I think that's a moiré pattern.

About five minutes ago, just before starting to write the text for this post, I looked up 'retirement quotes' in Google. I was hoping to find an appropriate one. After I read through the 30 Best Retirement Quotes without finding one that really impressed me, I decided against continuing my research with the next item down on the page, the 500 Best Retirement Quotes. Way too much work. And if the top 30 hadn't done it, well, what were the chances? 

I decided then to just wing it, and tell you what I've been thinking about of late.  

The subject for today begins with retirement of course, but is really (yes, again) about appreciating the world we've been given.  I've talked several times in past posts about how I now have time to really see the wonder of the world around me.  I've admired a bee's wing^, and been awestruck by seeing the Alpha Centauri binary separated into its A and B stars*.  I have continued to be amazed by our world, even when I am doing nothing more than sitting on our sofa and looking out our balcony door. That's what you'll learn about today if you continue to read.    

This was my view as I sat and looked. 

("Okay," you say to yourself.  "Big deal. What's he going to be amazed at this time?") 

Well, I'll tell you. 

The picture below is a close-up of the fabric that makes up the sheer curtains you just saw.  

("So what?," you might say. "The curtain hangs there in the window to provide a bit of privacy while still allowing plenty of light into a room. What's there to talk about?" )   

Well, I think there is plenty.  I might start off by wondering about the machinery that weaves something so fine, but that's not what I want to talk about right now. I prefer to point out the weird patterns that are visible on the folds of the fabric that you see over on the left side of the sheer curtain.  Go back up and look again if you didn't notice them during your first viewing.  

As I said in the title of this post, I think they're showing a moiré pattern.

A moiré pattern (I looked it up) can be produced by overlaying two identical (or even similar) pieces of a mesh (or other things) and moving them in relation to one another, or by having the observer move while they stand still.   (Wikipedia) 

In this case, the sheer behind the heavy drapes in front of our balcony door is constantly moving in the breeze and as it folds back on itself, sometimes several times, diffraction of the light coming through the weave of the fabric results in an interference pattern. This pattern takes all sorts of shapes, as you can see in the picture below and is of course, constantly changing. (This is a close up of the first picture. I think this looks a little like a display of weird neckties.)    

Diffraction simply means that some of the light at any given point bends a little if it passes the edge of something or if it goes through a slit. When there are lots of these slits or holes, as there are in this sheer mesh, the bent light from each of the tiny holes interferes with the bent light coming from other holes, and produces alternating dark and light bands, depending on whether the wavelengths of the bent light are adding to each other or diminishing one another. 

This effect is very common phenomenon, but still wondrous.  We are seeing a demonstration of how a component of the universe functions, and on our curtains of all places!  If that isn't worth appreciating, I don't know what is.  

Now, if you're in the dark at all about how wave lengths of light add together or diminish one another, think about this next explanation. It's something that I had forgotten, but that Jeanne had remembered as we talked about this post.   

Out at Bethell Beach one day, we watched the Waitakere River (only about a foot deep at that point) flow into the Tasman Sea. We noticed that the waves coming together from the two sources sometimes came together and formed an even bigger bit of wave, or they came together and cancelled each other out, or even disappeared. At certain areas, we could actually see patterns of standing waves. It all depended on what part of the waves, the high part or the low part, met the other waves.  

When the two high parts met, the new wave got larger, a high part and a low part evened each other out, and two low parts meant little or no water at all.  

The very same thing happens with light, but we see the result as either bright or dark bands instead. I could sit on the sofa and see physics revealed, just like at Bethells. But my feet didn't get wet nor was there sand between my toes. Does it get any better?

I hope that you now agree that this was worth reading. And it wasn't that long, after all.  

I said at the beginning of this post that I had been unsuccessful in finding an appropriate quote with which to start. If those 30 were the best there are, well then, it seems to me that almost anyone should be able to come up with a reasonably good one.  So, I thought about it and came up with my own quotes. Here they are. They're about acknowledging, and about giving thanks. 

