Book Club

I've never counted the number of books in my house -- there must be a thousand -- hardbacks, paperbacks, new, used, pristine, tattered, all read (except for a few college leftovers, and the impenetrable Essential Canon of Classical Music, by David Dubal, too daunting for even my fanaticism), ranging from Allan Nevins's comprehensive Civil War octet to eighteen Anthony Trollope intriguing morality tales to assorted Jack Reacher, Harry Bosch, Travis McGee (for anyone old enough to remember), and Hardy Boy adventures, some stacked two deep, floor to ceiling, on six walls of shelves.

One would think that a lifelong bibliophile who devoured three thousand pages a month would have had at least one book club in his resume, but apparently even that voracious appetite was an insufficient credential, as the invitation to join -- and the initiative to organize -- a synergistic assemblage of like-minded worms had quietly eluded me for the four decades I had been conspicuously entrenched within the narrow confines of zip code 24503; it was a prickly void not to be remedied until the kindling of my mature romance with JSG.

Reflecting on this incongruity, I can only conclude that, while I heard whispers of an exclusive fraternity convening regularly for discussion and analysis of scholarly works, the vast majority of book clubs are composed of either females or couples.

Indeed, my ex-wife, MHS, was during periods of our marriage a member of one, and possibly two, although I always believed the lure for her was the social interaction. She wasn't much of a reader -- well, who is, compared to me -- and was forever tossing aside the book-of-the-month tabbed at page fifty, having cracked it two days prior to the meeting, which I, determined to leave no tome unturned, swiftly brought to its proper completion.

Sometime during her tenure on the Board of Directors at Oakwood Country Club, in an effort to generate interest and attract members, MHS established a book club there. She did an admirable job publicizing it, researching titles, securing facilitators, and even gently coercing me into presenting P. D. James's Original Sin, although my good-faith effort to support this endeavor faltered when I looked around and discerned that I was the only male in the room and the only attendee under the age of seventy.

Could it be that my failure to pursue actively a book club affiliation was subconsciously intentional? As James Atlas writes in the New York Times, March 23, 2014, "Reading is a solitary act, an experience of interiority," and since I'm very comfortable in that state, perhaps I was naturally disinclined to disturb the quietude or apprehensive about my ability to articulate its simple pleasure.

Besides, I treasure my reading time -- too much, I acknowledge -- and even if it is filled with malodorous trash freshened with an occasional weighty biography, I'm reluctant to sacrifice any for a more fragrant bill of fare, no matter its purported intellectual value, just as I rarely recommend my own favorites. In other words, let us all wallow in our own preferred slime or bask in the sunshine of self-edification.

As for a couples clique, it's obviously dependent upon two factors: a group of friends or acquaintances interested in reading, and pairs in which both spouses are willing to participate. If those stars never aligned for me, they magically did for JSG and her husband at the time, DGG, twenty years ago when they bonded with three compatible duos, at whose homes they have been gathering monthly since then on a rotating schedule. The hosts' right to choose the book for the evening is not without a stipulation: they must prepare the main course, while their guests bring wine, salad, and dessert.

Life changes have spawned several iterations, yet remarkably the club has persisted through two divorces (and two remarriages) -- which requires the splintered partners, JSG and DGG, to alternate meetings (and assigned readings, which is a relief to me) -- and an exodus which opened a vacancy for a substitute couple, who themselves later relocated to Richmond but who trek back to Lynchburg every month for a sleepover and open up their own residence three times a year for a mass invasion.

I am gratified to have been embraced enthusiastically by one and all -- once I passed inspection by proving that my intentions toward their beloved JSG were entirely honorable.

An innocent bystander will be justified in asking -- and I'm not being critical; after all, these are my friends -- "Is this a dinner party or a book club?" And I'm not sure what the criteria are for making an accurate assessment. These affairs typically meander along for about three hours, as cocktail and dinner conversation twists and turns through current events, politics, children, pets, trips, humorous incidents, and deep memories until, just as dessert is being served, and complimented upon, one of the eight will broach the obligatory and inevitable "What did you think?" question, to which no object need be appended.

The consensus is usually "Aye," sometimes qualified with a quibble or two, and seldom does anyone turn an emphatic "thumbs down." But we're not literary masters, in spite of a smattering of liberal arts degrees and English majors (which, after all, date back forty-five years). Just how do we go about evaluating this novel or nonfiction piece as art or drivel?

I think it's fair to say that while everyone sitting around the table enjoys reading, few suffer from the guilt or compulsion that demands from me the fulfillment of all homework; occasionally, a book will surface spoiled by a telltale bookmark protruding like a periscope, even in the grasp of the ever conscientious RTH, a retired minister with a decidedly liberal bent. But what entitles me to the mantle of righteousness? If the subject at hand fails to engage the voluntary student, why not cut one's losses rather than waste valuable time slogging through to the end?

Normally though, RTH and his wife BTH come well-armed with evidence of their diligence, although in different modes -- he with tangible pages spotted with underlinings and scribblings, she with Kindle highlights retrievable at the touch of a fingertip, usually accompanied by a thoughtful comment.

Needing little encouragement to voice their authoritative opinions (after all, it's endemic to their profession) are our two attending physicians: SPF, a retired plastic surgeon who travels to third-world countries repairing children's broken smiles; and WBB, a family practitioner whose contractual work often makes for sixty-mile commutes (each way) and twelve-hour days and who is fond of pronouncing a book, "The best one I ever read!" Before long, each will have seized upon a dramatic element, a prominent character, or a pregnant theme as a launching pad for some tangential personal tale or erudite disquisition.

Sincere, perceptive, empathetic, passionate, and just as outspoken as their husbands on important issues, although with a softer tone, are CAF, an accomplished amateur actress and recent nursing school graduate, first in her class, no less, and JSB, a former teacher.

As one who thrives on convoluted mysteries and outlandish thrillers, where suspension of disbelief is a given, I expect a higher standard in the club's purported meritorious offerings, and am perhaps too hasty to reproach an author who resorts to an improbable coincidence or a convenient suicide to resolve a narrative dilemma. But whether it's disparaging or laudatory, I try to contribute at least one insightful observation to the discussion, which, I admit, often fails to rise to the level of my peers, due to two self-imposed handicaps. As if I'm trying to reach the finish line in a foot race, my reading is premature and perfunctory; by the time the club meets, four other books have intervened, and I've forgotten what this one is all about. There is a rationalized method to this madness: I need to compensate for JSG's procrastination over the same single copy.

JSG possesses the innate kindness and sensitivity that preclude her from speaking ill not only of another person (at least in public) but also of any book promoted by her friends, except in the most oblique manner, lest they take umbrage. Drawing upon her litigious training, she will mount a valiant defense, always seeking a positive angle.

Which is why, when the quarter marker points our way, picking a worthy nominee becomes an exercise in self-flagellation, as excruciating as shopping for a new dishwasher, which has taken her six months, and involving the meticulous investigation of online lists of top ten listings and the repetitive scrutiny of pages of professional reviews. Most of my suggestions are rejected outright, although I'm still carrying in my wallet a homemade gift certificate dating back to December 25th entitling me to the title of my choice, no questions asked.

I've tried to impress upon JSG that, just as "You can't judge a book by its cover," neither can you judge the deciders by their book, and that she shouldn't take the forthcoming verdict personally. We may be sitting in the guilty party's home, but after a round of wining and dining no one remembers or cares who offered up the evening's sacrificial lamb.

February was a two-act drama in itself. With her deadline drawing nigh -- and she had thirty extra days, since we always leap a month -- she finally zeroed in on two historical fiction contestants, The House Girl, by Tara Conklin, in which a young New York law associate working on a class action suit searches for the descendant of slave who may have been the actual artist of a series of gorgeous paintings credited to her white mistress, and Anthony Marra's A Constellation of Vital Phenomena, about which more will be revealed in good time.

The former seemed the more practical and economical choice after I unearthed a copy in our local library, but it failed to pass JSG's rigorous research, which sent me on the prowl for the latter. Givens Bookstore had one in hardback -- the paperback had not yet been released -- which I scarfed up on the spot, two weeks prior to our departure for New Zealand, which gave me time to breeze through it before handing it off to JSG for her travel reader.

All went well until we reached the Wilderness Lodge and checked into our room. As we carefully arranged  our clothes on the floor, I noticed her rooting through every zippered compartment and hideaway in her two bags, desperately seeking A Constellation, but to no avail, as was a longshot telephone call to our prior night's inn. She gamely tried to download a version on her i-pad, then weathered the loss with aplomb (I would have been apoplectic deprived of a book for four days, including one on board four airplanes) until we could replace it once we got home.

