Comings & Goings: Comings & Goings Travel

New Zealand in 30 pictures

Wendy Weitzel — Wed, 12 Nov 2025 02:42:24 GMT

New Zealand has long held a special place in my heart. I went there as a 4-H exchange student when I was 16, and returned with my husband, Scott, nine years later. I kept in touch with two farm families I stayed with, and have enjoyed some of their visits to California.

As I noted in my Australia post on Sunday, I continue to work remotely with some excellent support back home. This free, bonus content is because people asked for it; it does not interfere with my regular business coverage. Feel free to ignore them, or read instructions in the Australia post on how to edit your subscription to keep these off-topic photo-essays from entering your in box.

We went to Australia for a month, then New Zealand for a month, then finished with four days near the Great Barrier Reef back in Australia before heading to Indonesia. That’s why these two travel posts are so close together. Future ones will likely be about once a month, as we continue this globe-circling adventure.

In New Zealand, our route started in Christchurch on the South Island, where we picked up a crappy camper van. We spent two frigid, wet nights in the leaky, broken lime-green Jucy van until we switched gears and traded it in for a car. We had to make an unplanned trip to Queenstown to do this. Then we found lodging in Haast, Hokitika, Nelson and Blenheim before taking a ferry to the North Island. Up north, we stayed in windy Wellington, Hawkes Bay, Lake Taupo, Cambridge, Whangarei and Auckland.

All of these photos and videos are mine, shown in the order they were taken, starting on the South Island. Tip: If you see three dots at the end of the email, it means it’s truncated. Click on “View entire message” to continue.

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The Southern Alps on the South Island of New Zealand could be seen on our flight from Melbourne, Australia, to Christchurch, NZ, on Sept. 28.

ABOVE: Christchurch is a gorgeous city that had to rebuild after a magnitude 6.3 earthquake hit in 2011. This shot was taken in the city’s botanical gardens. BELOW: A blue penguin builds a nest under a boat in Oamaru. They come to shore at nighttime to do this.

Oamaru is home to a steampunk museum. This was one of the trippy rooms.

Downtown Oamaru had some interesting buildings.

The sun sets over Oamaru Harbour. Yes, the water is that blue.

A dock on Oamaru Harbour.

OK, one last image from Oamaru Harbour. My adult sons are probably saying, “There’s another of Mom’s photos of colorful boats.”

The view from Steamer Wharf in Queenstown. This place reminded me of Lake Tahoe, especially the cold temperatures in early spring.

We stopped in Mount Aspiring National Park on our drive from Queenstown to Haast.

Hokitika Gorge was gorgeous! All of the water was this color.

The beach in Hokitika has several wood sculptures.

Rolling green hills filled with livestock are a common sight in New Zealand. We saw these and got the next several shots on our drive from Hokitika to Nelson.

We walked along the Maitai River in Nelson.

Moss on a tree at the Brook Waimarama Sanctuary in Nelson. The sanctuary is like a mini Jurassic Park. They’ve eliminated non-native species as much as possible.

Blenheim is in the Marlborough region, known for its sauvignon blanc wines. Here’s a view from the Wither Hills Winery tasting room. Their wine wasn’t bad, either.

Vineyards and hills in Marlborough.

Marlborough vineyards and hills in the other direction.

On to the North Island, here’s a scene from the Wellington Botanic Garden. Wellington is the country’s capital city.

ABOVE: Two orphan lambs at the farm owned by my friends Richard and Helen of Hawkes Bay. I’ve known the family since I was 16. FIRST VIDEO BELOW: We visited Richard’s brother Ian at his holiday home near Lake Taupo. He and his partner Heather took us to Huka Falls. SECOND VIDEO BELOW: Craters of the Moon is a geothermal area near Lake Taupo.

Blue Springs were recently reopened to the public after being closed to recover from tourist abuse. It’s not far from Hobbiton.

ABOVE and BELOW: Hobbiton is the movie set where “The Hobbit” and parts of “The Lord of the Rings” trilogy were filmed. Our tour included a pint of ale at the Green Dragon Inn, shown, (after our second breakfast, of course).

Whangarei Falls. The city wasn’t our favorite but it had some nice spots like this.

Auckland was our final NZ destination before flying to Cairns, Australia. Here’s the harbour, with swim lanes. There’s also a diving platform. The Sky Tower (similar to Seattle’s Space Needle) lights up neon colors at night.

30 images from Down Under

Wendy Weitzel — Mon, 03 Nov 2025 01:50:20 GMT

My travelogue has been quiet lately but I continue to work remotely with some excellent support back home.

I had at least one person cancel their subscription after I sent my last travel post (on Sept. 4) about French Polynesia and Fiji, saying they didn’t want to pay for a travel blog. Let me be clear: This is bonus content. It’s free, and you don’t have to read it. It is not getting in the way of me posting business columns at least weekly.

