On the drive down to Dunedin there was a scheduled phone call I needed to take. Cell service was iffy in that part of the country.

We stopped in Palmerston. Not Palmerston North, mind you, a city most famous for being famously dull. No, this is the OG, plain old Palmerston. According to Wikipedia, it’s mostly there because it’s where a couple of highways come together.

I found a public hotspot and sat in the drizzly rain while a shocking number of large, loud trucks passed by on one of those intersecting highways. Altogether unlovely. The call worked, more or less. Get in the car and move on down the road.

Except. All this took place next to this eternally sorrowful Zealandia statue, grieving her war dead. She’s really quite beautiful, and I hope the good people of Palmerston sometimes get to pause and appreciate her.