I’m stepping away from historical fiction today to share a few pictures from New Zealand. “Why New Zealand?” you might ask. Well, New Zealand’s summer is our winter and this year, in order to escape a very cold, very snowy Toronto winter, hubby and I went to this beautiful country to enjoy their warm weather.
There’s a long story about my mother and her New Zealand lover behind our fascination for the land of Kiwis, but I’ll save that for another time. Instead, I hope a few photos will inspire you with the beauty of this country and possibly soothe your soul.
Shortly after our arrival, I went on a hike with a cousin – actually a 4th cousin, but who’s counting?
Almost every day, we walked the beach at sunrise – a sight that always filled me with wonder. Between us, we must have at least 50 pictures of sunrises.
We stayed on the Coromandel coast and took a boat tour one day where I captured this picture of a unique piece of rock.
We saw these plant – a toi toi – everywhere. Even pink-tinged clusters that dotted the hillsides.
Like the toi toi, fern trees are everywhere. No wonder the fern is New Zealand’s symbol.
Golf is always an option when we’re on holiday – but look at the beautiful hills in the distance.
New Zealand is a relatively young land mass – still forming in fact with regular volcanic activity, hot mud pools, geysers, and relatively recent earthquakes – one in 2011 did severe damage to Christchurch.
Yes, there’s steam gushing from the hillside. The second photo was taken on Lake Rotomahana.
We like to hike while on holiday – one of our hikes took us to the top of Te Mata on the North Island. Spread out below are vineyards from some of Hawke’s Bay wineries. Full confession, we did drive half way up the mountain 🙂
Another hike took us along the west shore of Lake Taupo where we found this intriguing statue.
Beaches are everywhere with sand ranging from black (on the west coast of the North Island) to pale golden like these at Waihi, which was the starting point of another hike.
We’ve had a truly amazing experience.
Back to historical fiction on the next post 🙂
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M.K. Tod writes historical fiction. Her latest novel THAT WAS THEN is a contemporary thriller. Mary’s other novels, THE ADMIRAL’S WIFE, PARIS IN RUINS, TIME AND REGRET, LIES TOLD IN SILENCE and UNRAVELLED are available from Amazon, Nook, Kobo, Google Play and iTunes. She can be contacted on Facebook or on her website www.mktod.com.