Both purchases were worth it, as were the time and money invested in these Book Club companions, only the first two of which I would ever have tackled on my own:

The Warden, Anthony Trollope's riveting portrait of Septimus Harding, the kindhearted priest and caretaker of a hospital housing twelve old men, who must resolve the moral dilemma of their poverty and his own lucrative salary when confronted with a lawsuit prosecuted by a zealous reformer who is courting his daughter;

11/22/63, Stephen King's tour de force, in which Jake Appling's benevolent efforts to change the course of a domestic dispute and global history land him in a bygone era exquisitely rendered, a poignant romance, a stew of unintended consequences, and a thrilling denouement so logical one departs thinking, "This might really have happened";

Colum McCann's Let the Great World Spin, in which persons from diverse social strata cross paths and impact each other's fates in the shadow of Philippe Petit's tightrope walk between the World Trade Center's Twin Towers on August 17, 1974: a street priest struggling between his faith and the woman he loves; one of his flock, a heroin-addicted prostitute, who takes the place of her daughter, also a prostitute, in court, with tragic results; the judge, disillusioned by the insensitive bureaucracy he serves; his grief-stricken wife, forever mourning the death of her son in Vietnam; and two married artists strung out on cocaine;

Another novel of vignettes, Tom Rathman's The Imperfectionists, who comprise the staff of an English-language newspaper in Rome on the verge of obsolescence: the indolent obituary writer gone to Switzerland to interview a dying intellectual; the militaristic copy editor immersed in the composition of a massive style guide; the editor-in-chief looking to rekindle an old romance as she discovers her husband is cheating on her; a young Cairo stringer beguiled by a fast-talking war correspondent; and the chief financial officer en route to Atlanta finding herself seated next to a man she just fired;

The Pulitzer Prize winning Visit from the Goon Squad, by Jennifer Egan, also episodic in structure, but moving back and forth in time, and even into the future, as she follows pop music writers, producers, and performers through four decades of misunderstandings, addictions, betrayals, and errant behavior: the genius guitarist, the rich girl friend, the kleptomaniac turned sculptress, the celebrity journalist who attempted to rape a starlet, and the publicist working to soften the image of a genocidal tyrant;

Rules of Civility, Amor Towles's deft evocation of Manhattan in the late 1930's, as seen through the eyes of a young secretary, Katey Kontent, whose aspiration to breach the walls of New York society is accelerated by her roommate's chance encounter in a village jazz club with the elegant, mysterious Tinker Grey, who entices her on a year-long journey that will change all of their lives forever;

Jennifer Haigh's Faith, a compassionate portrayal of a Boston priest accused of molesting an eight-year-old boy, narrated by his sister Sheila, who explains how he sought refuge from his families' troubled past in the comforting orthodoxy of the church and how he now finds its relevance and mystique undermined and his faith tested when it spurns him, while she and her brother strive to learn the truth;

Julian Barnes's Sense of an Ending, a slim, unsettling meditation on the unreliability of memory, in which an unexpected bequest compels a retired divorced man to revisit strong emotions from his past, reassess his self-perceived passivity and insignificance in light of possibly having motivated a friend's suicide, and realize how much he's gotten wrong;

The odd and annoying Sweet Tooth, in which Ian McEwan's narrator, the beautiful Serena Frome, is seduced into low-level intelligence by her senior lover, immediately falls for her own agent, a writer whose charge is to produce stories with anti-communist themes, and is ultimately exposed as a victim of her own illusions, as is the reader by the author's cheap post-modernist trick;

So Long, See You Tomorrow, William Maxwell's concise tale of a man haunted by three tragedies: the death of his mother in the 1918 influenza epidemic; his budding friendship with another youth, Cletus, that ended abruptly when the boy's father murdered his wife's lover and committed suicide; and his failure to speak to Cletus years later when the two pass each other in the corridor of their new school in Chicago, a minor inadvertence which leaves him tormented as he tries to imagine the passion and cruelties that ruptured two families;

Larry Watson's Montana 1948, in which another boy, David, undergoes a rite of passage as he observes his father, Wesley, a small town sheriff, torn between his obligation to pursue justice and his loyalty to his domineering father and his revered brother, Frank, a physician, when evidence emerges that Frank has been sexually abusing Sioux women and murdered one of them, David's beloved housekeeper;

Mark Haddon's lightweight Spot of Bother, an eponym for the lesion George Hall discovers on his hip, which he thinks is cancer but is emblematic of other poisons circulating in the bloodstream of his nuclear family: his own disdain for talking; the affair his wife is having with a former colleague; the upcoming marriage of his tempestuous daughter to a man socially beneath her; his gay son's foundering romance -- all of which drive him to the brink of a nervous breakdown, before ending predictably well;

Crescent, by Diana Abu-Jabar, the Williams Reads selection for 2013 (A copy is sent to all incoming students who along with staff and faculty will "explore diversity through a common reading experience."), in which Iraqi-American Sirine, chef at a Middle Eastern restaurant near the UCLA campus, encouraged by the professor uncle who raised her, falls in love with a charismatic Iraqi exile, Harif, whose guilt at abandoning his family and longing for his homeland awaken her sensibilities and shatter her innocence;

Amy Waldman's The Submission, in which the revelation that the award-winning design for a 9/11 memorial at the site of the World Trade Center was the inspiration of a Muslim sweeps a diverse ensemble into a life-threatening maelstrom: Mohammad, the architect whose stubborn pride will brook no compromising of his principles; Claire, who represents the victims' families yet remains steadfast in her support of Mohammad; Sean, whose resentment for his brother's death draws him into a troublesome alliance with the protestors; and Asma, whose identity as a mourner for her husband is suspect because he was an illegal immigrant;

Waiting for Snow in Havana, by Carlos Eire, professor of religion and European history at Yale, an amazingly detailed memoir of his 1950's Cuban upbringing in a comfortable but absurdist household dominated by a father who is a judge, art collector, classical music buff, and the reincarnation of Louis XVI (he believes), yet too hidebound to emigrate when normalcy is shattered by the abuses of the Castro coup, which are epitomized by young Carlos's refused admittance to the Disney film "Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea," because of, he imagines, its homosexual subtext;

How We Do Harm, by Dr. Otis Brawley, chief medical and scientific officer for the American Cancer Society, who, as the subtitle states, "breaks ranks about being sick in America," indicting doctors who select treatments based on their reimbursements, hospitals and pharmaceutical companies that stretch the boundaries of diagnosis to feed their gluttony for revenue, and patients demanding sophisticated procedures and medication regardless of problematic efficacy -- all manifest in the tragic case of Ralph, whose free screening metastasized into twelve biopsies, prostate removal, radiation, a hole between his rectum and his bladder, and his death from a urinary tract infection;

Another memoir, My Reading Life, by Pat Conroy, although it's more a collection of stand-alone essays, in which the best-selling author pays homage to those persons who have infused him with a passion for his avocation: his librarian mother, who always matched with a book every animal he brought home from the woods; his high school teacher Gene, who nurtured his early promise as a writer; Norman, a publication executive, who fostered his maturity by encouraging discipline, focus, and emotional depth; Cliff, whose bookstore became his informal university; and Thomas Wolfe, whom he exalts as his literary hero;

And finally A Constellation of Vital Phenomena, by Anthony Marra.

This is a book dense in style, diffuse in structure, and dark and disturbing in subject matter. While the title is derived from a definition of life published in a Russian medical dictionary, those phenomena are reduced to the capacity to endure the unrelenting suffering, terror, and violence that engulf the inhabitants of Eldar, a village in war-torn Chechnya.

Akhmed watches helplessly from across the road while his friend Dokka is abducted by Russian soldiers for sheltering Chechen rebels. He finds Dokka's eight-year-old daughter Haava hiding in the woods and takes her to the one person who can offer her sanctuary: Sonja, the only remaining doctor in the regional hospital at Volchansk and so talented she can suture chest wounds with dental floss. In exchange for caring for the girl, Sonja insists that Akhmed, also a doctor, come back every day to assist her, even though he barely graduated from medical school and is more suited to drawing likenesses than repairing bodies.

Constellation takes place over the subsequent five days in 2004, with alternating chapters arcing rearward ten years to explore the backstories of Akhmed, Sonja, and other persons who are entangled with them and each other in a delicate web that takes the whole length of their journey to be perfected.

An earlier arrest cost Dokka his fingers when he refused to betray any fighters or refugees, yet he still manages to play chess with Khassan, an elderly intellectual forever writing his multi-volume history of Chechnya. Khassan lives with but doesn't speak to his son Ramzan, a gun runner who was castrated before saving himself by turning informant; as his neighbors physically have melted away, so has his soul been destroyed by torture.

Sonja's sister, Natasha, has fled her home a second time; earlier, we learn, she was lured into drug addiction and prostitution. She returned to work with Sonja at the hospital, but wearied of the hopelessness and fled again, stopping at Dokka's shelter, where the gift of a pistol will have grave repercussions.

Flashbacks reveal the dismal past of this "sliver of humanity the world seemed determined to forget": a population exiled by their Soviet masters, allowed to return to a homeland occupied by foreign elements, and then demoralized by guerrilla attacks and merciless retaliations.

Marra's characters maintain their sanity by storytelling and by crafting primitive works of art. Akhmed spins yarns to Dokka's dying wife. Natasha reads the first published volume of Khassan's history while a wave of invaders overruns the city. Deshi, a nurse at the hospital, breathes imaginary life into a dead man whose clothing she finds and who left burial instructions for his sister on a note she will never see.

