Taupo

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The only thing better than getting to see the world is getting to see it along with someone who means the world to me – thank you for everything…

… I can’t wait to see what comes next!

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Black swan = cygnus atratus

This 200-year-old uncredited drawing is probably the first European record of the Australian black swan, locally named mulgos. As this little guy below can tell you black swans are also found in New Zealand and the UK where their aggressiveness is feared to be endangering native birds – and they’re among his neighbors on the beaches that ring Lake Taupo.

Black swans known for their bugle-like call, for usually mating for life, and for aggressively defending their cygnets. I’ve been told that, like geese, these large birds are powerful and can cause injuries at full charge.

A few days after I arrived my mother introduced me to this spot, this friendly duck and the area’s five newest inhabitants. I was lucky – they were all conveniently awake and about despite unseasonably damp and chilly weather.

Suddenly, something happened –

Forget heroics or action photography – I straight out froze when I heard the sound.

Luckily, something kicked in and my trigger finger moved again before my heart did. I never figured out what startled her – she calmed as quickly and inexplicably as she had raged.

Feathers were re-ruffled, water droplets settled – and my own mother told me it was time for everyone to go.

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When it comes to weather, Kansas is a bit unpredictable. I never counted on a white Christmas or even a cold Christmas and always figured I was flexible when it came to how the holidays “should” be. But spending the holiday season in New Zealand this year was confusing.

With the sun out and the beaches full of kids on holiday, there’s no trouble getting into the swing of summer. I can wear sandals, shorts and t-shirts walking to town and eat lunch on my parents’ back patio while the house’s doors and windows are all open to catch the breeze.

On the other hand, I could totally get into the holiday spirit just by reading in the living room next to our family’s tiny Christmas tree with white lace snow flakes, or when the kids the language school where my mom works learned to bake holiday pies.

The problem comes with doing both at the same time. Every time we turn on the radio or tv, there’s advertisements: “Do your holiday shopping during Farmer’s summer blowout sales!” “Get your Kiwi bloke a grill this holiday season!” “Spend your Christmas Eve at AC Baths – swimming, raffles, prizes!” Every time we watch tv, there’s commercials that just do not make sense to me.

I realized just how embedded some of my seasonal patterns are; I get little twinges when things don’t match up, whether it’s tourists who show up in July and complain about the cold or my mother referring to April as “last fall.”

Luckily, this complicated problem has a simple fix : there’s nothing more relaxing or more joyous than a family Christmas picnic at the beach.

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The end of the semester! I’ve turned in my students’ grades, received some of mine and finished semester projects. That means it’s time for winter break. My brother Peter, Steven and I heading to my parents’ house on New Zealand’s north island. I’ve been once, Peter has lived here over a year and visited since and it will be Steven’s first visit.

This time we’ll probably stay closer to home, but here are a few images from the north island…


…and a few images from the the south island…

…and a little something extra.

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Tel Aviv landing

One of the most basic elements of travel is how you do it. There’s planes, trains, automobiles – and that’s just the beginning. Whether you’re documenting an even for others or just wanting to remember for yourself, these all make great photo opportunities. Actually being in transport is one of the best moments to grab video footage of the city, country, or sky rolling by.

pre-flight in Taupo

As a pilot’s daughter, I’d be starting a series on transportation with planes no matter what. Today is especially timely, as I’m en route to a 2 week class in Dubai. I’ll be drafting on my notepad between Phx & Atlanta, and if I’m lucky, uploading through airport internet before the 2nd, longer flight.

So. Planes. How to summarize a lifelong relationship in just a few words? My 2nd earliest memory is an aerial view – caribou on the tundra. My parents met in Seattle and would go up to Alaska regularly for summer to hike. My dad and another pilot ran bush pilot service for scientists, photographers, naturalists, hikers. My mom and I spent one early summer in Kaktovik were 24 hour sunlight meant it quickly became clear that I needed independent verification even for the stories my parents told me. After all, how could it be 2am when it was bright as day outside? Definitely just a nefarious plot to trick me into going to bed early, and cutting tundra play time unnaturally short.

family trip

As I grew up, we split our family trips between road trips to camp in Colorado, commercial flights to see family in California, and borrowing my dad’s friend’s Piper Archer to go see friends in Wisconsin. Large airports are gateways to opportunity; small airports gateways to the sky.

I try to guess the moments of takeoff and landing, pack lots of gum in case my ears lock up, and firmly believe that the trip starts even before you leave your house for the airport – not just when you land and pick up your luggage.

And for me, the journey is part of the story – the online check-in kiosque mix-up (for some reason, I do not exist…) and the time we made it from the breakfast place across town, through rental return and security, to the gate in about 30 minutes. (we even, somehow, beat the plane, if barely). Even Thursday’s overpass terror will turn into an adventure once the heart rate slows and the insurance agent has checked everything out.

nearly Nairobi sunrise

But the big adventures, the most magic – those long haul flights where you quietly board the flight in an empty Detroit winter and descend through clouds and mitzvahs to an airport that welcomes you home from right to left, or disembarking on a shimmering, melting tarmac to the shouts of competing baggage handlers and smells nearly as vivid as the colors.

Sometimes I think I learn the most when everything is unfamiliar, including myself.

takeoff from PHX


This winter break (for the northern hemisphere, at least) my Dad will be flying himself to meetings all over both NZ islands, my brother will be crossing the Pacific for some temporary parental supervision and some good football bonding (the real stuff, none of those pads and helmets), and I’ll be looking down on the Atlantic in a few hours. If I’m lucky and the skies are clear, I’ll take some pictures.

When I get a chance, I’ll add the pictures that go with this entry, and there’ll be a some kind of gallery of plane related pictures – and I want you to tell me where you would go if you had one round trip ticket to anywhere in the world?

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