New Zealand is far away, far from pretty much everything. I’d always naively figured that once you’re in Australia, it’s just a quick hop between the two. Nope. Three plus hours on a plane from Sydney, which is basically the closest point. No wonder then that it was one of the last landmasses settled by humans less than a thousand years ago. When Europeans landed several hundred years later, they received a gruff greeting at the hands of the Maori. Our arrival was inauspicious in a more contemporary fashion.

Mom and I were due to land in Queenstown, on the southern island, and then meet up with Tori and Nick, heading down to Te Anau a couple hours distant. The plane had been a mostly smooth ride until we started our descent over the mountains that crowd the island’s western coast, where it rapidly got bumpy as our altitude dropped. Queenstown sits in a narrow valley, with the walls rising out from either side of the plane, which continued to buck. As we neared the ground, the plane abruptly pulled up owing to the buffeting from the winds. A second, equally hair-raising pass later and we were on our way to Christchurch to wait out the weather and make another go the following day.

Arrival the next day was fine and it was with relief that we gathered our rental car, acknowledged that we’d read the driving on the left guide, and hit the road. I hadn’t driven the ‘wrong’ side before but after a couple minutes it normalizes and the biggest trouble I had was with the turn signals, which are switched with the wiper for no clear reason. The upshot was that our windshield was spotless those days. Te Anau is the gateway to the Fiordland National Park, another small town dominated by tourism at the end of a glacial lake. The country is thick with them.

For me, the highlight was a visit to the glowworm caves. The caves are home to small, bioluminescent worms clinging to all surfaces and casting a pale blue shade that fills the space. The experience is enhanced through the smaller groups, with each boat holding no more than a dozen people, and a firm ‘no phones’ rule. The latter restriction transforms the experience, pulling people away from their screens and leaving them with only the moment. Voices turn down to whispers, and the cave is only filled with the gentle sound of the water flowing and the boat polling through the shallow darkness.

Being in New Zealand, the country is gripped by a fever to do all the things in the great outdoors, a well-marketed mecca of high (and low) adrenaline activities. Nick was a good sport and agreed to try riding the 70 or so km distant between Queenstown and Wanaka on bikes. We were fitted to the bikes quickly and with a degree of casualness that would render the entire climb a bit uncomfortable. We threw in the towel around one of the tighter, rockier bends before finding that the summit wasn’t that much farther. It was also a good lesson on the importance of proper preparation and we called Tori in from Wanaka to give us a lift the remainder of the way.

Near Wanaka, our base of operations, was a ranch offering horseback riding. Tori, to nobody’s surprise, led this enterprise while I, for the first time in…25 years?…decided sure, I’ll ride a horse. The guide felt that setting me up with Ginger Bear, one of the older horses, was the way to go, and her temperament suited a novice like myself well as we clambered up and down the rolling hillsides, past sheep paddocks and red deer enclosures. Ginger was a bit leery about the running, and I had to dig the heels in to get her moving but the experience was fun as a whole and much better at a canter than at a trot. We drank a victory beer at the Cardrona Hotel, an older roadside watering hole, before taking the horses back to the stables.

Wanaka is otherwise typical South Island town. Small and busy with tourists, with ample hiking opportunities around. We took the chance to visit a vineyard, sample local beers at an industrial park near the airport, and did some small hikes in the surrounding areas with stunning views of the mountain peaks and Lake Wanaka below. We also celebrated my mom’s 60th birthday with a meal out at a restaurant where the fare was upscale Kiwi comfort food (my description), which for me meant eating lamb. Its appearance on the  menu is no surprise considering how many sheep cover the island. From Wanaka we headed to the far side of the island, near Christchurch, for our next stop.