“Wrap up and enjoy,” says New Zealand Tourism. The month of May, our visit time, is on the “autumn-winter cusp,” but it sure felt like winter to us. Wearing beanies and all our warm clothes, we enjoyed the silver tree ferns and songbirds of the Queen Charlotte Track, the architecture of the world’s Art Deco capital, and the rugged west coast beaches of Auckland. Stormy seas followed us up and over the International Date Line, but we had fun nonetheless, kayaking with friends in Tonga and discovering 550 toads in the jungle in Pago Pago. On sea days Doug scrounged materials to design and build a vessel; his team was runner-up in the Shipbuilding Contest.

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