Stories from the Road – Ship Creek Beach, New Zealand

We pull the RV off the highway on New Zealand’s southeastern shores for no better reason than the kids are starting to bicker and I need to use the restroom. The temperature reflects layers of sharp, intermittent breezes bursting from Antarctica and a bright, hot summer sun. Sand spills into the parking lot; weathered driftwood lines the walkways.

 

As we read the informational placards about brackish water, a kind woman interrupts to tell us there’s a pod of Hector’s dolphins over the dunes, swimming just offshore. Come quick.

 

So, we scratch our informal worldschooling plan and race toward the beach. Past the break, we focus on rare, diminutive dolphins jumping, surfing, and surfacing in tandem. We watch them in wonder. A crowd of travelers takes video by hand and selfie stick.

 

“Let’s go in,” my thirteen-year-old daughter, Lorna, says to me, in her puffy jacket.

 

“Gosh, we should,” I reply, standing beside her in my fleece and leggings—as if someone should, but not the forty-seven-year-old mother that I have become. Not the woman who sees every potential hazard around her. Not the woman who has a plan to get to the town of Haast by lunchtime.

 

“We might never get this chance again,” she says.

 

And in me is this cavalcade of why nots: Sweet Jesus, that would be cold. Doesn’t this current come directly from an ice cap? I would ruin the videos and photos of the tourists—maybe become a subject of their videos. What if the surf is too strong? What if I can’t swim out past that surf break?

 

But when I look at her, I know what I should do. The voice inside that says Don’t do it is the voice that urges me to play it small. It’s time to reclaim my outside voice.

 

I don’t see any offending offshore rocks or signs of a riptide. Secure in the knowledge that my daughter is a competitive swimmer, I take off my fleece, T-shirt, and shoes and stand next to her in my sports bra and leggings.

 

“Come on.”

 

A man in a down parka tells us we should make clicking noises to attract the dolphins once we’re in. Duly noted.

 

I stand for a few waves to ice my feet and realize a slow entry is a bad idea. Instead, we watch for a break in the waves and dive into the frigid turquoise waters of the Tasman Sea to swim toward a pod of wild dolphins.

 

We time our entry between wave sets and easily swim past the break. The cold takes my breath away; I inhale in gulps. Once I can finally breathe with some success—about fifty feet offshore—I start making a frantic clicking noise and look back to my husband on the beach, who directs us toward the dolphins.

 

Lorna and I swim side by side for more than ten minutes next to these gorgeous creatures, squealing with shared delight. We can feel and hear them swirling underneath us—their click-click sounds at our feet. Suddenly, five feet away, a dolphin breaches, pauses to give us the side-eye, and dives below.

 

My husband meets us at the shore with our dry clothes. I don’t even feel the cold. I just feel alive.

 

I’m finding the will to get uncomfortable—to even spend hours reheating myself—for the chance to greet a dolphin in the Antarctic currents. To let go. To share wonder with my daughter. To interact bravely with the world. To look her in the eye and know that I’m striving to be the kind of adult I want my daughter to become.

 

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