Akhmed paints portraits of forty-one "disappeared" residents and nails them up around the village. Natasha draws a view of pre-war Volchansk on the cardboard covering the hospital windows. Each condemned man in the Landfill scratches his name on the pit's dirt wall, which his comrades commemorate and then obliterate when he is summoned to his fate.

On one hand, Marra laces his narrative with bizarre incidents and images: Haava has "the pale, waxen skin of an unripe pear"; Akhmed is bonded to his demented wife by what is no longer there, "as a web is no more than holes woven together"; Sonja sees her life as "an uneven orbit around a dark star, a moth circling a dead bulb"; a man's amputated stump pokes "from the edge of a white bed sheet like a rotten log through snow cover."

At the same time, the conflict's pervasive insanity remains anchored in concrete reality: unexploded bombs lying in a street covered with toilet bowls; a clown weeping in a basement during an aerial attack; a soldier insisting his prisoners wear seat belts en route to a death camp.

The gradual unveiling of successive horrors of increasing intensity becomes almost unbearable. A brief "immense, spinning" moment of joy pierces Dokka when he learns from Akhmed that "Haava is safe," but neither will know her future, that in twenty years she will publish a dissertation on the effects of climate change on freshwater microorganisms and at the age of sixty-eight hold a grandson in her hands. The heroic perseverance of her rescuer at the cost of his own life remains humanity's sole redemptive beacon on this bleak landscape.

I recommend it, Book Club or not.

Land of the Kiwi

And what a land it is, the South Island of New Zealand, blanketed by snow-capped mountain peaks, dense tropical rain forests, deep blue lakes the size of inland seas, huge lush sheep and cattle farms, and hordes of extreme sports enthusiasts, including JSG and me, and eighteen other emboldened cyclists for eight days last month.

As for the kiwi, it is first of all a plump earthbound bird endemic to New Zealand and its national symbol, with neither wings capable of flight nor a sternum strong enough to anchor the requisite musculature were it to evolve. Relieved of weight constraints, it lays the largest egg relative to its body size of any of its class in the world, but apparently not enough of them, as two of the recognized species are vulnerable to extinction, and three endangered, having been depopulated and driven into daytime hibernation by imported predators. While gift shops and clothing stores are overrun with stuffed and imprinted facsimiles of these curious fuzzy creatures flaunting their long pointed bills, spying a live one not in a darkened cage minus an admission fee is a rarity.

More plentiful is the non-indigenous and nutritious kiwifruit, originally the Chinese Gooseberry, named for its country of origin, but so birdlike in its color and texture that exporter Turners and Growers chose to rebrand it as such in 1959 in order to avoid the high duties imposed on berries.

As a popular and endearing demographic label, the term has its roots in World War I, but it is unclear whether it derived from the bird's appearance on military badges -- which dates back to 1886 -- or from the Expeditionary Force's diligent application of the boot polish so trademarked by its developer William Ramsay as a tribute to his wife, a native of the country. Once the national Rugby League team adopted the Kiwi nickname in 1938, and servicemen were deployed worldwide a second time, it was only natural that its reference would become universal and inclusive of all New Zealanders.

It takes about twenty-six hours to get from Lynchburg -- via Charlotte, Los Angeles, and Auckland (on the North Island) -- to our final destination, Christchurch, the longest leg of course being twelve hours over the Pacific Ocean. In spite of sitting in coach -- much to the chagrin of two frequent flier friends and my mother, who berate me so mercilessly for failing to upgrade, either by accumulating the necessary mileage or by simply writing a check, that I'm tempted to lie rather than defend myself -- I don't find the trip nearly as tiring as I anticipated, thanks in part to some tiny yellow relaxation (not sleeping) pills JSG has obtained.

In fact, is it any surprise that the most harrowing moments are the forty minutes we are delayed leaving Lynchburg -- we have only one hour to make our connection -- and our subsequent precipitate dash through the Charlotte Airport (if such a thing is possible, dragging three bags in our wake)? JSG orders me to hop aboard one of those motorized handicapped-carrier carts, which speeds us through the notorious "E" commuter terminal while dodging obstacles like an Olympian slalom skier.

Once en route -- by the slimmest of margins -- I am entertained by the non-stop chatter of my hyperactive seat mate, a ServPro franchisee, to whom the frigid East Coast temperature this winter has been a windfall. He's been in Virginia and Maryland for five months with a crew of twelve (they're driving back), plus extras hired as needed, cleaning up the damage from burst pipes and flooded basements. He's made $250,000, and he can't wait to get home to spend it. "You'll never see lights like that," he exclaims upon our approach, leaning across my lap, and indeed they glitter as far as the eye can see. "There are so many beautiful women down there," he says. "The first thing I'm going to do when we land is get in my car and ride around LA." That will burn some gas, I think to myself.

American-based airlines need to take a few lessons from their New Zealand counterpart, which actually tries to accommodate and please its customers rather than annoy them. Drinks are complimentary, and there are plenty of friendly folk around to serve them -- and our meals -- with an unfamiliar alacrity. Passengers board not by those ridiculous zones but logically from the rear forward, and, once liberated from U. S. regulatory insanity, they can deplane through doors fore and aft.

It would never occur to our own stodgy corporate wizards to inject any humor or irreverence into a safety video and create something mildly entertaining. Like a royally attired Cate Blanchett impersonator issuing this greeting to a planeload of goblins and elves: "Welcome aboard your Air Middle-earth flight."

Since I'm one of the few persons on the planet who hasn't seen at least one of the four New Zealand-sited Hobbit films -- and don't remember anything from the books I read fifty years ago -- I can't identify any of the characters who instruct us to keep a watchful eye on the lighted signs, fasten our seat belts "quick smart," power down all electronic devices, and make sure our seat backs are upright, window shades open, and armrests lowered. "And if you need a little more inflation in your life jacket," advises a leering male attendant to a comely female, "simply blow into the mouthpiece." When a gold ring rolls across the floor, who bends down to snatch it up but Lord of the Rings director Peter Jackson? "Should you need a light in darkness to help you find your way, the escape path illumination will lead you to an exit," intones a voice of authority.

Finally, swiveling around in the cockpit, the hoary pilot delivers his own bon voyage: "Now sit back, relax, and enjoy the journey. May the road rise up to meet you and your beard grow ever longer. May the sun shine warm upon . . . Fly, you fools!"

I understand, however, that the Hobbits have been displaced -- by four bikini-clad beauties whose cavorting on the beaches of the Cook Islands on the fiftieth anniversary of the Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue adds a whole new meaning to "Safety in Paradise" (and aboard Air New Zealand).

Just don't miss that LA plane to the Cook Islands, since it goes only once a week -- requiring a disgruntled fellow and his family to take a eight-hour detour by way of Auckland.

Fortunately, no such inconveniences mar our own long night over water. JSG has a panic attack when a three-hundred pound perspiring wide-body plants himself next to her and warns that his bigger daddy is right on his heels; miraculously, she locates an empty seat in another row, then settles in to watch three movies -- Gravity, Whale Rider, and the tear-jerker The Butler, which has her sobbing into her cocktail when I amble back to check on her.

Meanwhile, I draw a talkative Brit from New South Wales, a retired research pharmacist who, when I'm not engrossed in 3-D Golf, Sudoku, or my mindless Wilbur Smith novel, humbles me with a breadth of knowledge ranging from American health care to Scandinavian television. He is especially proud of his countryman, Frank Whittle, the acknowledged single-handed inventor of the turbojet engine. Repeated rejections by the British Air Ministry failed to deter Whittle, who was on the verge of bankruptcy and a physical and mental breakdown before selling the government a prototype which successfully flew on May 15, 1941.

Having crossed the International Date Line and lost one day (Tuesday), we don't want to squander another, despite our debilitated sleep-deprived condition. After a speedy check-in and change at our Christchurch Hotel, JSG and I set out on a run along the serpentine paths of Hadley Park, which lead through playgrounds and athletic fields to the conservatories, rose beds, mini-lakes, lawns, and woodland of the Botanic Gardens -- all nestled in the meandering loop of the Avon River. It's a lovely setting but so much of a maze that I opt for a more circumferential route the next morning.

A few near misses on the busy walkways alert me that I am now in territory where people, bicycles, and automobiles are all moving on the wrong side of the road, and that I need to keep to the left and pass on the right -- even on foot. On the other hand, the steady, loud, persistent whir of a thousand circular saws proclaims that a Virginia plague has tracked me half way round the globe: cicadas.

Moving beyond the tranquil beauty of the Park, we discover a city struggling to regain an identity shattered by the devastating earthquake which struck it with a magnitude of 7.1 on September 4, 2010, causing $3.5 billion worth of damage. Minor debris litters a handful of vacant lots. Scarred, cavernous structures loom in a state of limbo, while others are framed with restorative scaffolding, including a slowly-reviving cathedral. We walk several blocks through a deserted commercial district just to find a cafe to rest our weary bones and enjoy a lunch of soup, salad, and espresso. On our way home we are enchanted by a topiary menagerie of giraffe, elephant, and whale sculpted for an upcoming festival, and treat ourselves to a genuine milk shake which is not quite as creamy as advertised.

