A road trip across New Zealand conjures nostalgia

Sitting in the backseat of our plush car, I noticed a wide canopy of dense Banyan trees engulfed the narrow highway. We were on our way to Kochi – the port city in the state of Kerala in India. We had been on the road for more than 9 hrs. When we left the hill town of Tirumala – located in the state of Andhra Pradesh, at the break of dawn, the darkness still lingered all over the hills.

It was now mid-afternoon. As the blazing sun continued to spit fire, I felt my head pounding and agonising pain all over my body. I desperately hoped for our destination to arrive which seemed distant.

This was the month of May in 1999. We were in the middle of our annual summer vacation. It was not the first time we, a family of four – mum, dad, sister and I, were on a coveted road trip. Each year my father would come up with attractive but far-flung destinations in India forcing us to be on the road day after day. No wonder I grew up dreading road trips. For they brought boredom, inconvenience and a sense of drifting away into deeper mystery (that’s what I thought then). I would fret at the thought of never reaching where we were headed.

Cut to the present, many years later in New Zealand’s South Island.

Wineries in Blenheim

On a mild summer day after driving for a couple of hours, my husband and I were still trying to locate our B&B in Blenheim – a town best known as a gateway to the wineries of the Wairau Valley. After several futile turns and U-turns, with the help of a groomed sense of direction and intuition (as GPS failed us), we finally made it to our destination. Soon we left to acquaint ourselves with the area. The car that I always considered as my greatest travel rival seemed like a lost friend who arrived just in time to hold my hand and show me around.

That evening we drove all the way to the Blenheim town centre to enjoy a couple of pints of beer, country music, and the most incredible steak. During our stay here, we came across the best wineries of the region and enjoyed cheeses, New Zealand wines at local restaurants.

The scenic route to Lake Tekapo

After about a two-hour drive from Blenheim, the landscape rapidly erupted into the cerulean Pacific Ocean to my left and craggy hillocks the color of emeralds to my right but the true dash of drama was the Seaward Kaikoura Range peppered in the background. Kaikoura is a coastal town known for its sperm whale population.

The winding road along the coast was punctuated by bob of seals and a couple of promontories overlooking the seal colonies. While twisting road and very sharp sun rays piercing though the skin like a needle would have caused nausea and uneasiness – my old road trip buddies, here I was with eyes wide open and without a trace of physical or mental discomfort soaking in all the beauty nature plated before me.

Not only did we enjoy spotting fat fur seals in every nook and corner along the way but the journey speckled with a number of pauses, reroutes, and constantly changing plans had kept us enthralled.

Stargazing at Lake Tekapo

Next, we drove to Lake Tekapo. As we drove closer to the lake, a cloudless blue sky effortlessly merged into the snowcapped peaks highlighting kaleidoscopic blue waters in the distance. The unreal turquoise color of the lake is formed from the melting waters of the glaciers containing high levels of Sulphur. Lake Tekapo is part of a UNESCO Dark Sky Reserve; making it an ideal spot to admire the illuminated lake during the day and the star-studded sky at night.

In the days that followed, as I began to travel in earnest, euphoric drives became my obsession; I explored a famous burger joint in Queenstown, chased rolling Southern Alps and valleys and gave a lift to a pair of German girls trekking in the interiors of Abel Tasman National Park. After ages, I’d begun to learn the art of letting go – letting go of anxiety, fear of being lost and the absurd hurry to reach the destination.

And even now when I’m writing about my memories, I have the urge to hop in my tiny car and retreat to some remote corner, take a pit stop near a flowing river to pause from my over occupied urban life. I crave for a view from my car window. Because now for me, a road journey corresponds to a quote from Rebecca Solnit - "The magic of the street is the mingling of the errand and the epiphany.”