The business with her documentation went surprisingly quickly. Within a few days, she already had her own New Zealand bank account and a tax number. To all intents and purposes, she was ready to find a work and start enjoying her stay in this amazing country. Not that she didn't enjoy it before.
In all honesty, she didn't have to look for a job. She still had some money she had saved from the University job she had and her dad had sent some money to her as well. When he was sober enough, he worried about her, so it was his way of showing it. Kate really didn't want to touch that money but she held onto it nevertheless, just in case.
It was a week after her arrival in Auckland and she was still in this gorgeous city. She had spent most of her days roaming around the city, looking for the sights that Lonely Planet had described. She of course found most of them and was incredibly happy. She already had a lot of pictures in her tiny camera and she knew that she had to stop taking pictures.
The camera had belonged to her mom, who had just purchased it shortly before her death. Kate's dad didn't want anything to do with it, so Kate had just taken it. She would not have been able to afford it so easily by herself but she was glad she had it now. She had purposefully left her mom's favorite camera at home, the one that still had film in it. She didn't know if she had time and money for the pictures and this new digital camera was much more compact than her mom's favorite camera.
It was time for Kate to move on from Auckland. Of course she loved to be in the city and close to the beach and the blue clear water, but she needed to go somewhere more quiet. She wanted to see this beautiful country about which she had only heard stories. She had read a lot of suggestions from Lonely Planet and she had decided to go to the middle of North Island first. There were three big mountains there, still active volcanoes and she wanted to see them with her own eyes.
Currently, she was sitting on top of her suitcase in the bus station. It would take her to the nearest village, place called National Park. There she could find a place to sleep for few days while she spent her days hiking around and over these mountains. She was already getting excited.
It only took 5 hours to get to the Tongariro National Park and when she exited the bus, it was already dark outside. She was sad. She was hoping to see the great sights that were in her Lonely Planet book.
She sighed and took her belongings and walked towards her accommodation. The little village truly was small. Growing up in New York area, she had become used to the hustle and bustle of the big metropolis. But this in here was just few streets and rows of building in the middle of nowhere. And everything was quiet. She hadn't felt this quiet in her mind in a really long time.
She found her chosen hostel very soon. It wasn't too far from the bus stop and she walked there in no time. The owner greeted her with a smile and soon she had a key for her room and she made her way there.
The hostel was quite empty. Not a lot of people around. It was midweek, the owner had explained. And in summertime it was a little bit quieter in this tiny village than in the winter. Apparently there was a ski field close to the village and it kept the tourism industry around it busy most of the year.
To her luck, she had a room with a toilet and she didn't have to share it with anybody. It had a double bed in there and a little drawer but nothing else. Even though the room seemed a little bit run down, she was happy with her choice. The night was still young and she decided to go on a little walk around the small village. She knew it would not take much time.
Kate stepped outside and marveled the colder mountain air. The atmosphere around the mountains was not so damp and hot anymore and it was a sweet relief. The sky was clear and she could see all the stars.
She gasped loudly. There were so many stars in the sky! She could even see the Milky Way running across the sky! She had never seen so many stars. But then again she had grown up in the city most of her life. Yes, she remembered the trips to her father's cabin in Maine but she couldn't remember ever seeing anything like this.
The downside of this amazing sight was that there were no familiar stars for her to recognize. After full five minutes of gazing, she located the Orion. But that was about it. She smiled. At least something was familiar.
She had to pinch herself every time she remembered she was in New Zealand. The little she had seen so far had amazed her. It was of course somewhat similar to the landscapes of United States. But in the other hand, she had not travelled far away from her home state and she hadn't been everywhere yet, so these rolling hills and mountains she had seen from the bus window amazed her to no end.
She smiled to herself again and continued her journey through the sleepy, dark village. There was nobody on the streets walking, she was just alone and that feeling was exiting as well as a bit creepy. Anything could happen in the dark. Her face darkened at that thought. And she remembered the circumstances of her mom's death. She shuddered at the thought of it. All of a sudden the walk in the dark didn't seem like a good idea. She started going back to her hostel at a more hurried place than she intended.
She reached to her room just before her panic attack kicked in. It wasn't good. She locked herself to her tiny bathroom and tried to breathe as calmly as possible but it felt impossible. She shuddered against the cold wall of the shower cabin until she felt her muscles relaxing and her breathing coming more evenly.
All of a sudden she felt tired to the bone. Luckily, this time it was not as bad as it could have been. She had lived through worse episodes before. But she still couldn't stand it. She showered herself quickly, feeling the need to rid herself of the remnants of the attack. In the end, she crashed into her bed and slept. Yet even her sleep wasn't calm; it was full of memories and pain.
The morning greeted her with a headache. She grumbled when she opened her eyes. She didn't feel good. After a long while, she fished some painkillers out of her bag and swallowed them with a mouthful of water.
Since it was still dark outside, she decided not to move from the bed. There was no point, nothing would be open and she would have nowhere to go. She closed her eyes in an hope to find some peace of mind. In the end, she woke up with a start few hours later, when sun was shining into her eye.
