The last time I saw my son, I was waving to him through the back window of a decrepit taxi in Chennai, India.  Galen called out, “Love you, Mama! Love you!” as the taxi disappeared into the murky night taking me to catch my flight back home to California.

Ten months later, if Galen isn’t stuck traversing some gnarly glacier on the South Island, he will be waiting for me at the Christchurch International Airport in New Zealand.

Most people exclaim how difficult it must be for me that my 28-year-old son lives and travels in countries so far from home. On the contrary, I find it exhilarating to meet up with him and explore a new place he has grown to love. “Mother India” embraced him for a year and a half, and then he moved to New Zealand in February of 2011, landing there only three days after a devastating 6.3 earthquake leveled Christchurch.

The plane descends through steel-gray clouds that cap the misty green landscape. I’m glad I brought my ski parka, despite the fact that it’s October and supposed to be early summer here.

I gather my bags and make my way through customs with a combination of excitement over the prospect of adventure and a mother’s anticipation. In India, my son greeted me wearing a sarong wrapped around his lean body, hair in a topknot, and carrying a long-stem red rose. I wonder how I will find him now.

But he is not at the gate. I wander through the airport to the street, just as a small Toyota drives up with Galen in it, waving and grinning.

A ride, how delightful! I thought we’d be hitchhiking to Golden Bay where he lives, a method of transport I’d agreed to when first making plans, but soon regretted. By the time I realized I’d rather rent a car, rental prices had tripled. I accepted my fate and attempted to meet Galen’s enthusiasm that this was the only way to truly meet New Zealanders. “Come on, Mom—you’ll love it and it’s sooooo easy.”

Galen has grown a beard and his long, blond hair flows down his back. He looks like a Viking in his mountain-climbing attire. He envelops me in a huge bear hug and I inhale the scent of campfires and pine trees.

He introduces me to Heidi, the apple-cheeked young woman behind the wheel—the most recent addition to his flock of admirers. He is like honey to bees when it comes to women.

Feeling woozy from the long flight, I beg them for a coffee stop as I want to be clear-headed for this wonderful reunion with my son. Near Heidi’s house in Christchurch is a cafe where I buy us large lattés decorated with heart designs floating on their creamy surfaces. Galen has wisely waited for the caffeine to kick in to announce, “We’re going to a rave tonight and we want you to come with us.”

A rave? I’d been to raves years ago when dancing until sunrise seemed like a fun thing to do. Galen exclaims, “You will love it! Dancing all night long outside with Kiwis.”

“What kind of music?” I ask, suspecting that it is the loud, persistent, electronic beat that I have come to associate with an angry washing machine stuck on the rinse cycle—otherwise known as Techno.

“Techno,” he confirms.

“Will it be cold?” I ask as I mentally note the snow-capped mountains in the distance.

Galen cheerfully responds, “Yes, and it will probably be raining. It’s in a farmer’s cow pasture two hours from here. You can sleep in the car if you get tired.” Heidi nods vigorously. It’s obvious this is her idea to go to the rave with Galen in tow, though I wonder if she knew his mom would be tagging along.

A few hours later, Galen and three other friends are trying on various costumes at Heidi’s house. She is a preschool teacher by day and, it appears, a rainbow person in the off hours. They suit up in layers of wild print shirts, sparkly skirts, polka dot leggings, and earthy, long, felt vest coats topped with rainbow-striped caps. Heidi sews a lot of the apparel swirling around me, I discover, and I observe the fashion show with great amusement from a beanbag chair with a calico cat purring loudly on my lap.

They morph into over-sized hobbits in hippie wear and I flash back to the Haight-Ashbury days of my youth when they ask, in unison, “What do you want to wear?”

My true desire is a flannel nightgown to cuddle into after a hot bath, followed by a journey into a feather bed, but that doesn’t seem to be in my future for this first day in New Zealand. I don’t voice this thought but politely decline the offer to dress up like a character from The Cat in the Hat, and remain in my unfashionable black ski parka to ward off the bone-chilling cold.

