Sounds Like Paradise
Christmas Eve has come and for the first time in my life I am not hanging decorations with family, buying fireworks for New Years, listing secret gift ideas as I mark my calendar for holiday parties or even making the difficult decision of where and who I will celebrate with this year. This year, I am sitting down to dinner with strangers and spending my Eve at the shoreline of Deep Bay on Arapawa Island in Marlborough Sounds reading The Wharf at Waterfall Bay, a book about a female cheese maker in the Sounds. A place absolutely full of inspiring imagery, reading here is a 3D literary immersion and a lovely Christmas gift to have without the usual telltale signs of holiday life. Allow me to write a longer blurb to describe the scenery around me as it is the only indulgence I have this season and I am absolutely in love with the Sounds. Its first impression for many may not be that grandiose, but sit in it for a while and you realize the vast treasures along its impressive shores.
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My dwelling of residence is a holiday bach visited once a year for, well, the holidays. Annual TLC means the overgrown grassy paths are full of all sorts of extremities, dominated by the ever incorrigible gorse that pricks my skin on a varying scale of bothersome scratches to actual extraction of profanities surrounding my immediate outcries of "Ouch!" In spite of these obstacles, it is a pleasant walk to the shore, plodding along in oversized borrowed crocks from my hosts, colored in a touch of delicate green that reminds me of the Baskin Robbins Daiquiri Ice flavor (who knows about that??). I pull on the grass weeds as I stroll to the shore, plucking off the frosty fine blossoms in one long strip and scattering them to the wind as the aqua crystal blues of the water come into view. The beach here is not made of balmy white sands and boardwalks but is laden with flat thin rocks covered in salty sea creatures and abandoned shells. It is a skipping stone heaven, but I am here to read and escape the incredible heat of late night sun. Smothered in sunscreen wearing a floppy hat for the ridiculous I STILL head to the shade (I am a shade hugger, a required trade of the fair-skinned). Chair set and towel by my side I relax back ready for a quiet solitary read, but this is not the place for quiet. It is more like stepping into a scene of Jumanji (RIP Robin Williams) as hidden creatures come alive in this isolated spot. Tiny white translucent fish no larger than my fingers flip in the air smacking their thin sides against the rippled shallow shore as larger splashes spew up in the distance from zealous plunge dives by gleaming white terns, their dietary maneuver of 90 degree beelines for larger fresh fish. The surrounding woods of pine trees (planted for lumber) conceal a cacophony of other bird chants, the Tui's (or is it the Bellbird?) arpeggio call standing out above them all as some secret operatic practice. I hear someone thumping a tree trunk behind me only to turn around to discover it's a mischievous Weka. Often mistaken for a Kiwi, the Weka is a bit like a duck and chicken mixed together without wings or webbed feet walking in a forward manner with sharp flicks of its tail up and down for balance -- it does not waddle. Its many sounds include low thumps or grunts, soft chicken-like bocks and at night the high squeaks remind me of the mother bird in Alice in Wonderland crying "Serpent!" when Alice grows treetop tall and disturbs the mother's eggs. As the sounds of this bird paradise become a familiar mood music I return back to my book with gusts of strong southerlies cooling my skin, the wind shifts randomly creating conflicting patterns across the low tidal waters. Just as I settle into the true story about the Sounds' female cheese maker, my attention is once again taken away by the alarmed barks of dogs chatting to each other from opposite sides of the bay. Only it turns out it is a lengthy delayed echo, not two dogs, as my host's shining white retriever vocalizes her distress about me being across the bay in unrecognizable togs (a swimsuit) and the bay's rocky surface on the opposite side returns her calls word for word. Her endless protests of my distant presence are finally silenced by my hosts and I continue on, soaking up the peaceful atmosphere of the Sounds, watching another tern make a sharp twist in the air breaking its soft floating swoops for a fish dive plunge. A beautiful splash and then it bobs to the surface, throws back its head to consume its dinner and takes off again for another hunt leaving behind a jet stream trail of wing slaps along the water -- a picture perfect image for the origin of the Kiwi phrase "moving like the clappers" (so I was told). As the sun makes its final descent behind the mountain leaving golden encrusted fringes for tree line silhouettes and sandflies begin to come out in full force amidst the barnacle covered rocks, I reluctantly decide it's time to head back in for dinner. My 3D literary experience will have to continue on tomorrow when Christmas is here and I'm able to once again make my way down to the shore with its morning misty green waters. Merry Christmas to all!