"Shit," she grumbled. The sun was out now; the morning was in full swing. She glanced at her watch on her bedside table and it was about 9 o'clock. It was time to get up
She had planned to go to climb to the top of Mount Ruapehu, per the advice of the hostel owner. He was a local and knew it would be a nice thing to do on a nice summery January day as it was today. She opened the curtains and the world greeted her with light and a blue sky. It was indeed a perfect day. She quickly dressed herself and grabbed her small bag for short trips and made her way downstairs where she knew there would be breakfast waiting for her. And it was.
She ate quickly and almost next to nothing as she didn't have any appetite. Her still present migraine was the thing to blame for that. But she knew she had to eat at least something. Silently she prayed that the painkillers would kick in soon and she could actually enjoy her day.
Finishing up her orange juice, she stood from the table and went outside to wait for the shuttle to the mountain. It didn't take long at all for the small bus to arrive and she ended up being one of three people heading up the mountainside. The Japanese couple looked at her with a smile and greeted her with a nod. She smiled a polite smile to them and settled herself on a separate seat.
The journey to the mountain lasted for twenty minutes. When the small shuttle started climbing up the windy roads, Kate could see the views out of the window. Even with her headache, which was already receding a bit, it felt amazing. The vegetation around the active volcano was still short and sparse. She could not spot many trees, as they got higher. The hillsides were dotted with short bushes, grass and mostly volcanic rocks. When they reached the the ski field, it was just rocky surface everywhere. It looked like something out of a scifi movie – a planet in a galaxy far, far away.
To her surprise, there was a lot of cars and buses near the small ski field. The man from the hostel had said that there would be only few people up the mountain, so Kate looked quizzically at the driver, "So many tourists in here?"
Driver just shook his head. "No, not tourists. This belongs to a film crew."
"A film crew?"
"Yes, they are filming some kind of fantasy movie in here. I don't know exactly, mate."
"Fair enough," Kate nodded and kept looking outside of the window. Soon the shuttle stopped in front of the reception building and both Kate and the Japanese couple climbed out of the tiny bus.
She went in and purchased a ticket to go up the ski lifts. There was no snow around the ski field, only rocks and boulders.
Some shouting draw her attention further downhill. There was a big camera crew in the opening in the mountain. In the slopes of the lower mountain, there were people in golden armor running around with their swords and bows, playfully killing the people who were dressed as some kind of slimy monsters.
Kate just stared at all of this commotion with her mouth open.
To be fair, she had seen movies being shot around New York. Hell, there had even been a small crew filming a documentary around her university, but this was something new for her. Fantasy, the bus driver had said.
She was so immersed to watching the movie being shot from her viewpoint up the mountain, she did not notice a man stopping next to her.
"Hey," she heard a sudden voice next to her.
She jumped. She wasn't expecting that. She looked quickly at the source of the sound. He seemed very familiar but she couldn't pinpoint where.
The man's smile suddenly turned into confused grimace, until she saw him smiling again.
"It's you!" he beamed.
"It's me?" Kate asked with a little trepidation in her voice.
"It's you, from the beach. The green stone girl," he kept smiling.
"The Green stone girl?" Kate asked, still confused and still a bit anxious.
"I gave you the green stone, remember. I told you it was lucky," the man laughed.
"Ah. That. Yes." Kate nodded.
While the man seemed to be not so threatening, she still had her guard up. She didn't need anybody. Not today, not in the near future.
"Fancy seeing you here. Did you come up to see them film the movie as well?" He asked, a glint of joy in his eyes.
"No I didn't. I didn't know there was a film crew up here before I came here," she mumbled.
"You didn't?" he asked, surprised.
She only shook her head.
"So you are not here because of them like I am?" he asked.
"No," Kate answered yet again with a shake of her head.
"So you don't know what's going on then?"
"No, not really," she shook her head, focusing her attention to the filming.
"I just found out that they were filming here before I arrived. That's why I am here," He chuckled. "See, they are filming one of my childhood favorite books. The Lord of the Rings."
The title rang a bell in somewhere in her memories. She had read something about it when she was younger but she couldn't remember it. She wasn't a big fantasy fan to begin with. Scifi was more of her thing.
"I think I have heard of it. The books I mean."
"Good, good," the man mumbled. "I wanted to see this myself. It's an historic moment."
Kate was a bit confused at that. "Why it is historic. It's just a movie?"
The man raised his hand animatedly and started to tell a story. "No, believe me, it's not just a movie, it's a fantasy world. I used to escape into Middle-Earth when I was a child. So rich in detail, so wonderful. Nobody has ever dared to put these into movies, because it's almost impossible. Except that guy over there."
He pointed towards the direction of the film crew. Kate stared at them eyebrow raised.
"Peter Jackson. A director. I hope they will do the movie justice." He finished, settling himself next to her.
"Oh, okay." She nodded, not knowing what to say after this monologue. He seemed to be extremely interested in what was going down the mountain. Now, after hearing his description, she was starting to get interested as well.
"Were you going up the ski lifts, to Knoll's Ridge?" He asked.
Kate nodded with a shy smile. "I was planning to, I got distracted."
"Good, I was going there too." He stepped away from her, towards the lifts. "Shall we?"
She stood there for a second, deciding what to do. On one hand, she didn't need company. But on the other hand, she could put up with this guy for a little longer.
She nodded shyly. "Sure, why not?"
She wasn't really sure what was going to happen, but she decided to go with the flow. Having a coffee on top of an active volcano didn't sound too bad. She turned towards the man to look at him. He nodded and smiled at her again as they started to walk towards the lifts.