Planes, Trains & Automobiles

We headed up north to visit another of Brian’s distant relatives, Anne and Phil Herbert. They raise calves on a 150 acre farm near the Bay of Islands, and they invited us to stay for a couple of days. On the way to Anne’s house, we drove through the Waipoua Forest and learned all about the Kauri tree, a native tree that would be equivalent to the Redwoods of Northern California. Kiwis are obsessed about Kauri trees. They’re nice looking, and the wood is very pretty when made into consumer products (the Ancient Kauri Kingdom has everything known to man made out of Kauri wood) but I don’t know what all the fuss is about. …

Tokyo is nuts. We arrived at the Narita airport at 3pm, navigated customs, arranged for a hotel and caught a limo bus into Tokyo. Working on very little sleep in the past few days, I know I nodded off at least a couple of times on the way in jerking upright once my mind realized my body had passed out. We made it to our tiny but functional hotel room near Ginza and got right to bed around 8pm.

I woke up around 4:30am and surfed an unprotected wi-fi spot for a few minutes letting Jennifer catch up on some sleep. She has been sick for several days now and needs it even more than I do. …