During retirement, contemplate your own personal moiré effect.  Consider and acknowledge how the highs and lows of your life experiences have patterned your soul.  

And its corollary, (Okay, you're right, it doesn't precisely fit the definition of a corollary, but it sort of follows.)  

During retirement, if your life has been great, be thankful because you ought to be, and if your life has been tough, be thankful because it's almost over.  

I don't care if my quotes ever make it into the top 500 retirement quotes, much less the top 30, but that's okay. I have said since I was a kid that I would never, ever, ever, want to be a famous person, and in that, I have succeeded spectacularly.   -djf

-Just in case you're interested, here are the sites I referenced above:

^ https://fostersoe.blogspot.com/2021/01/gee-bees.html

*https://fostersoe.blogspot.com/2022/08/wonders-in-night-sky.html

  

Our South Island adventure winds down.

Today's post will be the last one detailing our South Island adventure.  It sure was a remarkable one. 

This first picture is a shot of the price list at a race track we visited.  You can have plenty of fun here as you can see.  

I don't know if you noticed it in the previous pictures, but 'loo with a view' is mentioned under the No-Drive heading on the sign. 

They have quite a few restrooms, for both the ladies and gentlemen that have windows all along the side facing the racetrack. That way, if a race is in progress, you don't have to miss any of the action if you're called away by personal needs.   

The glass is of course, one-way, and all the rooms have themes.  The ladies are done up with very fancy decorations; talk about throne-rooms.  

The picture below shows one of the men's rooms.  I don't usually take photos of such things, but this one is rather unique.  When used properly, each instrument plays a tune for as long as you're using it.  

Lake Wanaka. This is way more beautiful in person.  The sun was warm and the air just slightly cool. I'm sure my mouth was hanging open.  

We were treated like royalty at our lunch stop.

Alan, our bus driver, tour guide, and new friend, got to show off his home town of Alexandra, complete with its famous clock on the hill.  He told us stories about having helped to install it many years ago.  

We discovered on this trip that Barry and Janet, who live at our village and organize the tours that we residents can take, and Alan and Angela, their business partners, were true experts at providing each of us with a personalized experience. We could choose the type of room we wanted, there were choices to be made at all the meals, and special diets were accommodated. The tour was planned in such a way that there were times of rest after major events. And they never forgot how important the lava-trees are when traveling. Jeanne and I were more than impressed and thank them heartily for giving us such an experience. 

I've enjoyed sharing all these pictures and experiences of our South Island adventure. Interesting pictures have been a little harder to obtain since Covid came into the world and my travel was restricted. There were times when I worried a bit about what I could build a post from. It's been nice during these past months having an easily accessible file of photos to show you.  

It may be just a little harder for a time in the future as well, to come up with new places to photograph. So many places have been damaged by tropical cyclone Gabrielle. Many places, even around our suburb of Henderson, have trees, or parts of trees down, and mud is everywhere the water was at its highest point. It will be quite some time before life is back to normal.  

I'll be out there looking though, and bringing you what I think may be interesting views from like-no-other-place-on-earth New Zealand. I hope you'll keep coming back to see them.   

Just a quick additional note regarding the cyclone damage.  I was out walking just after the storm and was enormously impressed with the level of activity.  Two-person teams were seemingly everywhere I went, putting up barriers at danger points and taking pictures and notes about what they saw. It's obvious that prioritizing will have to be done when rebuilding, repairing, or cleaning up after the damage. But the first step is to have a clear picture of where to send the resources. And I think they're doing a great job at accomplishing that goal.     -djf

An evening cruise and dinner

Our South Island tour is approaching its end.  But, there is still plenty to see before we fly back home to Auckland, and that starts with this evening's ride aboard the Earnslaw, which will carry us down and across Lake Wakapitu to the biggest and best buffet dinner I have ever enjoyed.  

