The past is all around us

Here's a tip for anyone driving north from New Plymouth to Auckland: leave route 3 at Otorohanga and take route 39 to Ngaruawahia. Trust me, it's a great way of avoiding the delays around Hamilton - and you can practice your Maori pronunciation as you do it! Like most NZ country roads it's almost deserted.

Tuesday morning I had a pre-breakfast walk to look at the 'back beach' - almost black, volcanic sand with off-shore, tree-covered islands - then visited the garden project of John and Brenda's son. A vast smallholding behind a suburban bungalow, taking in a steep valley. Chickens ('chooks', of course, in this part of the world), ducks, asparagus and a whole range of fruit trees. Then on the road, winding through the limestone gorges, mostly covered in native trees and tree-ferns, but with the occasional cattle or sheep station ('Harangi cheviots' was one unexpected sign). I stopped for lunch at a new cafe on the outskirts of Te Kuiti - self-proclaimed 'sheep-shearing capital of the world'. Last time Diane and I tried to get lunch in this town it seemed pretty much closed down - I guess we'd called outside of the shearing season. The new cafe is a good example of NZ at its best: superb coffee, imaginative sandwiches and melt-in-the-mouth carrot cake.

Back in Auckland I fund myself leading a workshop on preaching with polynesian clergy and lay-ministers. I was cross-examined by one woman who I later found to be a top human-rights lawyer. The evening ended with a chance to begin to catch up with Winston Halapua, archbishop of polynesia and the main reason for my trip. He's in Auckland for a couple of days of meetings, then back to Fiji. He seems to spend a great proportion of his time in the air. When I first knew him (in 1974!) he had an 'afro' hairstyle with a mass of black curls. Now he's venerable and there are just a few wisps of grey.

I'm staying at the college of St John the Evangelist, the first theological institution in NZ and now incorporating the Methodist as well as the Anglican churches. It's setting is quite superb. I am sitting at a lbrary window, looking over the varied greens of a patch of native bush, then beyond to a field with horses and in the distance Auckland harbour and one of its islands. The colleges incorporates some of the oldest buildings in Auckland, including the chapel, built by Bishop Selwyn in the mid C19. One of my meetings yesterday was in Mrs Selwyn's kitchen, with a vast fireplace bearing the date 1846. The college has its own graveyard - something I'm thinking of instigating on my return to Edgehill! It's actually quite a moving place. The fresh grave is of Archbishop Sir Paul Reeves, former Governor General of NZ. There's just a simple wooden cross, with his own pectoral cross wrapped around it.

It's not just my Tongan past that's catching up with me here. Yesterday I preached at the college eucharist. As people streamed into the chapel someone said, 'perhaps you'd like to meet two other visitors from the UK'. It turned out to be Trevor Lloyd who was my Anglican counterpart in Wealdstone in the 80s. A leading liturgist he is here as a consultant with the NZ Church.