I lived in Auckland for a few years in the second half of the 1980’s. On the whole, they were not my finest years - in fact, I left for my great OE hoping to never come back to New Zealand. It wasn’t all Auckland’s fault - I was in that phase of my latening 20’s, thinking this can’t be all life has to offer - but Auckland wasn’t the greatest of places to live either. Since then, apart from a brief period between jobs, I have only been back as a visitor. It has improved immensely - better public transport; a huge range of places to eat, drink, hang out, etc and, strangely, I have more friends living here now than I did then. I myself have adjusted to the reality of living in New Zealand years ago, when England forced my hand and made me come home.
For the past few years, I have been a regular visitor in May for what, to me, are the two best cultural things Auckland has to offer - the Comedy Festival and the Writers’ Festival. Some very big names have come to speak at the latter festival over the years: just this morning, I listened to Bonnie Garmus (Lessons in Chemistry) and yesterday was book-ended by Trent Dalton (Boy Swallows Universe, Lola in the Mirror) and Paul Lynch (Prophet Song). Friday it was Richard Flanagan (The Narrow Road to the Deep North) and Lauren Groff (Fates and Furies). Of course, local authors have featured strongly: on Wednesday I went to the celebration of New Zealand writing across all genres - the Ockham New Zealand Book Awards.
My trip up here was pretty standard - shuttle to the airport, Jetstar, bus then train into the city and walk to my hotel. Judging by the shemozzle on the plane as we boarded, a lot of people must have been flying for the very first time. I have no other explanation for the number of people who just sat in the first seat that took their fancy, those who seemed unaware that they had a boarding pass with a seat number and those who didn’t know where to look for seat numbers. There was a fair amount of chaos as people had to re-arrange themselves into their proper seats. At the other end, I had an opposite experience. A sweet wee girl, 3 or 4, was standing on her seat facing back. First she engaged with the passenger on my left, then it was my turn - she tried to play some sort of counting game with her fingers I couldn’t follow, then it was a high five and fist bump. She tried with the fellow to my right, but he was having none of it. I hope she didn’t feel too injured.
In between comedy and authors, I’ve been eating a lot - I use Instagram for that. I still have some carry over work - writing a second edition of a book - from when I was employed, so have been going out each day to a different library, checking out the nearby coffee and food spots and doing a solid afternoon’s writing. It’s kind of the perfect way of living for me - particularly as most travel has been by rail. Here are two stations - the relatively new Auckland central Britomart station (a re-use of the former post office) and what was my local station when I lived in Auckland, Glen Eden.
As for going to China, I’ve been watching more YouTube and came across this useful map of western China and its neighbours. I’ll be going to Dunhuang, on the edge of the Gobi desert, and then to Urumqi. It’s a pity the lines shown on the map don’t represent rail links that are actually working - my trip would have much greater logic to it if I could scoot across from Kashgar to Samarkand, but with no direct connection across the border, I have to take the long way round, using Urumqi as my jumping off point for Kazakhstan.
There’s a place I’d love to go - Zhangijiajie - because of the beautiful rock formations (seen on Alina Mcleod’s channel)
but I’m terrified of heights. To get there involves one of the longest cable car rides in the world - 30 minutes or so. Then once you get there, there’s a tiny path cut into the mountains, with the path made of glass at points. Just watching Alina almost made me pass out!
My 2025 travels are likely to take me across Canada, and this week, I’ve pretty much put Spain on the agenda for 2026. I’d always thought that would be a western Europe year, as I’ll start getting a regular income again, but I have just finished Tom Chesshyre’s Slow Trains Around Spain: A 3,000 Mile Adventure on 52 Rides
It’s a wonderful book, which I have written a little about here, but this extract will give a small taste of how he describes what he sees.
Until next week.