A good night's sleep galvanizes us for the New Zealand Day of Independence; whereas in the United States merchants celebrate holidays by putting their wares on sale, here they impose a fifteen per cent surcharge, as if to discourage consumption.

In our case, the perverse strategy works; except for a ham and cheese panini and a sushi roll -- which we resort to when my patience wears thin waiting for a more appetizing falafel -- no purchases are made, maybe because this is some of the strangest shopping I have ever done. We are in a container mall, a warren of streets and alleys bordered by rows of large steel storage or shipping boxes -- some stacked two or three high, painted red, orange, green, and blue, their fronts and sides cut away to accommodate glass doors and windows -- a cheap replacement for demolished and abandoned stores conceived by some shrewd real estate entrepreneur.

Our brief (about six miles) inaugural bicycle ride takes us through the splendid Mona Vale plantation, past flowering rhododendrons, camellias, and begonias, to its famous Rose Garden, home to one hundred varieties, and, just opposite, a lily pond, where the proliferation of another species, Asian tourists, makes it impossible to get close to the water.

Friday morning we board the TranzAlpine Express for what is reputedly one of the world's most scenic railway journeys -- from Christchurch one-hundred-forty miles west to Greymouth on the Tasman Sea (although we won't be going that far), on a narrow-gauge single track that twists and turns above steep river gorges, crosses high spindly viaducts, and passes through nineteen tunnels. Kiwi Rail has earned design awards for its glass-encased carriages, which provide the sensation of floating above the landscape as if in a bubble.

Rising from the Canterbury Plains, we enter the mighty Southern Alps, which stretch almost the entire length of the island. Our eyes are as confused as they were watching Cirque du Soleil's "O" in Las Vegas a few days ago; with so much happening simultaneously, we can't absorb it all. Beside and above us, the majestic mountains soar into the billowing clouds, their slopes alternately draped with evergreen forests, deeply-eroded stony escarpments, fresh snow, and glacial ice formations. Below us, the sinuous strands of the Waimakiriri River parallel our course, changing from blue-green streams to sandy shallow flats to dry rocky channels in a matter of minutes. Except for a solitary fisherman, a distant kayak, and a lost flock of sheep, one can imagine himself in a time warp going back millions of years.

We disembark at the hamlet of Arthur's Pass, the highest point on the railway and only a few thousand yards before it enters the seventeenth and longest tunnel, which descends at a 33% grade five miles to the town of Otira. We are advised to hold tight to our wallets and hats, lest they be filched by one of the pesky, precocious mountain parrots, or keas, lurking about the station.

One would think this would be an ideal spot to begin cycling -- a misconception soon corrected by our thirty-minute van transport through the Otira Gorge over a narrow road featuring hairpin turns, switchbacks, and roller-coaster inclines. Along the way our guide points out an abandoned village one can purchase in its entirety for a relative pittance.

What we are about to ingest is the stunning diversity of the South Island -- which one can devour in a motorized vehicle in several hours -- at a modest cycling pace of about twenty miles in the morning and twenty in the afternoon, during which each day's landscape and weather conditions are fairly consistent -- if not monotonous -- yet very different from those of its predecessor and successor.

Today we ride through broad fields and dairy farms -- against a stiff headwind -- to the Stationhouse Cafe on the shore of Lake Brunner, where we sample lamb pie, fish and chips (but with too much batter, says JSG), Speight's Ale, Monteith's Beer, and a long black coffee (espresso and water). Further on, where the area becomes more forested, we pass the site of the 1896 Brunner Coal Mine disaster, an underground explosion that killed sixty-five workers, the deadliest industrial accident in the country's history.

Our destination is the seaport of Hokitika, once a mid-nineteenth century thriving commercial center invigorated by the discovery of gold in the region, now a sparsely-populated curiosity for tourists and students on vacation, the latter of whom seem to have all been recalled to their universities. A quick perambulation of the quiet streets reveals their three major -- or minor -- attractions: a mile-long beachfront sculpture garden, composed of pieces of burnt driftwood crafted into a profusion of plant, animal, human, mechanical, and unidentifiable statuary, the most striking of which is a graceful ballet dancer precariously balanced on one leg; Fat Pipi's Pizza, which honors its world-renowned reputation (so we are told) not in the quality of its cuisine, which is pedestrian, but in the full house which necessitates a forty-minute wait; and the Mountain Jade Factory, where one can not only shop for necklaces, earrings, rings, and charms, but also matriculate a crash course in the history, geology, and manufacture of this precious mineral.

Nephrite jade, known locally as greenstone or pounamu, is found only on the South Island. Its incredible toughness, smooth glowing luster, and waxy surface made it highly prized by the native Maoris, who shaped it into tools, weapons, and jewelry, and who attributed to it, their "god stone," life-enhancing spiritual powers. In 1997, the British Crown returned ownership of all naturally-occurring pounamu to the Ngai Tahu tribe as part of a larger claims settlement in which it also received land and cash compensation.

Most of the items on display are rather pricey, yet JSG, exhibiting her well-honed bargain-hunting savvy, ferrets out a rough-hewn triangular pendant as a suitable memento.

The next morning, Saturday, we shuttle to Ross, founded during the 1860's gold rush, where an active mine still exists, ready to extract $700 million worth of wealth, provided the town's 315 residents give their unanimous consent, which they stubbornly refuse to do. JSG and I do yield to each other's entreaties to have our faces photo-shopped as a couple of pathetic period caricatures -- her as a burlesque barmaid, me as an optimistic prospector.

Our ride exposes us to more spectacular scenery -- verdant flatland sprinkled with rainbows of wildflowers, dense forests from which tree branches reach out overhead to embrace one another, sapphire blue lakes extending to the horizon, snow-covered mountain peaks close enough to touch. We pull over for refreshment at the historic Pike Pub in Pukekura -- where we smell, but do not taste, the possum pie (Our guides have prepared a sumptuous picnic a few yards up the road.), browse the store's unique product line, which includes furry nipple pads and insulated willy warmers, resist the urge to yank out our cameras, strictly forbidden, and peruse a petition protesting governmental restrictions on the sale of possum -- part of a campaign to exterminate all thirty million of these pesky parasites, a scourge to vegetation, wildlife, and cattle.

Our cycling regimen presents its share of challenges. There is one highway along the west coast, and we are on it; it's narrow, with hardly any shoulder outside the little white line we have been instructed to keep our tires glued to. When we cross a bridge -- about ten or twelve a day -- two lanes merge into one, requiring one direction, as indicated by signage, to "give way," in the local vernacular, to the other, even in the case of an automobile confronting a bicycle, or so we hope.

Fortunately, traffic is scarce, but when it comes, barreling along at fifty to sixty miles an hour, it's usually a beastly tour bus, which brushes me aside as if I'm a pesky gnat, or a racing duo, one behind the other, whose commingled warning sounds lure me into a false sense of security when the first speeds past, but leave me shaken to the core when a partner materializes from his exhaust. Motorcycles can be even more frightening, especially when they come shrieking by two or three abreast. And every time I see a hidden curve up ahead, I imagine two cars coming around it, one swinging wide into my lane to pass the other, with no room for error.

Why am I not surprised to learn that the only fatality in the forty-three-year history of Vermont Biking Tours occurred in New Zealand? Or that a Back Roads cyclist right behind us gets clipped by a crazed Chinese motorist overly enamored of his rental maxi-van and his inferior driving skills?

As for the terrain, it's mostly categorized as gently rolling, except for three notable climbs, the first two labeled appropriately Mount Hercules and the Triple Bypass, but neither as imposing as the Haast Pass which rises 1800 feet in crossing the Southern Alps, and is not conquerable by this novice, even at the lowest of twenty-four gears, without a couple of dismounts and wobbly walk-ups. With our guides constantly reminding us that all rides are optional, I choose to bypass the Triple Bypass, not because of the hills, but because it will extend the day's mileage from fifty to sixty-five, which is more punishment than my nether parts can endure. After an hour in the saddle, the burning ignites and spreads like a gasoline fire out of control; I try stuffing a pair of socks in my shorts for extra padding, but to no avail.

Thus, our Sunday layover at the Franz Josef Glacier (named after the Austro-Hungarian Emperor by German geologist and explorer Julius von Haast in 1865), sans cycling, is a welcome respite.

This is a strange and unique part of the world. The mountains surrounding us -- forced upward at the rate of thirty-three feet every 1000 years by the collision between two major tectonic plates along the Alpine Fault line, which also earthquakes every 300 years -- are the only barrier to the great windstorms that blow from Australia and the Tasman Sea across the Pacific to South America. Depending on their altitude, the rapidly cooled air dumps huge amounts of snow and rain on the land masses, creating the juxtaposition of rainforest, where I run that morning, and glacier, where we tread that afternoon.

As heavy snow accumulates in mountain basins or depressions, called neves, its weight squeezes the air out of the buried snow, converting it to extremely dense ice. When the neve overflows, pressure, gravity, and acute declivity draw the ice downhill to an equilibrium or melting point, called the terminus. Irregular bedrock beneath the glacier causes the ice to move at different velocities and crack into deep crevasses. When snowfall declines, the supply of ice being fed into the glacial trunk dwindles, so that it melts faster than it advances, which gives the terminus the appearance of retreating.

