SOMETIMES you just feel that you were born too early for all the exciting opportunities on offer, like bungy jumping and sky diving, all heavily advertised at our current stopover, Queenstown in New Zealand. But leaving the fun behind and exploring the countryside and farming ways have been every bit exciting to us.

Quite revelatory to me has been the contribution the Chinese have made to this country’s culture and history. Arrowtown, a centre of the gold mining frenzy of the 19th century, still has a few of the shacks that housed the hopeful young immigrants all those years ago.

All from one rural area of China, they supplemented their diets with fruit and vegetables grown around their huts, then later, when the gold had all been mined, many became successful market gardeners.

The area’s iconic place in Chinese history means it has become a popular tourist attraction. And these tourists, in particular, appear to adore pictures of themselves everywhere they visit. So much so that I have become fascinated with the lengths many will go to capture an enduring image of themselves in situ.

I was particularly taken with one lady who lugged a tripod and suitcase full of accessories to the end of a pier on Queenstown’s lake. It was a windy evening. Not a hat she tried on would stay put. Every scarf she artfully draped round her neck had strangulation in mind.

Carefully groomed hair rapidly became dishevelled and would that tripod with her camera perched on top stay upright. Would it flip? In fact it did flip. Right over, time and time again.

“Shall I offer to help,” I asked John. But my offer came to late. After one last despairing attempt at the classic Titanic flying pose that Kate Winslet immortalised, she gave in, and bedraggled and windswept gathered up accessories, camera and tripod, and sloped off. My camera does not contain any selfies, don’t want a cracked lens, but occasionally I have dragooned some passerby into taking a pic of John and me. Most images are of the absolutely stunning scenery and wildlife, and yes, a few I sneakily shot of the frustrated model on the pier.

Our big trip to New Zealand has nearly finished. “I can save you the vouchers in our paper mum,” my daughter Jo said when I spoke to her on FaceTime. “ You could have a holiday in Bognor Regis for only a few pounds.” I’m considering it seriously. Might be all we can afford after this trip.