I have created a new section: Comings & Goings Travel. If you do not want to receive these travel posts, you can customize your subscription by going to the notifications area of your subscription page and turning off “Comings & Goings Travel” from there. Likewise, for my out-of-town friends who care only about the travel, you can flip the Comings & Goings button. I can’t do this for you but if you are having trouble, let me know.

My newly retired husband and I spent September on Australia’s east coast, between Brisbane and Melbourne, and October in New Zealand. Then, we went back to Australia for four days to Cairns, on the north coast, to see the Great Barrier Reef. It shortened our travel time to Indonesia, where we are now. I wanted Australia to be complete before I posted about it, which is why it’s been a while. These images are posted in order from when we started in Brisbane to when we concluded in Cairns. I’ll fill you in on New Zealand in a few days. Stay tuned!

Note: Because of the length of this email, you may see three dots at the end. Click on “View entire message,” because if you’ve made it that far, you don’t want to miss the underwater Great Barrier Reef photos.

All but the underwater photos were taken by me. Those photos were by the boat’s photographer, and were all things that we saw while snorkeling that day.

Streets Beach is a human-made attraction. This is just one part of the lagoon.

Scott and I were in Brisbane right before its Brisbane Festival. Here, we’re under a colorful blowup arch on one of the city’s bridges.

View of downtown Brisbane from a ferry that crosses the river.

An Australian White Ibis in the botanical gardens.

Sunset over Coffs Harbour.

I try to find yoga when I travel. Here’s the sunrise view from a studio in Forster.

View of the ocean from Forster.

Sydney at night.

Sydney Harbour with my friend Annette and her husband Peter. Annette was a Lions Club exchange student who stayed with my family in Grass Valley when we were in high school.

Surfers at dusk in Woollongong.

Claude and Maude are the resident Rainbow Lorikeets at the place we stayed in the Fitzroy neighborhood of Melbourne. They came to visit every morning after we put out a handful of plain sunflower seeds provided by our host.

Melbourne has embraced graffiti as art.

Windmills at the Melbourne Museum.

Phar Lap is the most famous Australian race horse He lifted the country’s spirit during the Great Depression. Here he is – stuffed!

Sunrise over Cairns.

A Masked Lapwing in the Cairns mudflats. The city doesn’t really have a beach. It has a lagoon, kind of like Brisbane’s human-made beach and pool.

Michaelmans Cay, above, and in video, below.

The giant clams were amazing. Probably the favorite thing we saw snorkeling.

Our final day was spent at the Cairns Aquarium. This Red-Clawed Crayfish was my favorite tenant.

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Comings & Goings in French Polynesia and Fiji

Wendy Weitzel — Thu, 04 Sep 2025 00:29:36 GMT

I am so fortunate to be able to travel and work remotely. Readers, tipsters, assistants, friends and family all make this possible, helping confirm things back home.

As I have mentioned, my husband retired from UC Davis on July 1. We hit the road on July 6. I’ve posted photos of Alaska, Hawaii and Tahiti. This post will include photos from the island of Moorea in French Polynesia; Korotogo on Fiji’s main island of Viti Levu, and Drawaqa Island in Fiji’s Yasawa Island Group.

Note: The photos make this email long. If it’s truncated, click on “View entire message” to continue reading the post.

A public beach on Moorea. Although we stayed across the street from the water, the beach had no public access. We had to rent a car to go to this beach.

After five days on Tahiti, we spent seven days on Moorea. We found French Polynesia beautiful, with sharp mountain peaks and brilliant blue waters. It was also full of mosquitoes, some that carry Dengue Fever. Our open-air bungalow was basic. We slept under a mosquito net and wore lots of DEET. The food and lodging were expensive, especially compared to Fiji.

A side road led to this view on Moorea.

We took a cooking class at Food & CookLab, which was recommended to us by Brennan Flemming of Davis’ Dunloe Brewing. We learned about the culture, the importance of organic farming, and how to make several dishes native to French Polynesia. It was a highlight of our week. Below, I shred coconut the traditional way.

In Fiji, we stayed for a week in Korotogo, on the Coral Coast. We paddled and waded in water across the street from Kaila Na Ua Resort, where we stayed. Our room had a kitchenette. Twice, we rode the bus into the larger town of Sigatoka to buy groceries and supplies. Long-term travel requires a tight budget. We typically make breakfast and lunch ourselves, and dinner a couple of times a week

Coral Coast, Korotogo, Fiji. (All photos by Wendy Weitzel)

The bus ride to Sigatoka was inexpensive. Fijians are super friendly, always yelling an enthusiastic “Bula!” when they pass.

