Page 46 - Travel Leisure - USA (February 2020)

E X P E R I E N C E S
arranged this mostly to please Felix—I
prefer to explore waterways at the pace of
a kayak—but I found the landscape and
history surprisingly moving. Our guide,
Thomas Hawkins, a Maori man whose
family has hung on to their farm through
200 years of illegal European property
Clockwise from seizures, told us about the river and its
top left: Chateau
Tongariro, a hotel banks in a way that only someone who has
in Tongariro inherited the land could.
National Park; a Hawkins still farms, but his family also
jet boat on the runs a company providing various ways of
Whanganui River;
bottles of Pinot in exploring the river, from multiday kayaking
the town of and camping trips to this jet-boat excursion
Martinborough; to the Bridge to Nowhere, which was built
the coast near across the Mangapurua stream in 1935 as
Wellington, as
seen from the part of a plan to open up the area to
Northern Explorer. European farmers. The scheme was
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typically hubristic: once the native forest had
been felled and burned for pasture, there was
nothing left to secure the topsoil, which slid off
the underlying rock in just six years, leaving the
remote area uninhabitable and obviating any
reason to complete the road. The bridge stands,
a monument to imperial shortsightedness. But it’s
a beautiful woodland walk from the jetty to the
bridge, and a shady place to enjoy a picnic and
reflect on the history of colonial ambition. On the
way back Hawkins put most of his passengers
sedately ashore and then took me and Felix out for
some fast 360-degree spins, which delighted Felix
and pleased me more than I thought it would.
The Tongariro Alpine Crossing is a classic New
Zealand hike, 12 miles around the shoulder of
Mount Tongariro. It’s a good idea to have a guide,
especially in wintry conditions and with a child.
We met our small group of hikers earlier in the
morning than Felix considered humane. The
conditions felt Alpine: bright sun, cold air,
the land around us burgeoning with spring plants