Tassie and hope that our future holds another visit to retrace old footsteps, see the places we missed and to catch up with the kindest most hospitable people we've met.
I have a feeling our Tasssie trip will hold a very special place in our memories.
Saturday, April 15, 2017
Cycle Touring Tasmania: Part 1
We've just completed day 10 of our 3-week cycle tour of Tasmania and today is the first day that I've said, "I just want a hot tea and a blanket and a snuggle." The weather here would be typical of a New England September. Most days are in the 60's and it alternates between a light drizzle, overcast and damp and a bluebird crispness that makes your sinuses prickle with the first big inhale of chilly morning air. I call that "hace fresco" weather because the English vocabulary hasn't come up with a word that suits my fancy to describe such a day.
The leaves are turning yellow and burnt orange in the North-central part of the state and the last 2 days of cycling through rolling hills of apple orchards and sheep and cow farms may as well have been western Massachusetts except for the pervasive eucalyptus skyline.
We've noticed a few things during our first week and a half or so. The first is that cycle touring is not really a thing in Tassie... yet. We have seen one other cyclist with panniers and she said she had seen another so that's 4 cycle tourists in the state right now. Or something like that. Cycling is popular in the larger cities like Hobart where there are bike shops and spandex clad roadies out and about all day long but in the rural mountain towns of the central plains and western mountains - we are a bizarre and confusing anomaly.
Other Tassie tourists are almost exclusively older and/or retired Aussies from either Melbourne, Brisbane or Perth and they all have caravans. They are also the most friendly people we have ever met. Almost obtrusively so. Like even as you are clearly standing up to leave and your body language says "It's time for us to move on" the Aussie will keep chatting away, apologize for not having space in their home for you tonight and give you their business card for the next time you're casually passing through Sheffield. Don't worry about starting up a conversation - the 65-year old in the camper van 50 yards away will walk into your campsite wondering how you're going, where you're from and how on earth did your country vote Don into office? We are almost always assumed to be Canadians at first glance and then we have to gently explain where we're actually from to the reception of more unsolicited disproval at our country's current state of affairs. "Don't worry," one woman from Melbourne told me, "I sometimes wish I were from New Zealand too." We are offered food, water, a hot fire, alcohol. We have been offered a place to stay in Noosa and in Townsville when we arrive there later. A nice man in a pick up truck pulled over as we were slowly spinning up a hill, he asked where we were going and then offered us a ride. "Why would you bike there? That's 90k away."
The general consensus is that we've made a mistake by accidentally hiring push bikes without realizing it. Or that we are crazy. Just a bunch of young whippersnappers we are. I've taken to calling the face "the face of otter confusion" because the faces of these elderly holidayers as they drive by us are the same face that I once saw on a sea otter when Bill woke it up from its nap and it genuinely couldn't tell whether it was dreaming or not. Not fear or anger - just complete and utter befuddlement. So we get that face a lot.
We also get a lot of friendly honks and plenty of berth from cars passing us on narrow, winding shoulder-less roads.
We get waves and smiles too. We've gotten a few fist pumps and plenty of thumbs up out the windows as cars pass us on a steep incline. And only once was someone a real asshole when he sped by with his window rolled down and screamed at me right as he passed. I let out a squeal of fear that I've never heard myself make before.
We have had some trouble finding appropriate campsites. A rumor was that there were 90 free campsites in Tasmania - however these are free only if you are "self-contained" meaning you are an RV with your own waste disposal/toilet inside. We unfortunately were unable to fit one into our panniers.
