Whakapapa Ski Resort On a Summer's Day

 

Whakapapa Ski Area on the north-western slopes of Mt Ruapehu is New Zealand's largest ski area. The drive to the ski resort was astounding, the view was spectacular as far as the eye could see.  It was summer when we visited and it was too windy and cloudy to ride the ski lift so the next best thing was to eat lunch at the Lorenzs' Bar and Café and sight see the valley below.  On a cloudy, windy and misty summer's day, I cannot help but think of Shakespeare's Sonnet 18.

A Summer's Day

William Shakespeare, 1564 - 1616

Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate.
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer’s lease hath all too short a date.
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimmed;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance, or nature’s changing course, untrimmed;
But thy eternal summer shall not fade,
Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow’st,
Nor shall death brag thou wand’rest in his shade,
When in eternal lines to Time thou grow’st.
     So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see,
     So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.