Coining a trio of vivid metaphors -- frying pan (neve), handle (downhill flow), and Milky Way caramel (gluey ice) -- our sprightly guide Sam (who hails from India, foiling my Filipino guess when he broaches the question) not only elucidates the science, he validates his degree in Adventure Management and his resume as a Himalayan mountaineer.

Yes, JSG and I volunteer for the heli-hike, a ten-minute (each way) aerial surveillance of the Franz Josef via helicopter (worthy of more of the usual superlatives) followed by a gentle touchdown, a perfunctory lesson in the attachment of crampon to boot (Try explaining that to a family of Japanese.), and ninety minutes of shadowing Sam as he carves stairways in the ice, tests treacherous ice bridges before waving us on, pokes his way under dripping ice tunnels, leaps across frigid meltwater streams, and leads us like a Pied Piper up the icy slope to a shimmering waterfall and back.

"Just remember to plant your foot firmly, and never turn sideways, unless you want a broken ankle," he says with a sly grin. At JSG's behest, he lends me his ice ax, demonstrates the Franz Josef launch (ax on shoulder, knees bent, eyes forward), and pushes me up on a promontory for another phony pose.

One would think that by now JSG would have had her fill of thrills for one day, but no sooner are we back on terra firma than it's time for the ultimate. I'm sure there are many places back home where one can skydive (such as Charlottesville, I just heard), but, as a person who likes nothing better than escaping planes, as long as they are on the ground, the thought of doing it never crossed my mind -- until our guides started handing out brochures several days ago, the hook of course being one's panoramic view of mountain, glacier, forest, and ocean from thousands of feet, assuming his eyes are not tightly clenched in terror. Momentum from my peers -- as Carolyn, then her husband Tom, then Paul, then Ashley, and finally JSG herself sign on -- entices me closer to the edge, until sanity, or cowardice, snatches me back.

"Why would I want to jump out of a perfectly good plane?" I ask, playing the straight man. "Wait until you see the plane," quips a comedian in the crowd.

Indeed, it looks like a mail-order self-assembly relic incapable of levitation as it sputters down the runway, its cramped fuselage packed with JSG, three other hardy souls, and the four jumpmasters to whom they will be strapped as they plummet through inner space. ("How many times have you done this?" I ask JSG's human lifeboat. "About 3500," he replies. In other words, it's just another day at the office.) So slowly does it climb that JSG has to be restrained at 6000 feet, because there are 6000 more to go. Even there, she's at the lowest (and cheapest) of the three altitude options, from which she will free fall for thirty seconds, compared to forty-five seconds at 15,000 feet and sixty seconds at 18,000 feet, before her chute opens.

"I'd do it again in a heartbeat," she says afterward. "It was quiet, awesome, with hardly any sensation of falling," and certainly the week's least dangerous activity. As for me, a mere vicarious spectator to these lofty antics, my charge is to record them for posterity. Having been advised she is first out of the box, I gaze upward, shielding my eyes from the sun, frantically searching for a meteorite, when suddenly it appears, a white speck, gradually expanding until it's blotted out by an arching red balloon, which glides through a u-turn into a perfect two-point landing.

Alas, it's not JSG -- she's the next one down -- nor is any object distinguishable in my heavenly portfolio, other than vacant blue and white serenity. I happily relinquish the camera to JSG for her more polished picture-taking, including one of Englishman John Birdsall, a well-traveled paraplegic whose twenty-fourth consecutive day of skydiving will be chronicled on his blog.

The next morning, Monday, after shuttling over the Triple Bypass, we forge ahead into the South West New Zealand World Heritage Area -- over one million acres of magnificent primeval vistas: fiords, glaciers, cliffs, lakes, rivers, waterfalls, tussock grasslands, fecund wetlands, wilderness coastlines, and temperate rainforests unmatched anywhere in the world in their composition, extent, and intactness.

Only traces of human influence are evident, and then mainly on the periphery -- like at the busy Salmon Farm and Cafe, where I am mesmerized by thousands of fish segregated by size in four huge tanks racing in circles like furious NASCAR drivers. Further along, we pause at scenic Bruce Bay, site of a seaside rock garden of memories, where JSG can transcribe our presence and leave a message for her children, should they ever follow in our footsteps.

We are bound for the singular Wilderness Lodge, an ecological resort situated on the peaceful shore of Lake Moeraki, only two miles from the sea. It is the brainchild of visionary Dr. Gerry M., who nurtured its transformation from the one-room pub he and his wife purchased thirty years ago into a sprawling eco-tourist and adult camp playground.

Dr. Gerry is a chubby, chipper environmentalist whose enthusiasm for all manner of flora and fauna is, frankly, exhausting. As we gather in the humid shadows of the main building for a nature trek, he scolds me for not wearing socks, then plucks a can of bug spray from a hidden pocket, which is about effective as perfume against the swarms of sandflies that attack my bare legs and ankles like piranha. He spies a rare wood pigeon fluttering in a nearby bush, all but invisible to me. He scoops from the water a bucket of whitebait, tiny immature fry fish prized for their delectable taste, especially when rolled into fritters, as we can already attest to.

We follow him into the forest, home to 103 species of ferns, and many trees, including the one thousand year old kahikatea, the tallest, which sustains 101 plants of its own, and the matai, whose intricate branch system was replicated by director James Cameron as the ideal nesting place for his avatars. Gerry wades into the lake, where he has entirely too much fun feeding lamb chops to a school of long-finned eels (The females grow to ten feet.), another valuable delicacy. Ever on the lookout, he points overhead, where a heat seeking falcon is zeroing in on an innocent white heron. Later that night he will prove that the Southern Cross and glowworms really do exist, unless he has secretly strung Christmas tree lights deep in the woods.

Tuesday is a leisurely day at the Lodge. JSG and I walk to the beach, which is covered with white, brown, black, and green quartz and sandstone -- and millions of sandflies. Huge tooth-like volcanic rocks line the coast, hard enough to have resisted erosion for sixty-five million years. My clothes dry out from a morning run just in time for a wet kayaking circuit of the lake, where we flush out a few black swans (the title of a book, says Tom, about man's presumptive knowledge of all things, since for centuries Westerners were certain all swans were white) and work up an appetite for one of our best meals of the week, prepared by Gerry's chef: pumpkin soup, lamb shanks, and a berry-topped pavlova.

Wednesday we are in the Haast Valley -- a land of dense forests nestled between mountain ranges peppered with ninety foot waterfalls crashing down rocky cliff faces. Rainfall here is some of the heaviest in the world, 230 inches a year, compared to New York City's 44 inches. Once we scale the tortuous Haast Pass the air dries out, and tussock growth, green meadows, and grand lakes creep over the countryside; we glide pleasantly downhill toward an afternoon rendezvous with our homestay, the highlight of our trip.

All twenty of us will be divided among four local families, who will host us for the evening and overnight. At the urging of some Lynchburg friends, who took this tour a few years ago, we have requested -- and been assigned to -- Penny and Taff, whose spontaneous warmth and graciousness would be extraordinary even if their closest neighbors were not twenty miles away. Obviously none are in sight during the ten minute ride by Land Rover from their property's entrance to their farm complex -- through paddocks stocked with sheep (9000) and cattle (1400) and turnip plots cultivated for winter feed along a waterfront as extensive as Smith Mountain Lake, except one has it all to himself.

Not wanting to appear too awestruck, I wait a few hours before posing the inevitable question: "Just how big is this place?" It's 20,000 acres, a mere shell of its former self, since the government, through some perverse exercise of eminent domain, reclaimed two-thirds of it some years ago.

Before we have time to catch our breath, we are shepherded to a barn for a shearing demonstration. Supported by a harness, each member of the five-man crew grabs a sheep from a stall, upends it, and in fifty-five deft strokes shaves the fleece from the body, at a blistering and backbreaking pace of about twenty an hour, for which he receives a net $1.30 a head, after paying forty cents to his contract chief.

Separating the wheat from the chaff -- that is, sweeping aside the inferior droppings -- and supervising the wool gathering into huge bales are Penny and Taff's youthful mirror images: Briar (I keep wanting preface it with "Sweet"), a statuesque blond with sparkling blue eyes and shiny white teeth right out of a television commercial, and Digby, a stocky florid fellow whose slightly tilted gait is the residue of a horrific automobile accident.

Out in the yard, it's supper time for a dozen restless border collies. At Digby's command, Mick, Sally, Boss, and their siblings hop onto a truck flatbed and are driven to their cages, locked in, and pacified with slabs of raw meat. The two breeds are their owners pride and joy, and essential to their livelihood, the huntaways trained to scour the hills for grazing sheep, the headings to herd them home.