We all crowd into Heidi’s car, somehow managing to pack in costumes, food, camping gear, and my roller bag. Windy streets take us past fallen cathedrals and leaning office towers and, even in my foggy, jetlagged condition, I register how terribly devastated the city is from the recent earthquake.

It is a relief to reach the countryside where sheep wander in verdant pastures and meandering rows of spring-green willows fringe creek beds. As we come closer to our destination, I spot a handwritten sign low on the side of the road with the magic letters B&B.

“U-turn! Make a U-turn,” I shout from the back seat. Without questioning my impulsive demand, Heidi executes a magnificent turn, accelerating with flair down the muddy road.

At the end of the road sits a modern farmhouse. I ring the bell and a woman greets me as if I am expected, taking control of my roller bag while I follow her to a suite with large picture windows looking out over the vineyards. It is warm and cozy inside, and Galen sweetly agrees not to forget where they have parked me, promising to pick me up the next morning.

I savor a luxuriously long, hot shower, dress, and join the proprietors, Betty and Fred, for a fruity glass of sauvignon blanc beside the fire as we debate the upcoming Rugby World Cup final to be held in Auckland the next evening.

As I lie down on the king-size bed, a heating pad melts my fatigued muscles. I have not slept for 48 hours. A sense of peace pervades and a big grin spreads across my face. Galen is off doing what he wants to do and I am exactly where I want to be. That, my friends, is the difference between being in your twenties versus your late fifties. And to two free spirits, the success of traveling together is that we both get to do what we want.

At nine a.m. sharp, as I am finishing my orange-yolked eggs and thick, crispy bacon, Galen and his circus troupe arrive. The kids’ faces are painted and their outfits are askew, but they don’t look fatigued. I hug Betty and Fred goodbye and off we go.

That wasn’t bad. For $100 I got a wing in their house, wine, dinner, great conversation, breakfast—and a cure for jet lag.

“How was the rave?” I ask.

“We stayed up all night dancing, but I’m glad you didn’t come. You wouldn’t have liked all the drunks, or the music.”

Heidi and friends drop us off on the side of the road just a few miles from the B&B. They drive back to Christchurch and we hitchhike to Golden Bay, a progressive agricultural community perched on the north end of the South Island. My son has been living there for six months WWOOFing (World Wide Opportunities on Organic Farms) and selling homemade feijoa preserves and chai at the farmers’ market.

His insistence that we hitchhike was born from a desire to show me his new home through the locals we’d meet. I’d reluctantly agreed because it had been successful in getting him all over New Zealand and added to his vast collection of friends around the globe.

It is definitely a stretch for me to be standing here beside the tarmac with my roller bag, smiling at potential rides. Last hitchhiking experience? Guatemala, 17 years ago. The Mayan Indians threw rocks at me from the local bus window.

Galen insists I remove my Angelina Jolie sunglasses and stick my thumb out, even when he disappears into the bushes to pee. Several dozen cars pass. So far, hitching does not seem as easy as he claims. Finally a van stops, full of blokes. Much to my relief (as I do not savor the idea of riding with seven guys), just as we run up to the van, they screech off, laughing and pointing at us. Ha ha ha.

One hour later—thank goodness, because Galen and I are beginning to have disagreements about this hitching business—a sputtering, tiny two-door car pulls up. The smiling middle-aged woman driving wears a lavender dress and strings of amethyst beads, and she is very excited about meeting foreigners. We stuff ourselves into her car and drive north. She is fascinated that I’m Galen’s mom and have agreed to hitchhike.  We trade travel stories—she tells us that she has “only” been to Cambodia to do volunteer medical work, which, for some reason, she does not consider a travel experience. We are impressed with her heartfelt descriptions of the pain she experienced in Cambodia when helping people traumatized by Pol Pot’s regime. Galen traveled in Cambodia two years earlier and we actually spill tears as the two of them discuss their interactions with people who were so open yet scarred by that period of history.

