I was telling a work colleague about my apprehension regarding flying over The Pacific.  He, who also works at CNN, said, “Well, if your plane does disappear over the ocean at least you know we’ll cover it for months.”  For some reason, I found this oddly comforting.  I started a timer as we left 85th Street and West End Avenue in Manhattan.  I turned it off as we pulled into the driveway.  Thirty-one hours had elapsed.  

The house we’re staying at is rustic, expansive, and beautiful.  It would not be out of place featured on HGTV.  Ample windows allow unobstructed views of the surrounding mountains and Lake Wanaka.  The red, tin roof makes a glorious noise when it rains, as it did for much of the day.  Our second story bedroom windows panoramically overlook the mountains depicted in the images below.  

The scale of everything here seems to be off.  The mountains are taller than anything I’ve ever seen.  The water is colder, bluer, and deeper than anything back home. The country is roughly the size of Japan, but with the same amount of coast line as The United States.  Four million people populate this place, which means roughly half of New Zealand’s people would fit on the island of Manhattan.  In this vast land carved by repeated glaciation, little prepares you for the immensity of it all.  It’s like the gauges, rulers, and metaphors all need resetting.  One image has a house at the very, very bottom … almost too small to see.