Two nights ago we wound up in Deloraine, a charming old Victorian town on a gently flowing, duck-invested river. Dismayed by our camping options, we ended up pitching our tent behind a footy (Australian Rules Football) field and woke up the next morning pleasantly surprised to have not been murdered by an eccentric man who makes dolls. Let me elaborate. Matthew, like all Aussies, did not require an invitation to conversation. He walked 200 yards off the walking track to chat with us. He had long gray hair and a long gray beard which he tied into a knot at the bottom. He wore oversized courderoys which were covered in paint and brown faux leather loafers which he had cut holes in the toes so that his heather green socks could be seen. He asked odd questions of us like: "So Bill, do you like to think?" And held Bill's hand for way too long after shaking it, commenting on how oddly delicate and lovely they were and not like most mans' hands. He walked with us back to town and wanted to show us the home he lived in - an old 1890's school house that was now being renovated into a family home and he was allowed to live in what used to be the school kitchen. His room, when he showed us, was absolutely covered in dolls. A wall was lined with books about dolls and he had hand carved at least 10 dolls out of wood and had painted them with that terrifyingly blank stare of a horror movie porcelain doll. Then, to make things even more meta, he had painted portraits of all the dolls he had carved and those were adorning the walls. Paint and fabric and paint brushes and wood shavings lay all over. "I didn't always make dolls," he told us, "I played the bagpipes for 11 years prior." Oh.
So later that night as I lay awake in the empty field I realized that Matthew was pretty creepy and he knew where we were sleeping. I spent the night watching my pocket knife and flinching at every crunch of a leaf made by a grazing mouse.
So, like I said, I'm very happy not to be murdered today.
Tasmania is very old. And minimally changed compared with the rest of "Mainland" Australia when it comes to infrastructure and technology. The people here are called everything from old-fashioned to red necks. The economy is sustaining itself on farming, mining for metals and logging - all of which require the cutting down of pristine gum tree rainforest and native animal habitat. The contrast between the generations-old, remote mining communities and the newer, hipper more environmentally conscious is much like that of the American debate between building pipelines and drilling for oil. It's a battle between preservation and livelihood. Hard to say who's winning.
In general, we have found cycle touring to be incredibly easy and that it requires almost no planning. Wearing the same clothes every day, abstaining from showers, finding lodging and food has all been, overall, really simple. The one exception had been Good Friday, which unlike in the USA, is a bigger holiday than Christmas day and shops, supermarkets and cafes are closed and everyone is home from work - so good luck finding groceries on this day. The Easter holiday for school children is two weeks compared to just one over Christmas holiday. Considering the US is such a Christian county, Australians have been surprised to find out from us that Good Friday typically slips by without much of a mention and certainly without any national holiday recognition.
At the halfway point of our loop of Tassie, we have seen the mountainous, lush, remote rainforest side of the country in the West coast and are now creeping toward the beachy flat dunes of the East Coast. We have seen more roadkill than I've ever seen in my life and for those of you playing wildlife bingo at home we've seen wombats, wallabies, kookaburras, echidnas and more. The birds here have the most unique and jarring calls I've ever heard and I cannot wait to see what lies ahead on the second half of our ride!
Monday, April 3, 2017
What is this thing you call "Big City"?
Bill and I have never been on a vacation to a city. We have briefly passed through Los Angeles or SF or Minneapolis on our way to somewhere else more remote but we've never actually stopped and stayed put in one place for more than a few days. The closest thing I can think of is when we spent 3 days in New Orleans a year ago. Aside from that, and the hand full of brief interludes with Portland or Boston or Vancouver the idea of purposefully going to a large congested city was nearly as interesting to me as huffing paint fumes or drinking curdled milk. Unequivocally uninteresting, nay, revolting - and not worth my time. 
But then we came to Sydney. And we stayed 8 days in that same city. And it turns out Sydney is not like paint fumes or old milk at all! In fact Sydney is like perfectly creamy Camembert and salty breezes and and like the frenetic energy and simultaneous order of a disrupted ant hill. And actually, we have thoroughly enjoyed the cultural and urban discoveries of this big city.
Below: the view from our neighborhood in Kirribilli.
Bill and I had such a seamless passing through the Australian airport and customs that I might actually worry for their national security. Nobody even stamped my passport and we were through getting our visas, bags and on the train 40 minutes after landing. I didn't even have time to get hungry or grumpy.