She drops us at the turnoff for Lewis Pass, which is still 300 kilometers from our destination. Before long, a trucker gives us a lift. We sit in the front cab, looking across the country through a gigantic picture windshield that provides us a full panoramic view of the mountains. The trucker is a roadie on his way to Nelson to pick up sound equipment after the Rugby World Cup festivities tonight. He loves his job and tells us stories about carting sound equipment for U2’s recent tour in New Zealand. He hung out with Bono backstage—a roadie’s raison d’être.

Halfway to Nelson, which is at the top of the South Island and at least four hours further, the roadie leaves us in the whitewater rafting town of Murchison. The Backpacker Hotel has a cheery room for us with stellar valley views, and the River Café dishes up lamb shank pie and a pint; then it’s off to the pub for the rugby finale. Galen is hoping for a crowd of rowdy, ruddy-cheeked farm boys in gumboots yelling in drunken enthusiasm but it is disappointingly subdued and quiet for a workingman’s pub. The All Blacks win, but the triumph is far tougher than expected, with the All Blacks barely squeezing by France, 8-7. Even after several polite blokes at the bar explain rugby to me, I still don’t understand the game and all that butt-hugging scrimmaging that wins it.

We’re back on the road the next morning, and the young couple who picks us up lead kayak tours along the Abel Tasman coastline. We play a game that requires we shout, “Tractor!” whenever we spot one. Our conversation about tramping in Abel Tasman National Park, and our driver’s recent arrest for defending a woman who got beaten up by her boyfriend (the other guy’s face “will never look the same”), is frequently punctuated by “Tractor!” Points accumulate fast, as New Zealand is one big farm spread.

“Would you like to go for a swim?” the driver asks.

To me this seems odd, as it is freezing outside, but we agree to the adventure and they take us on a detour to the Resurgence. I wonder if we are going to a religious revival and baptism, but it is a magical forest where a crystal-clear river spills out of a limestone cave and pours down the valley. Our new friends tell us it is a sacred and ancient place where the Maori came to give birth. The water is icy but we get naked, dive in, and swim to the rocks like speedboats to emerge shivering but exhilarated.

Back on the road, we stop to buy fresh asparagus from a produce stand and gift our drivers a bunch, too. After goodbye hugs they leave us at the turnoff for the road that leads over the hill to Golden Bay, which we’ll reach, hopefully, in the next day or two.

When a giant green school bus stops, it takes us a moment to realize that the elderly couple who motion us to hop in are the drivers. We settle into sheepskin-covered banquettes and the lady tells us proudly that this is their new home. They just sold their farm to live in this bus as they explore the country. They say they have not traveled much, and then the woman casually adds, “We are also missionaries and lived with the Huli Wigmen clan in the Southern Highlands of Papua New Guinea for ten years. We raised our four children in that remote region, a two-day hike from anywhere.”

Our jaws hang open at this account of these intrepid, friendly farmer folk. As they drop us off near our final destination, the wife winks at me and says, “I always really wanted to be a hippie.”

Five rides, two days, and a multitude of conversations later, we arrive in Takaka in Golden Bay at the Grove Orchard where Galen lives. We set up camp beside the creek, as my son has always preferred living outdoors no matter what the temperature. I can’t complain since I’m the one who taught him how to travel the world. Starting when he was eight months old, we camped with Berbers in Morocco, hitchhiked in Bali, rode horseback through the snowy passes in the Sierra Nevada— generally wandering the world like gypsies. But I’m several decades older now, and long for that B&B with 1,000-thread-count sheets and a glass of wine next to a cozy fireplace.

Galen reads my mind. He builds a wood fire beneath the porcelain bathtub under the stars and fills it with buckets of cold creek water. He pours me a fine glass of white wine, and when the tub starts to steam I sink in, marveling at the constellations above, unrecognizable to me in this different hemisphere, traveling like a gypsy again.

“Two Thumbs Up” is included in my latest book Wild Life: Travel Adventures of a Worldly Woman