There is an indoor and outdoor market in Sigatoka, and several grocery stores. We made vegetarian meals because the meat section of the nicest market smelled bad.

The snorkeling in Fiji was unbelievable, even compared to Hawaii. I don’t have more than a lanyard pouch for my phone, so I didn’t take it too deep. We enjoyed paddleboarding, where I had a 5-foot white-tipped reef shark swim under me in shallow water. I didn’t get a picture of that, either. There are lots of blue sea stars everywhere.

Paddleboarding at high tide in a Korotogo lagoon.

Blue Linckia sea star.

Half underwater shot in the lagoon.

A spearfisher wades in at low tide in Korotogo, Fiji.

We spent three days at a homey and lovely resort in the Yasawas. Barefoot Manta Resort on Drawaqa Island was a highlight. They provided snorkeling gear – even a mask with prescription lenses for my husband, which made a big difference. We got to eat traditional food and participate in a kava ceremony. My favorite dish was Kokoda, a ceviche-like dish of fish marinated in lime and served in coconut milk. It was very similar to the Poisson Cru we learned to make on Moorea but that wasn’t cold cooked in an acetic marinade, so it was truly raw.

Sunset Beach on Drawaqa Island, Fiji.

View from atop Drawaqa Island, where we hiked.

Sunset view from our bure at Barefoot Manta Resort.

A bird takes a rest near our foot bath outside our bure.

Mud crab.

Kava ceremony.

It’s fun to share my adventures but I can’t promise that all my travel photos will come with this much explanation. I’m a business columnist first. This is bonus content, and I am not getting any perks for mentioning places. Thanks for reading and supporting Comings & Goings. Bula!

Comings & Goings gets some northern exposure

Wendy Weitzel — Tue, 05 Aug 2025 02:06:03 GMT

The view from our apartment as I wrote this column today in Seward, Alaska. (Photo by Wendy Weitzel)

Greetings from Seward, Alaska! I’ve been working remotely since July 6. You saw my report on Seapine Brewing in Seattle on July 9. On July 10, my husband and I started traveling around Alaska.

As I mentioned earlier, Scott retired from his staff research position at the UC Davis vet school on July 1, after working nearly 40 years at the university (counting his time in as a student). But I’m not retiring from this gig anytime soon. I love it too much.

Our routine has been that as I write my column, Scott goes on a hike, does the laundry, or plans an upcoming adventure. Counting this one, I’ve written seven columns in the four weeks since we started traveling. On Tuesday, we fly to Honolulu for a few days to visit our younger son and daughter-in-law. (Brock is in grad school at UH Manoa, studying biotech.)

I wanted to share some of the photos and videos I’ve taken on our trip so far. After that, read on for some regularly scheduled Comings & Goings. Thank you to the spies helping me verify facts and take photos back home, along with the many awesome tipsters I’ve gained since I started writing this column in 2001.

Note: Because of the length added by the extra photos, you’ll have to click the “View entire message” to continue reading all of today’s business news.

Scott and I pack light when we travel. Here’s when our older son dropped us off at the Sacramento airport on July 6. (Photo by Evan Wetzlich)

Below, a bald eagle dive bombed me and finally landed on a tree at Chilkoot Lake outside of Haines, Alaska. (Video by Wendy Weitzel)

Sea lions are perched on a buoy with the Mendenhall Glacier in the background in the Lynn Canal, outside of Juneau, Alaska. (Photo by Wendy Weitzel)

“The Whale Project” in Juneau is a fountain commemorating the Alaska’s 50th year as a state. I fooled a lot of people on Facebook when I made this my profile pic. Below is a real breeching humpback whale that we witnessed on Sunday in Resurrection Bay, outside of Seaward, Alaska. (Photo and video by Wendy Weitzel)

Above, a moose and her calf graze in a lake at Denali National Park. (Video by Wendy Weitzel)

It was too cloudy to see Mt. Denali when we were at Denali National Park. Later, however, we saw it clearly from Talkeetna. The adorable town was the inspiration for the “Northern Exposure” TV Series in the 1990s. (Photo by Wendy Weitzel)

It’s 11 p.m. in Talkeetna, Alaska. Time for sunset! (Photo by Wendy Weitzel)

Turnagain Arm. (Photo by Wendy Weitzel)

Above, a rescued grizzly bear plays in the water at the Alaska Wildlife Conservation Center. (Video by Wendy Weitzel)

There is a bison breeding program at the Alaska Wildlife Conservation Center. It is the only species at the center that’s reintroduced into the wild. (Photo by Wendy Weitzel)

Above, ice falls from the Aialik Glacier in Kenai Fjords National Park in Alaska. (Video by Wendy Weitzel)

We saw rainbow crosswalks in Seward, shown here, and Juneau, Alaska. (Photo by Wendy Weitzel)

And now, some business news …