Our love affair with Sydney's culinary bastion of excellence began with a Lebanese spinach and feta pouch purchased at an airport kiosk. This piece of perfectly risen bread with impeccably salted and golden exterior was better than 90% of the food we had eaten in New Zealand. It may have been 15 minutes after this interlude with Sydney airport food that we decided our prior budget of $60/day would have to go for our week in Sydney as we were going to need at least double that to eat our way through one of the most diverse and fabulous food scenes in the world.
Our host in Sydney is Philip, the same generous man who, along with his life partner, Judith, hosted us in Wanaka a month prior. When they heard we were headed to Sydney they casually asked "Oh, we have a flat there with an extra room. You would like to stay there would you?" To which Bill and I telepathically instructed the other to maintain thencoolest of countanences and not let on that inside we were wiggling with the excitement of a 4 year old with a piñata and agreed that, yes, that would work just nicely.
Philip and Judith, are likely the most well-read ,brilliant, high class, city-dwelling adventure junkies I will ever meet. They are simultaneously planning trips to walk through Africa with elephants and bike through Nepal while giving university grade personal lessons on oyster shucking and wine tasting as well as historical lessons on bird conservation strategies post-cyclone and how sailors learned to calculate latitude and the intracasies of coal mining in Australia and its impact on global warming. I actually had to tell Philip at one point that I wasn't paying attention anymore because my brain was too tired from learning new things.
Anyway, Philip and Judith made some fantastic recommendations on food and drink and we were not disappointed. He also contacted his local fisherman connection and acquired 48 un-shucked Sydney Harbor oysters for us to have with a nice dry Reisling on one night. He is a class act.
We rented bicycles for the week and used them to explore a handful of Sydney's many sprawling suburbs.
We biked through beach towns without pretense. Through business districts with stock market suit wearing execs having a pint at noon and over bridges with jog-commuters (now you've got nothing to brag about bike-commuters) who run to and from work with a backpack and business suit hanging from the pack with a carabiner. We biked through ferry terminals and touristy wharfs with over priced fish and chips and happy hour drinks. We visited old Victorian neighborhoods with newly decorated graffiti art walls and hipsters who look like the Allman brothers and Amy Winehouse at the same time. Through old tight knit communities in the blue mountains and through scuzzy industrial train track riddled wharehouse districts.
All the while sampling local beers and coffee, tapas, cheeses, Chinese yum cha, seafood, veggie bowls and breakfast eggs poached in balsamic reduction, local wines and old fashioneds. Nothing was disappointing. Everything was fabulous.
There's an alluring energy to big cities and I'm starting to understand it. At any given time there are people moving by foot or bike or motorcycle, by Uber or bus or car or train or taxi, by ferry or sailboat or cruise ship. People swimming or jogging or roller skating or playing frisbee or volleyball or surfing or kite surfing. There is no shortage of a physical energy transfer between the city and its people. Though I still think I prefer the imaculate stillness of a snow covered tundra, there is no denying that a city carries in it an organism of living and breathing exchange between its inhabitants which is so intriguing as to make you want to stay and get wrapped in it for a while.
The newness of it all and the pleasant marital harmony we've been enjoying have made for a really lovely stay-cation if you will. A nice break from the constant traveling mantra we've had the last 3 months. It's been so comfortable to spent a rainy day inside the flat and not worry about where we ought to be off to next.
Speaking of, we fly to Hobart, Tasmania tomorrow morning. We will not have a vehicle so transport will be by bus or bicycle. Plans are still being formed but the resumption of the new-day-new-city way of life beckons and we must follow our instincts into the next big city-less adventure.
Tuesday, March 28, 2017
Postcards from Grandma: an Ode to the woman who taught me to travel
I wrote this post about 4 days ago to help me cope and relive what my grandmother meant to me. She passed away today.
