Next a nice flight by Air New Zealand to Auckland. I arrived in my room to find a large bouquet of flowers and a note from a TV friend who belongs to the Beaumont Society in England and had been told of my coming by another friend and customer of mine on the South Island. New Zealand is made up of two large islands you may remem- ber. So the next morning we got acquainted, took a ferry ride across Auckland harbor and walked around town. That evening we had dinner together after walking all over trying to find an open restaur- ant. N.Z. is a very conservative and in some ways old fashioned country and they almost roll up and store the sidewalks in Auckland on Sunday evenings. "After all, who needs sidewalks, you ought to be in Church where you belong!" The following day we drove down through the North Island to Rotorua which is in the geothermal belt and we went through the geyser and steam pool area where the Maoris for generations have done their laundry and cooking in the natural hot waters. We also took a nice swim in the hotels hot steam pool which was a very relaxing though sulfurous experience.

Then by air to Wellington, a quick 2 hour drive around the city which is beautiful hills and habor like San Francisco and Hong Kong

and then back to the airport for a flight to Christchurch on the south island. I was met there by Joan whose article about her acting career was in TVia No. 63. She showed me around town, took me to visit another one of our girls who had just had surgery and for whom I had brought some Chevalier merchandise down with me. I also got to at- tend one of "Gabrielle's" performances that night. She does the whole "singing to records" bit with beautiful costumes and very close synchronization with the records. It goes over so well that if anyone in the audience didn't know that "John" was Gabrielle, they would only suppose that some woman in costume had sung for them. I wonder if they don't miss half the fun that way. It was very good to have a chance to meet two of my girls (as their brothers) whom I have been in correspondence with and to talk it out "in the flesh." It made each of us more real to the other.

We went out to Te Anau which is a beautiful lake on the west side of the south island right up against the snow capped mountains that form the backbone ridge of the island. We had a bus ride up through those mountains and down to Milford Sound where we took a launch ride down the fjord. It is exactly the same sort of geology as the fjords of Norway steep glaciated valleys that were flooded by the ocean as the land sank enough to bring the ocean in. Sea going tourist ships come in about 30 miles from the sea between the nearly

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