traveling back in time
new zeand is a land from another time – everywhere you look, there are elements of the prehistoric, traces of an existence tied to the birth of the planet. a land shaped by the earth’s violence, creating a preternatural beauty.
we begin in rotorua, at the center of creation, the birthplace of a nation. the destructive forces which littered the land with the most astounding scars, creating jewels from the ashes. the waiotapu thermal park is full of hissing, spitting and rumbling earth – geysers and boiling poisonous lakes, scalding steam vents and dangerous mud pots. these are reminders that we inhabit these islands only at mother nature’s discretion. you can read the evidence of upheaval in the surrounding landscape, deceptively green, yet born of fire and crush. though many fearues have existed here for eons, some are more recent – a warning against complacency.
we wend our way to the vast lake tarawera area. an enormous crystalline lake lying in the shadow of mt. tarawera, who flipped her lid in the late 1800’s, killing many and leaving an ominous jagged crater looming above the placid waters.
and then we visit the redwood forest. while not native to the area, these have been here for more than a century, and the ancient giants have been known to live for millenia. interspersed with towering primeval ebony ferns, they create a forest reminiscent of those that would have existed when the first humans explored the continents.
there is something about a redwood forest which is like a sacred chapel – humbling and solemn and overwhelming in grace. the eyes and heart are lifted skyward. steps fall silent in the spongy loam underfoot. sunlight filters through the canopy far above like through the rose window of a magnificent cathedral. decades and centuries are recorded within, a constant of history.
men are born and die, wars wage, seas shift, planets twirl, meteors tumble, cities rise and fall… yet these simple trees are everlasting.
it puts our own short, insignificant lives into perspective. it is awesome.