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My family has been immensely compassionate, loving and brave in making decisions to help each other and to help my grandmother as best they can.
I've been explicitly told that I should absolutely not cancel any of my plans in order to return home and be there for a funeral or otherwise. My family knows how badly I want to be there. And they also know how disappointed my grandma would be if she were the reason that I wasn't able to continue with my trip.
My grandma, you see, is the reason that I've even gotten it in my head at all that international travel is a good idea in the first place.
Let's start at the beginning.
She and I had a special connection from the outset. I hate to sound boastful or to put her relationship with my other cousins in to call but there was always this sense that I had that she and I were special. That we had a link no one else had, although the likely truth is that all of us felt like we were her special treasure because that's how she made her grandkids feel.
I was her first granddaughter and though she had three grandsons before me there's something special about a baby girl that makes a grandma bend over backwards to meet every need and want of that child. That was me. When I was born my parents were still partially in school and couldn't afford their own home so they lived with my grandparents - therefore when my mom brought me home from the hospital I landed at my grandmother's house. With my mom's crazy work schedule and my dad being a student, my grandma cared for me and was present in my life as much as a parent would be. I actually remember her dropping me off at preschool when I was 3 years old and singing a song to me to stop me from crying and begging her not to leave me. I still know the words to that song. I was my grandma's special girl. Though 3 more granddaughters came after me, I was the first, and there's something unique about the first.
My parents, younger sister and I moved out of grandma's house when I was 5 years old but my connection to my grandma stayed strong. I remember her visiting our new house, watching my soccer games as I grew older and most importantly I remember her post cards.
My parents, whether it was frugality or comfort I'm not sure, took my sister and I on nearly the same vacation each year. Each winter we went to the Sierras to ski and each summer we went back to that same mountain town to camp and fish for trout. I can't say that I regret this because my memories of Lake Mary and Twin Lakes are some of the best and certainly helped foster my current love affair with alpine terrain but the exotic lands across our country's borders seemed so far out of my reach that I scarcely thought of them. That is until my grandmother started sending me post cards. Again, I know she sent all my cousins post cards but I can't say how the cards affected them.
When my grandpa retired, the two of them set off. They had always traveled but after he retired the widespread travel increased exponentially. They road tripped across the country more than once. All 50 states. National Parks. To the top of Mt. Whitney. To Canada. Mexico. South and Central America. And the Middle East. They went to Madagascar and to Africa. They chartered a boat in the Seychelles and stalked ruins in Greece and Turkey. They sailed canals in Venice and fiords in Scandinavia. To China. To Japan. To Indonesia. They even slid down ice slopes with penguins in Antarctica.
And from each place they sent me a post card. I relished these cards as a token of what my life could be like when I was older. I don't think I would have ever even dreamed of foreign lands or ever imagined that these types of remote foreign ideas were within my reach if it wasn't for my grandma.
She took me to Washington DC and New York City when I was 12. My eyes opened to broadway musicals and homelessness. We had bisque at at a swanky NYC bistro. I'd never had bisque before. What a revelation. That trip was also the first time I heard an adult scream "fuck!" at the top of her lungs in frustration and I believe it may have been one of the first times I saw adults as people too - beyond just caregivers and people designed to dote on children.
When I was 17 my grandma took me to Spain. It was my first international trip. She ordered Sangria and got me drunk for the first time. We ate grilled anchovies on the beach. I told her how I'd lost my virginity. No one else knew.
She drove 7 hours from LA to Stanford for my first triathlon in college and cheered for me. She nearly always showed up for me.
I wrote her letters because I knew how much the written word spoke to her. Every year in college my address changed - she would write me and ask for my new address to put in her old-fashioned telephone book. A new international post card would arrive shortly thereafter.
When I expressed my interest in studying abroad in Cape Town, South Africa, her's was the only voice of encouragement. Other voices urged caution. Fear. Consideration of a more European destination. She offered to pay for my flight to Africa.
