rain on the inlet in McKerrow
returning to walk the sandspit
following Graeme into the dunes
look at the beautiful tresses of a daughter of the sea
whose lover lay on land
towards the Mays again, May was the English name given one of the kaumatua Tutoko’s two daughters
because they could but saw no need to pronounce her name in Maori
sand
sand which gives the impression of shifting
yet may have been formed into dunes
hundreds of years before
not the cushion moss. Graeme told us of a guy, from an earlier group,
who, upon being told that the cushion moss has a single tap root, grabbed, and, pulling one
from the ground, declared he could not see any tap root.
There it is; frail and thin as a single hair, said Graeme.
On being told the small sand pyramids were full of the eggs of local scarab beetles, the same guy scooped up
a sand pyramid, or nest, and, rubbing it between his fingers, said there were no eggs.
Do you think nature would be so stupid as to have them resemble anything else than grains of sand?
weather
walking the spit
a find
back on the jetboat
inlet
deer visit here and Dion told the others who were picked up before the wind-lashed sandspit walk
he had seen a hind crossing the inlet and terrified it by jetting along beside it;
what is not pictured in this dune series is the lancewoods.
Everywhere in this area, lancewoods are observed to reach maturity at a certain height, whether
growing from the branches of other tree hosts or on the ground. However, with the presence of deer on the dunes, the
lancewood have adapted and change from long serrated sword-like leaves to short more easily digestible mature
leaves in a bunching branching habit just beyond the reach of browsing deer.
Nature is able to adapt much more quickly than we imagine.
My mother’s family told tales of meeting Arawata Bill
lost dreams
lifting off without the slightest feeling of g-force in a small glass bubble
now looking back down Martins Bay towards Big Bay
passing into the entry to Milford Sound, which is in fact the only true fjord in Fiordland, which is in fact misspelt,
a passage Capt. Cook missed as it is so tucked around behind a flank of the mountains,
tears came into my eyes at the same time as two realisations: we inhabit the sublime;
before the immensity of this landscape what are but a tiny gnat
a bug, ridiculously small bubble filled with six bodies, with such self-important
dreams that we would rename even our own experience the sublime. It has another name, however.
Mitre Peak is the tallest mountain in the world that rises straight from the sea.
Among many -ests along the route.
approach to Milford
from Milford towards Mitre Peak
rock curtain which the Homer Tunnel penetrates
still immense and running
from the bus
along beside
return to Queenstown on Wokkity-pooh
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