States of flux

A week is a long time in politics, I believe, but it's no time at all on a blog, especially when there's a big trip looming and essential pre-travel tasks to be ticked off. Like throwing out a bunch of ancient lipsticks, tidying my shoes, knocking off a bit of pruning, that sort of thing. There have also been some industry events to attend: promoting the Southern Great Barrier Reef, tramping in Hawaii, the latest developments in New Caledonia. All possibilities, all promising, and all - this bit is important - offering drinks, canapes and the opportunity to do some schmoozing, gossiping and catching up with travel buddies. (I've also, I have to confess, been lured away from blogging by the siren call of Instagram, which also has the novelty factor at the moment.)

The States seem to be something of a trend with my colleagues at the moment - road trips particularly. RVing through Dakota and neighbouring states, for example; and a C&W/jazz tour from Nashville to New Orleans. I haven't been to any of those places but, having written all my various commissioned stories, I've been toying with some unused material from my tour of Washington state a couple of years ago. It's impossible, and undesirable, to cram everything on a trip into a single story; and given the smallish market for travel in NZ, it's inevitable that the suppliers of some of the elements of a busy famil will, after a while, write off that Kiwi free-loader as a bad job. And then, months - years - later, out of the blue they'll get a pdf or a link to a story that features their business and all will be well with the world again. That's how I like to look at it, anyway.

So, the lovely people at the Whale Museum on San Juan Island will finally get their due; and that very comfortable apartment in Friday Harbor with the great view over all the boats; and the boyishly enthusiastic directors of the quirky museums at Bellingham and Yakima Valley; and the nice man who attempted to teach me to fly-fish at the Canyon River Ranch on a sunny autumn afternoon... But not the people who took me on a walking ghost tour of Yakima, because that was just silly (though amazingly, it's still running) - ghosts, pft. You might just as well try to whip up interest in vampires or zombies. Oh, wait...