We got down to the dock a little early and saw this. A beautiful boat but not really what we were expecting.  Well, let's wait a bit....

'

Okay, here we go.  This looks like our boat.

The Earnslaw was launched in 1912.  It is coal-fired steam ship.  

I'm on the main deck looking down at the workings of the engine. You can see that there are two levels down there. The lowest is where you see the men who operate it.

We have arrived and are looking forward to dinner.  

Just look at that view.  

The closer we get, the better it looks. 

Before we go in, I look back over my shoulder.  

We had a great dinner.  Without a doubt, the biggest and best buffet I have ever seen.  

I worried a little when we were all seated that it might take half the night before our table would be called to join the buffet line, but was amazed when they announced that we all could make our way into the buffet rooms.  I discovered multiple tables of food that speeded the crowds through.  It was the best organized buffet ever.  

Later, I wandered around the grounds.  There was a sheep herding demonstration going on behind one of the buildings but I wasn't interested. Instead, I walked and shot a few pictures and let the breezes cool me after our large dinner.  

And we got to ride on it!  

The waves were fairly rough on the way back, but it rode very smoothly. Impressive, to say the least.  

We are returning to Queenstown.

Our South Island tour is coming to a close.  Tomorrow we'll start heading back to Dunedin in a round-about way, and once there, we'll fly home to Auckland.  It's been an amazing trip. 

Be watching next week for my last installment.  -djf

A day-trip from Queenstown

After taking a short detour from our South Island adventure due to the recent floods, with this post we have once again returned to our journey.  

After resting up a bit in Queenstown, we were once again ready to see some sights.  Today's adventure took us first, to a historic gold-mining town, and then to a high bridge for a look at the very up-to-date sport of bungy jumping.  

Are you ready to come along?  Well, then, let's do it.  We'll return to Queenstown this afternoon and take a cruise across a lake to a sheep station where we'll have dinner.  You'll have to return to my site next week though to see that. (I've already worked on it a bit and the pictures are impressive.) 

Here we are in Arrowtown.  Back in1862, it became a booming gold rush destination for thousands. The very first shipment of gold that left town in January of '63 weighed 748 pounds.   

Although the gold rush was long ago, you can still rent pans and go down to the Arrow River that runs through the town and try your luck.  To insure that we found some gold during our visit, we stopped into one of the gold store/jewelers in town and bought our grandsons each a vial filled with pieces of sand-sized gold.    

This is the bakery.  The good smells drew us in and we left with a couple of freshly baked, French-style baguettes.  In my opinion, there are few things better.  We bought some coffee from another place, found a spot to sit down, and marveled at our comfort.  

A painting in the coffee shop.

Cars look somewhat out of place here, don't they? 

  I can imagine horses and wagons here.  

Let's get back on the bus. We've got places to go....

Notice that the 'bungy bridge' has come into view. We're approaching the A.J. Hackett Bungy/Zipline Center above the Kawarau River.

Here we are, out of the bus and in the center. Well, who's going to jump?

The moment of truth. Will she do it? 

There she goes.

Almost at full extension

She's on her way back up. Quite a bounce, huh? 

The jumpers are taken from the cord into the boat.  

I've seen this woman and her child go down the zipline several times now.  The woman, on the left of course, started out by going down in tandem with her child. Then, confidence gained, they split up and went down separately.  The third time, the woman rode down like Superman flies, laying flat with her arms stretched out ahead of her. She rode her fourth ride in the chair,  but backwards. This is their fifth ride and here, she is doing it upside down as you see.  Her daughter was content to use the foreword facing chair each time.  

Wow, we've had a full day of fun and it's a long ways from being over.  We're only about 15 km or so from Queenstown so it won't take long to get back to our hotel.  We have a busy evening planned featuring a ride on a 110 year-old steam ship. Don't worry, no baling required.  

Be sure to check in next week for those great photos.  -djf