The residence is simple yet refined. The kitchen glows with colorful inlaid tile, wall hangings, containers, and utensils. The living and dining rooms display an exquisite collection of original art. One side of the house looks out at a grass tennis court, rarely used, we are told; the other on a stone patio, a flourishing vegetable garden, and a sweeping lawn dotted with lambs and calves which, being weaned, wander by for bottle suckling. In the background are the lake and a six thousand foot mountain so clearly delineated and fanciful that I imagine it to be computer generated.

For a person entrenched on the outskirts of civilization, Taff is quite the charming cosmopolitan. He waxes prolifically on politics, economics, history, agronomy, animal husbandry, climatic conditions (He meticulously records daily rainfall on a desk chart.) international commerce, investments, and even cycling, as he brandishes a handsomely-bound photographic chronicle of his and Penny's decade-ago romp through Cognac, France. "He's so brilliant we call him Dr. Google," says Briar, flashing a mischievous smile.

Dinner that evening is a masterpiece, for twelve -- including six from our tour group, Gus, a handyman in training, and Tony, Briar's boy friend, a New Zealander whom she actually met in Colorado, where they now spend the Northern Hemisphere summers building fences, and then follow the sun south to work the farm, "livin' the dream," as he inscribed for her on a varnished wooden panel resting conspicuously atop a decorative sideboard. So are we all, as we feast upon a homegrown cucumber salad with garlic cream dressing, tender rolls sweetened with manuka honey, braised lamb, baked chicken in a stewed tomato sauce, yellow, russet, and blue potatoes, and a soft pavlova.

After more of the same for breakfast -- fried eggs, pancakes, bacon, sausage, pastries, and wonderful coffee -- we must wistfully take leave of this bucolic setting and its delightful proprietors. It's Thursday, our last day, and we will be cycling through the land of the Merinos, the hardy strain of sheep whose dense fleece yields the world's finest wool. Before our final loop -- a paltry twelve miles, which, inexplicably, seems the most painful of all, despite the absence of any obnoxious motor vehicles -- we visit the only museum established to honor a single sheep, the legendary Shrek, who was found in a cave after six years outside captivity burdened with a fluffy coat of arms weighing sixty pounds, six times the norm.

For lunch and a wine tasting ritual, we shuttle to the Wooing Tree Vineyard -- named after, what else, the shelter of many a courtship, and the sole survivor of a bulldozer only after a vigorous campaign by the local citizenry. Gathered around the long banquet table are twenty-one mates with whom we have shared fun, laughter, learning, amazement, suffering, and overindulgence for the past week:

Two energetic sixty-nine-year-old companions, Marj, an interior designer whose fourth life partner, Tom, a former Congressional speechwriter now a contractor, couldn't make the trip because of a bad fall he took pouring concrete for a horseshoe pit, and Betsy, a psychiatric nurse with whom I start off on a sour note by arguing about physician salaries, but who wins my undying admiration when she bungy jumps;

Chip, a nephrologist, the only masochist in our group courageous enough to attempt -- and complete -- the Triple Bypass; his wife Dori, who's trying to acquire a taste for the coffee her daughter brews in her newly-opened cafe back in Louisville;

Tom, an economist whose firm does research for the Department of Defense and who can always be counted upon for some astute observation, like the one he makes in our first conversation reproaching UVA students (including his own son) for their "elitist superiority attitude"; his wife Carolyn, a writer for a Washington, D. C. niche publication (like my son), who is the first to throw down the skydiving gauntlet;

Their friends Valerie and her husband Paul, with whom my close encounter has its own supernatural elements: his remarkable resemblance to my son-in-law Nate, aged thirty years, and his career evolution from engineer to patent attorney, which mirrors that of my children's stepfather;

Dave, a former computer science professor at Florida State University ("Its weakness," he says, "is academics. I'm a witness, because I almost lost my job for flunking the star of the girls' basketball team."), now making fiddles in Santa Fe after being enticed there by a start-up venture that failed; his wife Steffie, the only person I've ever met who plays the boudhran, a framed drum, I know, because I saw them being manufactured in Ireland two years ago;

His brother Rick, who ran away from home at the age of sixteen to play the guitar in night clubs (and never looked back), but defers to Dave as the better musician, and who bemoans the high cost of health insurance while soaking up six weeks of the good life here in New Zealand along with his girl friend Ann, a mathematics professor;

Another Ann, a textile artist, who sadly contracts mold poisoning at a hotel a few days before our trip commences and is unable to cycle ("That may not be all bad," I tell her, trying to be cheerful.);

Leanne, an actuary for a reinsurance company, whose multiple sclerosis doesn't slow her down for a minute, nor prevent her from joining Betsy as the only other member of our troupe to brave the bungy, the A. J. Hackett original, a 140-foot plunge off a narrow bridge that leaves her dangling just above the shallow waters of the Kawarau River, for which we have a cliffside seat;

Craig, a Washington, D. C. attorney with Australian roots, a keen wit grounded in a good-humored cynicism ("I went to law school for five years; I'm a highly-educated man," he says with a feigned pomposity.), and a sedentary disposition that belies a youthful tennis prowess of championship caliber and a stint as a semiprofessional footballer; his wife Vicki, a former teacher, now a ballroom dance instructor who took up the vocation because, she says, "Craig wouldn't dance with me," and whose principal goal on this trip is to defeat him in scrabble, which they play nightly on their i-pad;

Michael, also an attorney, now working in Charlotte for Wells Fargo, in a department that evaluates and manages tax credit investments in low-income housing, whose associates were heavily involved with the infamous Lynchburg Bluffwalk project, or as it was affectionately known to them, "The Red Shoe Legend"; his partner Ashley, a registered nurse hoping to set up a wellness practice, who was introduced to Michael by an ex-girl friend who knew he had broken his leg and needed someone to walk his dog;

And finally, our three guides, who keep us on the road, on schedule, and well nourished during timely rest stops with wafers, cookies, chocolate, fruit, cheese, and crackers: Ritche, snowboarding instructor, kidney donor (to his father), bungy jumper in tandem with LeAnne, and cycling instructor, whose opening day lesson on keeping to the straight and narrow little white line was oh so prescient; Broni, an adventuress whose skiing skills have taken her to Japan, Europe, and Colorado, but apparently the rookie here, as she was delegated the task of accompanying Chip through the Triple Bypass; and Josey, the leader of the pack, who studied engineering back in Ireland so she could emigrate to New Zealand, from whose lips words gush like cascading waterfalls as she descries from her driver's post every "cool" landmark, including the lake where she snagged her one and only fish when her boy friend waded in to grab it.

Our own terminus is Queenstown, a bustling and picturesque settlement snuggled between the curve of Lake Wakatipu and the rugged slopes of the Remarkables range that surround it like an amphitheater. A paved waterfront pier links a small park on one end to a quiet garden of fir trees and rose beds on the other, past which a gravel trail offers a scenic course for a morning run. The town center is a grid of restaurants and shops, most of them purveying expensive wool clothing (including my first ever grandfatherly purchase of a pair of baby socks), serious sporting equipment, and assorted ticket packages for the adrenaline-pumping recreation the area is famous for: paragliding; parasailing; wilderness, thunder, or shotover jet boating; white-water rafting; and the relatively sedate gondola excursion.

Needless to say, our forthcoming thirty hours of travel, including non-stop trans-Pacific turbulence, will quench our thirst for excitement. Friday, February 14th, is like going "Back to the Future"; we depart Auckland at 9:30 PM and arrive in Los Angeles at 9:30 AM the same morning. I guess if there is any day one might want to stretch into two, it would be Valentine's, although opportunities for romance are severely limited on planes and in airports, despite the proverbial fantasies.

Besides, we've checked the weather reports, and, as we bid farewell to the glorious Land of the Kiwi, headed for snow, ice, wintry mix, and some unexpected lifestyle upheavals, why would we not imagine our Hobbit captain to be signing off with this stinger: "You're flying home? You fools!"

Kenyan Odyssey

Fifteen years ago I surprised my ex-wife, MHS, with the anomalous announcement that I'd like to go to Africa. Speechless for one of the few times in our marriage, she could only stare across the room at me in stunned silence, while today, looking back, I can only imagine the thoughts roiling her brain: Has he lost his mind? This is a man whose boundaries are defined by the farthest reach of the Schewel footprint, Plymouth, North Carolina, a leisurely four-and-a-half-hour drive from home, occasionally stretched as far as every southeast redneck's favorite vacation spot -- Myrtle Beach. Is he planning to take me along? Or better yet, will he be coming back?

Yes, belying the various adventures chronicled on this web site -- cruising the Mediterranean, sailing in the British Virgin Islands, cycling in Italy, Ireland, and Northern Europe -- back in those days the mere suggestion of long-distance travel to exotic locations would be summarily dismissed as beyond the pale, which for me was circumscribed by a contented provincialism, with a few noteworthy exceptions.

In 1989, shortly after my father's death, a supplier friend -- whose signature sales pitch, "Buy this plant stand, Marc, you'll sell telephone numbers," never failed to elicit groans of incredulity -- persuaded me to accompany him first to Taiwan for work and then to Hong Kong for rest and relaxation. He promised me an unforgettable experience, and for once he was not exaggerating: the worst Chinese food I have ever eaten; traffic and pedestrian congestion so impenetrable I had to terminate my morning run; the impulsive purchase of a fake Rolex that expired two months later; furniture factories housed in sheds, shacks, and cottages primitive enough to discourage the most unscrupulous of buyers; an isolated farmhouse flaunting a big-screen tv and adorned with Michael Jordan tee shirts; and a dainty foot masseuse who squeezed and pummeled every bone, muscle, and ligament into a gelatinous mush.

