Auspex Posted May 24, 2009 Share Posted May 24, 2009 I'm almost caught up with work (and almost over my jet-lag), so I thought I'd post a little about the trip. My best friend married a "Kiwi", and asked me to be his best man for the New Zealand half of the wedding (I stood with him for his Texas nuptials a year and a half ago). This is why I was AWOL from the Forum the first two weeks of this month. Well, between days spent traveling and days spent putting the wedding together, we only had five days to play, and it rained the whole time (breaking a 12 month drouth). As a consequence, I did very little birding and no fossil collecting, and took very few pictures (outside of the wedding). I can just about justify the post by the fact that we visited a place on the southern coast (46 deg. South Lat.) called Curio Bay. It has what is billed as one of the world's largest petrified forests. Dating to the Jurassic, it is below the blufs and exposed at low tide. Collecting is verboten, but I did snap a couple pics between rain squalls. This is the exposure, sadly not at low tide: (Pictures in the travel brochure show that it goes way out at low tide). This is a piece of the wood in situ: (The little red thing is a Swiss Army Kinfe, key chain size). All the trees along this coast reveal the direction of the prevailing wind, and the wind definitely prevails: The country is extraordinarily beautiful, and everyone I met was just wonderful; I shall return! "There has been an alarming increase in the number of things I know nothing about." - Ashleigh Ellwood Brilliant “Try to learn something about everything and everything about something.” - Thomas Henry Huxley >Paleontology is an evolving science. >May your wonders never cease! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BobC Posted May 24, 2009 Share Posted May 24, 2009 Man! To say you are a lucky guy is the understatement of the year. I fell in love with New Zealand after seeing "The Piano." Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
barefootgirl Posted May 24, 2009 Share Posted May 24, 2009 Ahhh, how cool! I'm so happy that you got to go. New Zealand is on the very top of my list of places to see before I die. Thanks for sharing those cool photos, the trees are pretty funny and that petrified log is super sweet. In formal logic, a contradiction is the signal of defeat: but in the evolution of real knowledge, it marks the first step in progress toward victory. Alfred North Whithead 'Don't worry about the world coming to an end today. It's already tomorrow in Australia!' Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mommabetts Posted May 24, 2009 Share Posted May 24, 2009 I guess it is a good thing you couldn't collect, I can just see you now trying to carry that pet wood to the car, that would have been a chore. Thanks for sharing the pics. Glad you had a good time. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CreekCrawler Posted May 24, 2009 Share Posted May 24, 2009 Hey you should have brought that PET wood home.It would have only cost a couple bucks Thanks for the pics of a far away place. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RJB Posted May 24, 2009 Share Posted May 24, 2009 Wow! In New Zealand and no fossil hunting and no birding. Sounds like that murphy cloud over my head paid you a little visit. But yeah, its a beautiful place. That petrified wood site looks purty neat. What do you say the next time you go, we meet up at midnight with flashlights and big prybars and get us a piece. Ha! RB Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frank Menser Posted May 24, 2009 Share Posted May 24, 2009 Nice spar! Any info on the age of that? Be true to the reality you create. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Auspex Posted May 24, 2009 Author Share Posted May 24, 2009 Nice spar! Any info on the age of that? 180 MYBP Link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curio_Bay "There has been an alarming increase in the number of things I know nothing about." - Ashleigh Ellwood Brilliant “Try to learn something about everything and everything about something.” - Thomas Henry Huxley >Paleontology is an evolving science. >May your wonders never cease! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nicholas Posted May 24, 2009 Share Posted May 24, 2009 The pictures are gorgeous, this is a place I must see before I die. I'm glad you had such a wonderful trip. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
racevw112 Posted May 25, 2009 Share Posted May 25, 2009 I have a good friend of mine that lives in New Zealand, he calls me about once a month and him and his wife have come to visit us twice. Very nice people. They have been begging us to come over, but I told him I cannot leave 3 teenage boys at home alone, (one is 17, two are 13), while me and my wife would be 1/2 way across the world from them. I could not imagine what I would come home to. We do plan to go over there in the future sometime. He does not care anything about fossils. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lawooten Posted May 25, 2009 Share Posted May 25, 2009 What a cool trip you took Charles. Do they have fossils or shark teeth that wash up on there shores? The area looks like they have hard winds from the lay of the tree lines in the pic. The best days are spent collecting fossils Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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