{"id":43187,"date":"2025-07-21T12:00:20","date_gmt":"2025-07-21T00:00:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/?p=43187"},"modified":"2025-07-21T12:00:20","modified_gmt":"2025-07-21T00:00:20","slug":"inside-middle-earth-something-about-auckland","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/2025\/07\/21\/inside-middle-earth-something-about-auckland\/","title":{"rendered":"Inside Middle Earth: ‘Something About Auckland’"},"content":{"rendered":"

Just for something different, here are a couple of “inside NZ” (aka Middle Earth, albeit some time ago now!) photos of Auckland in the “sunny north” — finally seeing the sunshine, which I gather has decidedly not been the case of late. \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n

And to go with the photos, a poem I wrote around 2003, when I was struck by exactly the qualities the photos show.<\/p>\n

\"\"

Devonport, on Auckland’s North Shore, looking back toward the city centre.<\/p><\/div>\n

Something About Auckland<\/span><\/h4>\n

Shelly Bay, Midwinter 2003<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

There definitely is something<\/span>
\nabout Auckland,<\/span>
\nwith the sea lapping in<\/span>
\nalong a hundred little bays<\/span>
\nand blue<\/span>
\nshining all the way out<\/span>
\ninto the Gulf, with its scattering<\/span>
\nof islands,<\/span>
\nturquoise misting into cobalt<\/span>
\nand the sun sparkling<\/span>
\non every wave edge<\/span>
\ncurving in<\/span>
\nto a pohutakawa-tangled<\/span>
\nshore \u2014 boats bob, voices<\/span>
\ncalling one to the other<\/span>
\nin that last, little rush<\/span>
\nof landfall, unexpected echo<\/span>
\nof summer.<\/span><\/p>\n

(c) Helen Lowe<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"

Milford beach, also on Auckland’s North Shore<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Just for something different, here are a couple of “inside NZ” (aka Middle Earth, albeit some time ago now!) photos of Auckland in the “sunny north” — finally seeing the sunshine, which I gather has decidedly not been the case of late. \ud83d\ude42 And to go with the photos, a poem I wrote around 2003, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[19,10,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-43187","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-funstuff","category-general","category-poetry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43187","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=43187"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43187\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":43191,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43187\/revisions\/43191"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=43187"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=43187"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=43187"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}