The official bird of Fiordland is the sandfly. For the past week it has wanted to be our close companion. But we have been able to keep it at a distance, mostly, because we have been going not only by land but also by sea. Home has been a fiord-going scow that has taken us into the deepest remotest wilderness.
Trip of a lifetime is the most clapped-out of clichés, but honestly, it was. This was a part of our big little country I never thought I'd get to.
A few years ago, for a very short time, I was the overnight news reader for RNZ. This was not my natural calling. It only came about because Wellington had been rattled by a big earthquake and they felt they should have somebody in the Auckland studio overnight as a backup voice. That would be me. And because I was there, they said I might as well read the news, and the marine forecast, all 12 or so minutes of it, at 4am.