In 1992 I was enticed (along with MHS) to Israel on a "mission" to research my ethnic roots -- conceding that every Jew should go there at least once and having paid for this ostensibly free trip many times over by my contributions to the United Jewish Appeal. Even more memorable than Jerusalem's Old City and Wailing Wall, the Hall of Names and Pages of Testimonials at the Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial, sightings of luminaries Shimon Peres and Yitzhak Rabin, and a West Bank history lesson in a Hebron classroom was a single-day itinerary which encapsulated the past, present and future of the Jewish State: scaling the heights of Mount Masada, where one thousand freedom fighters committed mass suicide rather than surrender to their Roman conquerors; watching fighter jets in training against a background of Arab nomads at a desert Air Force base, in a land where peace is always temporary; and wandering through a modular city of recently resettled Ethiopian refugees, whose faces beamed with the joys of liberation, hope, and full stomachs.

Not long afterward MHS and I were lured to Italy by a friend's gracious offer of accommodations in a small town near Orvieto, which gave us the opportunity to explore the lovely Umbrian countryside, sample the province's exquisite cuisine, and acquire a taste for its soothing red wine.

But were it were not for National Home Furnishings Association Board Meetings and Conferences -- which took me to San Francisco, Phoenix, Montreal, New Orleans, Santa Fe, San Antonio, Charleston, the Bahamas, and Mackinac Island -- my world-view, up to that time, would have been confined to the Lynchburg fishbowl. I even scoffed at the reputed pleasures of the grandest city in the world, New York, leaving MHS to make her annual junket to the U. S. Tennis Open without me, and snubbing my older son, who had been happily ensconced there since 1997 building his resume as an accomplished television film editor.

Why this stubborn resistance to broadening my horizons? I submit that my reasons were threefold, not any one of which contained an element of rationality. First, I harbored a perverse fear of flying, which, while not daunting enough to preclude an occasional two or even three-hour (although it seemed to last forever) leap from one state to another, was too oppressive to permit the consideration of an intercontinental marathon. Indeed, one of the few regrets I have is forgoing a business meeting in Banff, Alberta -- having heard from many of its unsurpassed beauty -- because I thought it was too far away and too tortuous to get to.

Second, I was reluctant to absent myself from my business for the near two-week period most of these excursions entailed -- in an era when instantaneous communication via email and text was as fanciful as Dick Tracy's two-way wrist radio; it was an ill-founded qualm, since the loyal, dedicated, and self-sufficient team which I was fortunate enough to captain was more than capable of sustaining -- and even improving -- its performance in the interim.

Third -- do I dare admit it? -- I just didn't want to spend the money. I'm not going to say I couldn't afford it, because I could. But I can least offer the lame excuse that during this period I was in the midst of putting three children through college -- at institutions that were each more successively proud, if price were the measurement, of their pedagogy: Northwestern, Bowdoin, and Duke.

Standing alone, any of the objections would have been easily demolished; layered atop one another, they proved impregnable.

Two other prickly absurdities capped the barrier like strands of barbed wire. First, I was loath to interrupt a compulsive regimen of running, swimming, cycling, or lifting, during which, at various times, I would establish consecutive-day exercise streaks of two to three years. (Actually, I think some were even longer.) If asked why I would subject myself to such punishment, I would reply that, once the numbers start to accumulate, the greater the motivation not to falter -- not to succumb to fatigue, to that nagging cough, to the inconvenience of a predawn flight -- because the true anguish arises not from the pain of the workout but from the panic of its omission, when the long string of sweat-soaked opalescent sunrises peters out.

Second, I always figured that if there were places in the world I wanted to learn more about I could just pick up a book and read about them, a fatuous assumption that collapsed under the weight of two incongruous fallacies. Having long ago satiated my modest appetite for writings boasting a modicum of intellectual value and replaced it with a steady diet of trashy mystery thrillers, I rarely if ever tasted any other flavor (unless required for a Book Club). And when I did, oh, the irony, as occasionally a foreign subject would pique my curiosity and inspire me to contemplate an on-site inspection.

One of the most seductive of such works is Nelson DeMille's Upcountry, in which the protagonist, a Vietnam war veteran, is sent back to the scene of his former exploits on some contemporary convoluted espionage mission. While the plot is thin, the descriptions of a land and people ravaged by combat but now a reinvented developing country stirred a desire -- not yet fulfilled -- to witness for myself the bustling city streets, the lush rain forests, the teeming rice paddies, and the idyllic tropical beaches -- but avoid the furniture factories from whence flows seventy per cent of the bedroom suites displayed in my stores.

As for that Africa surprise, it was the product of one massive tome, Thomas Pakenham's The Scramble for Africa, a magisterial account of European imperialism's frantic colonization of the Dark Continent (1876-1912), of one relative lightweight, Adam Hochschild's King Leopold's Ghost, a grim expose of the Belgian ruler's ruthless exploitation of his Congolese possession and its attendant slaughter of six million natives, and of one glossy brochure, the latest edition of Washington and Lee's Alumni College/Traveler, which I decided to thumb through rather than consign to the same fate as its predecessors: the recycling bin.

While one could opt for a Lexington summer school session on scintillating topics like "The Young George" or "Robert E.'s Last Days," the principal curriculum consisted of a buffet of delectable destinations, whose delights were extolled in the flowery rhetoric of a tenured English professor, unveiled in a collage of scenic vistas, and verified by a host of enthusiastic testimonials.

All the rewards of deflating one's bank account were eloquently summarized: absorbing the history of nations and civilizations by osmosis; immersing oneself in the culture and customs of strange peoples; discovering natural wonders and awesome beauty at every turn (although Central Virginia can hold its own in any contest); eating, drinking, laughing, and playing with a gang of new friends; and sharing it all with a loved one.

Always left unmentioned is this guilty pleasure: We like to travel so we can tell everyone where we are going and where we have been. Who doesn't like to be the center of attention among a gathering of his peers? Why else does one politely decline an invitation to an event or meeting, or disclose the void behind the answering machine, not by simply stating, "I will out of town," but by declaring with a hint of braggadocio, "I will be out of the country?"

Maybe subconsciously I too was eager to impress, although loath to admit it. Nor was I even thinking about the wildlife, which is Africa's main attraction. I had simply stumbled upon a couple of good books, had acquired a little knowledge (which is a dangerous thing), and was now energized to augment it.

Washington and Lee sponsored trips are supposed to be the creme de la creme, providing its customers the ultimate experience -- the best itinerary, food, accommodations, guides, companionship, and education money can buy. And, having enjoyed three of them, I cannot deny that the designation is well-deserved. But neither can I repress the cynical observation that there is an ulterior motive to all this collegiality: Keep your friends and alumni close and connected, so that when the Development Officers come calling, they will be greeted with open pocketbooks.

The only problem with this mantra was that if I was looking for any long-lost classmates, they were few and far between. Apparently the University's mailing list far exceeds its graduate roster, as there were more Lexington and Lynchburg townies -- all wonderful to be with -- in each of my groups than there were Blue-and-White Minks.

Nevertheless, the aura of elitism was irrepressible, and to such an extent that it seemed wholly appropriate that midweek a seasoned veteran of these affairs should pull me aside and whisper in my ear, "You do know, Marc, that at our last supper at least one of each couple is expected to give a brief commentary on what he has seen and heard."

I was one of the few genuine alumni in the troupe; it was surely incumbent upon me to uphold the intellectual reputation of my alma mater. Since this was long before my blogging days, when I was too lazy to maintain a journal or even scribble the barely decipherable notes that would be so essential to my rambling dissertations, and since extemporaneous speeches then, as now, were not my forte, I was panic-stricken at the thought of ill-preparedness. Lodged in the rear seat of a cranky Land Rover, bouncing over a ruined roadway more cratered than the Sea of Tranquility, I snatched a stray sheet of paper from one neighbor, borrowed a pen from the other, and began to compose the last resort of all presumptive comedians -- a poem, and of course in its most mindless format, doggerel, or rhyming couplets.

I'm glad I did. Other than a few hazy memories, it's the only record I have of this "Kenyan Odyssey." Back then, digital cameras were as futuristic as, well, i-phones, and photographers captured their images on a plastic material known as film using shutter, rangefinder, or reflex equipment, depending on their level of expertise. I don't know which kind MHS owned, but it served the purpose, birthing our own private National Geographic collection. I had hoped to reproduce a few of those pictures for this article, but they have all disappeared, along with the scrapbook she collated of the best two dozen and my perfected epic.

An explication of some of the references in the poem, as well as some additional reflections it has prompted, may be instructive.