I had heartbreaks. Troubled relationships. Self loathing and doubt. I'd call her. She was the first to know my ex-boyfriend had a drug problem. She offered to help me see a counselor to sort out my complicated relationship with my parents. It seems no coincidence that my counselor's name was Margaret.
I moved to Massachusetts. California. Arizona. Utah. I got post cards from exotic locales at each of these addresses.
When Bill moved to Phoenix after we had started dating, we struggled with the pressure of living together. We went to California to see grandma after a hip surgery and I asked her about marriage and partnership as I had many many times in my history. Bill left that visit feeling like grandma was on his side.
When Bill and I left for this trip, grandma was as proud as any one else. I, along with my travel extrordinaire sister, carried her torch.
I felt an otherworldly sense of pride and deep atomic level connectivity when a month ago I penned a note and sent my grandmother a postcard from New Zealand. Our lives had reversed. Come full circle. It was me now that was exploring the new frontiers and sending alluring hopes of possible adventure back home.
I can't figure at this time whether my grandmother got my postcard before she fell ill. I desperately hope she did and saw the symbolism of it all. I so desperately hope she got my card.
As I sit here wracking my brain for the "right" way to celebrate a life, to grieve, to honor the woman who gave me the key to international possibilities I'm socked with simultaneous pride at having carried the torch and with horrendous guilt knowing my aunts and cousins and particularly my mother are in California having the most difficult discussions and making the most pained decisions and I'm nowhere near to offer solidarity or support. It's odd that at this time in fact my deepest sorrow is with sympathy for the survivors who I know will miss my grandmother dearly.
My grandma was wildly imperfect in her life. She had depression. Was psychotic at times. Made terrible mistakes as a mother and teacher. But as a grandmother, she had a new life. She thought so much of me that her almost ridiculous fawning of my talents balanced any reality checks I may have suffered from other possibly more honest critics. She holds a place in my heart that will not be replaced. It is because of her that I am in New Zealand right now.
I will miss her dearly but her influence on me is impossible to ignore and can't be forgotten.
To my grandma, Margaret Smith, you were a beautiful, brave, flawed, adventurous, sage woman. Be free. Be pain free. Travel the infinite world of the other side of life forever and ever.
Monday, March 20, 2017
We Learned to Live in the Van
It was much rockier and more tearful than I expected but we did it. We learned to be married and live in a van.
Spending 24 hours a day of every day in the week for months in a row even with the best of best of friends will lead to disagreements and close examinations and criticisms of the most minute idiosyncrasies. When the person is your spouse, it is more challenging because even a casual remark or criticism can have the stark underlying meta message of "you're inadequate and I'm mad that I'm stuck with you!" More fun discourse on that later!
Early on, when we were bussing and touring around Vietnam, the romance of "the trip" was so shiny new that the minor frustrations rolled off our egos quickly and without leaving any noticeable scars. We were high on our own pride at "having really done it!" Quit our jobs. Put ourselves at the mercy of adventure and fate. Done what all our friends wish they had done and left the comforts of stable employment and "the grind" to pursue new frontiers, new countries, grand adventure. We were still patting ourselves on the back then. Basking in our own awe to be too bothered by the realization that we had entered into the lifelong challenge of spending a life with just one person.
On December 28 when we arrived in Auckland the adrenaline was still high. We bought a van! Hell yes, we are DOING this!
That high ended a few days later while driving aimlessly up the north coast after a glutinous New Years Eve with friends of friends (who mercilessly noted our poverty and paid for our meals - friends, good karma is coming your way!). It was during these few days when we actually realized that we hadn't talked about our individual hopes and ideas for the trip - and when we did we realized we had very different ideas.
It seems ludicrous that months would have passed, innumerable conversations about "the trip" before we actually got on the plane, yet somehow we came to realize on a windy tropical beach road that Bill had detailed each alpine hike he had planned to do while my thoughts were to make no plans at all and travel by the suggestions of locals - even if that meant going to beaches which isn't really our thing.
