Santa Claus waits at a reindeer comfort stop.
There are so many happy places in this great world of ours, but for me there's nothing happier than when I'm on my sleigh, delivering presents around the world on Christmas Eve.
Setting out from the North Pole is a delightful rush. It's a great feeling knowing the hard work
of list-checking and present-wrapping and reindeer-training is done, and it's just me and the reindeer out in the elements for the next 24 hours or so.
It's amazingly quiet up there, with just the rhythmic puff of reindeer breath, the swish of the sleigh through the air and the odd Christmas carol drifting up from below. One year a bang from a fireworks display catapulted me off my seat and the reindeer did some tricky aerobatics to catch me before I went splat on to the Auckland Harbour Bridge.
The play of light and dark below is beautiful - the endless oceans all silvery in the moonlight, great black forests and deserts, sprinklings of light marking small towns, and sparkling cities.
Of course, it's not all about sitting there enjoying the views. I'm working to constant deadlines, and dealing with fluctuating time zones and see-sawing temperatures - the big red coat comes on and off more times than I can count. And with eight reindeer, there's always one needing a comfort stop or bleating about needing water, or complaining it ate too many carrots at the last chimney.