*I exorcised my fear of flying somewhere over the Rift Valley after, in sequence, four eight-hour transcontinental legs, North America to Northern Europe to East Africa, and back; an early morning descent to Amsterdam in fog so thick we felt the wheels strike the runway before we saw the ground; buckling into a rebuilt World War II vintage DC-3 museum piece with wings so muscular and limber they flapped all they way to the Masai Mara; and, having chosen a day trip to Victoria Island as safer than a balloon ride, buzzing the gravel landing strip in order to clear it of chickens and children, explained the pilot of our eight-seater private plane, himself mysteriously far from his Wisconsin home.

*Since it's not wise to tempt the creatures roaming the African bush, I was able to alleviate my running frustrations only twice: first, during our Amsterdam layover, through a city park packed with the local crowd, youthful, slim, fit, and smoking (not necessarily cigarettes), and second, about a week later, along the inner fence line of our tented camp, where one minute I spied a gaggle of hungry baboons scouting the garbage dump from afar, and in the next heard the thump-thump of one tracking me down, only to glance back in fright and be relieved by the sight of a blue-eyed, blond-haired, bare-chested fellow human.

*I was warned to exercise dietary moderation, but the bountiful and scrumptious fare laid before us thrice daily -- salads, fruits, tomatoes, yams, beans, corn, eggs, and infinite varieties of meat (this was long before I ever dreamt of pseudo-vegetarianism) -- sparked a sinful gluttony that raged unchecked -- for about four days, until my bowels began to pay the price. Chastened by rocky rides and infrequent rest stops, I gradually diminished my intake, so that at the end I was subsisting on soup, bread, and bottled water.

*Alas, I missed the best meal of all, breakfast on the river bank, not because I was ill, but because after a week of game drives, I didn't feel like rising at 6:30 AM for another repeat performance, except this one included a unique highlight, I learned afterward, as our guide directed the caravan toward a lion's den where all the faithful (minus me) got lucky: they stalked a female engaged in the common yet cruel practice of devouring one of her own offspring, which, while disturbing, did not discourage them from moving on to enjoy their own sumptuous spread.

*Another rarity is eyeballing a wild rhinoceros, a species so decimated by the lustful harvesting of its sexually potent horns that heroic conservationists are now nurturing it back to life on private farms, cultivating gentle beasts tame enough to feed by hand. We detoured one evening to a mountain cabin where we were advised to sleep lightly, lest we fail to be roused by the alarm summoning us to the solarium overlooking the great salt lick, where, precisely on schedule, a rhino ambled by for his midnight snack.

*If I'm ever asked, "What's Africa like?" I always draw this simple analogy: "When you drive through the Virginia countryside and look out into the surrounding fields, you see cows, horses, and pigs. When you creep through the African bush and gaze over the tall grass, you see elephants, giraffes, gazelles, and hyenas."

*And, naturally, that's what hunters bring home from these safaris, or did when we went, boxes and boxes of photographs, stacked on tables, blanketing the floor of the Lexington home where we were invited to a reunion of our travel mates, who, overwhelmed by the superfluity, were tossing them up for grabs. Looking at all those animals, I was struck by the notion that people are a lot more interesting, and saddened that they had all but been ignored in this frenzy of picture-taking.

*As for that farewell banquet, I believe someone had played a practical joke on me, because when the call went out for volunteers to stand and speak, it was met with universal silence. After this portentous pause, realizing I could do no worse than be lauded for an honest effort, I rose and delivered these lyrical verses:

We leave from the states with Washington and Lee,
And land in Amsterdam by the Zuider Zee.
We marvel at Rembrandt, Vermeer, and Van Gogh;
These trips are for study and not just fun, you know.
We see frozen canals and many ice skaters,
Watch diamond cutters and dine on riistafel.

Another overnight and we arrive in Nairobi,
Where we meet a good guy; his name is Tony.
We visit a giraffe park, and lunch on the lawn;
Between all those courses it's hard not to yawn.
Those still alert visit the home of Karen Blixen,
Whom they are startled to learn was a regular vixen.
Then it's off to the Safari Park to rest for a while,
Before dining on pig, chicken, eland, and crocodile.

By now we're together, one big family,
As we board our next plane, a Kenya Air DC-3,
And fly west to our campsite; get out your camera.
It's right in the middle of the Masai Mara.
On your first game drive, oh the sights you'll discover,
As you graze the tall grass in your green-spotted Land Rover:
Impala, gazelle, warthog, and hyena,
Elephants, giraffe, topi, and even a cheetah.
What vistas, what visions, will wonders never cease,
When you happen upon a herd of wildebeest.
And then in the bush a lion and her pride,
Because from our good guide, there's no place to hide.

We're up early next morn to board a small plane;
Our pilot's a Wisconsin who says call him Dane.
I've never liked flying. What a way to travel:
The runway was nothing but dirt and some gravel.
It was a beautiful day on Victoria's Lake,
As we searched for the perch for all to partake.
Alas, no luck, and we're ready for departing,
When you should show up but dependable Harden.
With the catch of the day we flew back to camp,
Leaving behind all those ants and some pants.

We're out the next day to see the Masai.
Down to the river is a really rough ride.
These are folks who have kept their traditions,
Like face-painting, polygamy, and painful circumcisions.
All day long the men sing, dance, and defend
Their village from enemies real and pretend,
While the women their daily duties perform.
I think to myself as I listen and learn,
What would a fine lady like Ms. Martha Lou
Look like building a house of cow poo?

Lunch on the river, then across on a raft;
We don't know whether to cry or to laugh.
For the heat and the wait poor Blake is not made;
So a Masai warrior brings her some shade.
It's been glorious all day, until the blue sky turns gray.
The rains fill the roads as we go slip-sliding away.
Next morning near the river where the hippopotamus float,
We brunch in the bush while they bellow and bloat.
And our last memory of the Mara Intrepid Club
Is a male lion which has slain another one's cub.

Next stop Nairobi, and guess what's in store?
All your clothes, and more, spread all over the floor.
But Tony says we've been traveling so well
He'll treat us to lunch at the Norfolk Hotel.
Then it's back on the vans for a long painful ride;
It's when this doggerel I began to transcribe.
I put down my pen to reach for a water bottle,
But it's hard to swallow bouncing over a pothole.

The vans roll on to the hills beyond.
But where, oh where, is the Club Aberdare?
Hark, Hark, I see the ark,
And none too soon, because it's getting dark.
Dinner and to bed, to await a midnight buzz:
Your summons to observe a wild rhinoceros.
On a morning drive we spy monkeys colobus;
Then it's pack up your bag and get back on the bus.

We stop and we shop, and we cross the equator
En route to our next place; it's Camp Sweetwater.
And always the question is will we arrive
With enough time to embark on another game drive.
We see water draining as observed by Correa.
But I wish he'd discovered a cure for diarrhea.
In spite of the sympathy of our new found friends,
Nothing can stop the ravages of Montezuma's Revenge.
This is so much worse than being constipated:
Suppose you were a giraffe, especially reticulated.

On a game drive we see zebra, eland, and waterbuck;
But the elephants scared the monkeys, and are we out of luck?
No, because our guide Tony is able to convince
The rangers to let us inspect the baby chimps.
Then on to the tame rhino named Morani;
All he does is sit around on his hiney.
But we are quite happy he is cooperating,
Because he offers a special photo opportunity.
Then I lace up my running shoes and go out for a dash,
Carefully watching for baboons darting in from the grass.

What a beautiful sight, Mt. Kenya at sunset,
While gazelles and giraffes graze right by your tent.
I'll never forget Sweetwater and the common zebra,
Because it's where my wife came down with a fever.
She was laid up in bed, looking quite scary,
But made a speedy recovery, thanks to Dr. Harry.
She's on her feet the next day, Akuna Matada,
While Tony lectures us on Jomo Kenyatta,
And how the Kenyans won the right to freedom enjoy,
Only to encounter the corruption of Moi.

On the road it's lunch at the reserve for rhinoceros,
Where we hear a report by remarkable Ann Merz.
Then a hard ride with one pit stop en route
To our next destination, Camp Samburu.
This is the worst road I've ever been on, because
I'm chewing gum without moving my jaws.
"How much further? How much further?" says Ms. Lucille.
"Now I remember; this ride's from hell."
"Hurry up," says Kitty, "I'm getting sick."
But Francis stops to gawk at a bright gerenek.
We see oryx and lion doing their dance,
While tourists are stalking in twenty-six vans.

Next morning we see cheetah enjoying a kill.
I'm sorry, but since it's making me ill,
I'd rather birdwatch a yellow hornbill.
Along the shoreline of the River Osaniru
From the bush emerges a herd of cape Buffalo.
We stop by a tree upon our return,
But before we can see it, the go-away bird is gone.

There's always another surprise around the bend.
And although too soon this trip must end,
While some move on to explore the Serenghetti,
For home I think this weary traveler is ready.
Our last night is dinner at the home of Philip Leakey,
Where we get one last chance to flaunt our Swahili.
"Jambo" is the way to say "How do you do?"
To the Masai, Lua, Samburu, and Kikuyu.
And for a great trip we say, "A sante sana, Rob Fure,"
As we bid farewell with a wistful "Kwaherri."