First disagreements and misunderstandings ensued: You take charge of too much. You always want to know everything. You never asked. You aren't listening. You're too rigid. You don't even like the beach! I feel like we aren't communicating well right now.
Silence. Podcasts. Spotify.
The next day renews hope of idyllic vacationland. But tensions rise again. You missed the exit. You haven't brushed your teeth in 2 days. You didn't make camping plans for tonight? You expect me to read your mind. You don't notice enough.
More podcasts. Local radio. Turn that off it's terrible.
Fitful sleep but a new day. New hope. Another try at idyllic paradisical life of a traveling duo.
It was hard to have no personal time. Bill wrote in his journal that he knows he makes stupid mistakes all the time but that during quiet introspective moments he is able to forgive himself for the thoughtlessness and move on. He had none of that in the van.
I wrote about the heartbreaking conversation we had on that perfect secluded beach in Oamaru - that was January 31.
It all tumbled out that day. Feeling aimless and without purpose. Having low self esteem about life purpose. About body image. About how how your partner saw you and the difference in how they see you now. Feelings of frustration about what we had done and hadn't done. Unmet expectations. The ongoing struggle to "be on the same page". Where to put things in the van. Mis-en-place for christs sake! The wanting to be seamlessly and effortlessly understood by your soul mate - and then not.
That day was a turning point. After that day we had a few more tiffs. A week of uninterrupted natural beauty, physical exertion and marital harmony followed by two or three days of subtle strife. Then harmony again.
We arrived to Wanaka on February 22. We got to ride bikes. Glorious bikes! Cradled by the generosity of bygone dirtbags who earnestly wished to pay it forward we felt like we had been kissed by fate. One of those "I must be one of the lucky ones" kind of feelings. We went on a breathtaking 4-day backpack and spent an afternoon alone with only us and a pristine glacial moraine.
Upon returning from that hike my Achilles was absolutely having nothing to do with any further walking. I offered to drive Bill to a trail head to complete a 2-3 day hike that we had both wanted to do (but which I was absolutely not able to do at this point) but he said no, he didn't want to separate. And besides, he told me, it's more fun with you anyway.
I'm embarrassed to say that it took a grand gesture like that for Bill to actually convince me that I was indeed the lifelong travel partner he'd always dreamed about. Until then I had guilt nagging at my conscious that the fearless adventure girl he wanted was just a dream. That I'd let him down.
Around this time we got really good at living in the Ark. Like military precision good. Grocery shopping was a flawless exercise in procurement of trail mix additives and we each had our jobs (well Bill had to find coffee and alcohol and I did the rest). Setting up the bed had a grace and an order. Breakfast and coffee had a routine. Free camping was easier to find. Huts and hikes and lakeside skinny dipping baths were built into the routine and it all felt so normal.
I think it took us 2 and a half months to really really actually learn to live in the van and be married and to feel tranquil and satisfied with it all. And to feel confident enough in ourselves and that routine that we could return to nuanced coupledom and feel like the we really were in vacationland. We had to learn a new routine. Appreciate new ideas and rhythms. New time tables.
When I think about it, it's always taken a few months to feel totally comfortable in a new routine and so why should this be any different. There's a funny double standard about "vacations" or whatever you want to call what we're doing. An idea that since we're not working or theoretically doing anything displeasurable that there will be nothing but bliss. Of course that's ridiculous - but that doesn't stop egos from believing that.
The tragic irony of it all is that just as we are absolutely nailing it on a regular basis, we must sell the van, fly to Australia, and start yet another new routine which may or may not take some getting used to.
Bill Murray has been quoted as saying "If you have someone that you think is the one...buy a plane ticket for the two of you and travel around the world and when you come back if you're still in love with that person? Get married."
I mean YES, Bill Murray, yes! An emphatic dramatic YES! The suffocating stuck-togetherness of 24/7 time with your partner is intense and it's an accelerated version of real life - like 6 years worth of marital growth crammed into 6 months - but so worth it.
