Robyn Gallagher

The old fellas

In April 2006, the Cribs were my new favourite band. I’d stumbled across the Jarman brothers’ Yorkshirian blend of pop, rock and punk and decided I rather liked it. I became completely obsessed with the band and went on a mission to obtain as many of their recordings as I could.

I kept it a secret [...]

Gisborne part 2: The lady and the lake

“A Christmas carnival and the Poverty Bay rodeo on New Year’s Day are not to be missed,” urges Maurice Shadbolt, as I again consult the Shell Guide to New Zealand for something to do. As brilliant as his suggestion sounds, I was a couple of weeks too late. Maurice didn’t have any further recommended sightseeing [...]

Gisborne part 1: Mystery and history

Had I been naive to think there would be an overhead locker in which to store my laptop bag on the 19-seater Beechcraft 1900D aeroplane that was clanging its way to Gisborne? I can happily do without inadequate airline coffee or those weird “veggie crisps” things that Air New Zealand serves in flight. But I [...]

The awfulness of the previous period of time

In my iTunes library, I have songs that mention the ’70s, ’80s and ’90s, either looking back in anger or forward in excitement. “Goodbye, ’70s!” sneers Alison Moyet; “Heading for the ’90s, living in the ’80s,” notes one-hit wonders the Escape Club.

But what happened to the ’00s? Where were the songs from the late ’90s [...]

Good August and other months

I started the year by recreating the Cover Girl lipgloss ad task from “America’s Next Top Model”, thanks to Jo of Pretty Pretty Pretty. It is important for a modern girl to know how to work the camera.

I was lucky enough to go to Webstock, but due to the Current Economic Climate I had go [...]

Epilogue: Oh, that’ll do

Things from my notebook that I couldn’t wrangle into any sort of narrative

After I’d checked in at the hotel in Christchurch, I went up to my room, swiped my room card and opened what I thought was my hotel room. Instead I found myself in a small space, faced with three doors. I felt like [...]

Part 10: The case of the exploding bear

There comes a time in the life of any New Zealander from the generation known as “X”, when one must look back and wonder what happened to the Play School toys.

Big Ted, Manu and Humpty now live at Te Papa, the sign at the Otago Settlers Museum says. The bear, the wahine and the curious [...]

Part 9: Pleasantly weary

I didn’t meant to go to the New Zealand Sports Hall of Fame. It was an accident, I swear.

See, I’d been basing my travels on my 1969 edition of the Shell Guide to New Zealand (edited by Maurice Shadbolt, cover by Colin McCahon), so anything opened in the last 40 years was off my radar.

But [...]

Part 8: Everyone’s talking about it

The road to Bluff is desolate and beautiful. But it’s also so isolated. It seems like the sort of place where people would only willingly live if they had a really good reason, like running away from extreme levels of parking fines.

The sky was grey, but the landscape had a strange brightness to it. It [...]

Part 7: Provincially expensive

I had another day with a rental car. My mission this time was to explore historic Southland. The goal was to go as far south as Bluff, just so I could stand at most southern part of New Zealand (even though technically it’s not) just so I could say I’d done it.

My first stop was [...]