So what now? Do I have to change the name of my blog?
Saturday, March 18, 2017
Kiwi-isms
There are a lot of really nice things about traveling in an English-speaking developed country. The cost of a pint of beer is not one of them. But the Kiwis still have a unique way about their speech and social habits that is clearly unique to them. I'd like to share some of these with you.
"Sweet As!" - an exclamation used by anyone younger than about 45 years old. Some cooler older folks use it too. Meaning "right on!"
Jandals - their word for flip flop type sandals. It's a cognate of Japanese+sandals. I think its brilliant.
Togs - a bathing suit. Um what. It doesn't even come close to making sense.
The pie. Basically a personal sized pot pie that mostly has shitty meat or cheese inside. Every local you talk to says "oh you've got to get a pie!" Like it's the local delicacy or treat. Pies are terrible. If you come here don't waste your time on pies.
Espresso - there is literally no drip coffee here. No french press. Just espresso. And it is fabulous. I haven't had a bad coffee here yet. And also the cafe-style baked goods game is on fire. The scones and muffins here are perfection.
Heated towel racks - no joke every middle class family has one of these in their bathroom. They dry your towel and make sure it's warm Every. Single. Time. You get out of the shower. Its amazing. Why have we not adapted this in the US yet?
Automated public toilets/public toilets in general- they are everywhere. Signs directing you to them are everywhere. No one in New Zealand will ever pee their pants. Also some are automated with automatic locks, a song plays while you pee and the flusher, soap, water and lock on the door are all motion detected. And did I mention they play songs while you pee?
American basketball and baseball paraphernalia - they love US sports here. Actually I don't think most of them have a clue what's going on but if you have a Chicago Bulls jersey or a Red Sox hat then you're totally in with the in crowd. Oddly this phenomenon is more prominent on the North Island. We saw far less NBA and MLB gear in the south.
Clubs - Kiwis have a club for everything. A skiing club. Bowling club (actually this is just bocce ball but they call it bowling here). Hiking club. Alpine club. Photography club. Guitar club. Anything you name it there is a local community organized chapter of a club where you can meet likeminded souls and plan fun excursions with them. Retirees are especially fond of clubs and they belong to many. Not uncommon to see a group of 15 grandparents - all 65+ on a cycling trip because they're all a member of their local Wanganui Tramping Club and they thought it would be fun to ride bikes for a change!
Skate Parks - every town has one. Even the smallest town that only has a small pub and gas station to speak of has a skate park. Seems to be just the rational normal part of every city planning committee's basic plan.
Veterinarians - are in such high demand here. Again, there could be a town of 100 people with hardly amenities for groceries or gas but they will have a local Vet. Unlikely that they will have a clinic for sick humans but 100% they will have a vet.
Short shorts - undoubtedly this is because of the Rugby fanaticism here but it's like the chicken and the egg - which came first? Really short shorts on lay people or really short shorts on rugby players? Either way there is a lot of male thigh around this country.
Barefootedness - no shoes? No problem. Barefoot patrons at grocery stores, cafes, and dairies (their word for convenience store), walking down the street. As soon as the work day is over, shoes come off and they don't go back on regardless of what other errands must be run.
Hiking by time and not distance - consult any map, DOC site or information board and you're likely to get an estimate of your hike in terms of hours. I.e. "Distance from trail head to Avalanche Peak : 3-4 hours". No where is there a mention of distance. We have hiked single day walks and multi-day backpacking trips and I couldn't tell you how far we walked on any of them.
Distrust for Chinese and Indians - a general and sometimes verbalized concern for the number of Asian tourists visiting their country. True that most automobile accidents are caused by tourists from Asian countries but overall a general dislike for the presence of "so many Asians."
There are more. Lots more. Maybe I'll remember some more and post another blog. Until then we have 7 days left in Kiwi Country so we're just trying to soak it all in!
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