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11~6~00

Hitting the Road

Just a quick note to say that my plans have been made - tomorrow I will be driving southward in a rented campervan with two other people: Farley, a 26-year-old American chick from New York, and Matt, a 22-year-old Welsh guy.

We are renting a budget campervan with a double bed. We will be buying a tent and I (alone) and Matt and Farley (together) will sleep in it on a rotating basis. The campervan has a gas stove and utensils, but no toilet or shower. Most of the driving will be done by Matt, who is used to driving on the left. Farley and I may take turns when we're out on the highway with nobody around (our American drivers licenses are valid here).

We will be spending one night on the North Island, somewhere south of here, then crossing via ferry to the South Island, which we'll tour in a counter-clockwise direction.

11~11~00

Touring in the Ladybug

We rented the campervan (which was later christened the "Ladybug" for obvious reasons) in Auckland and drove until about 9 at night. Having heard about people pulling off the road and camping all over New Zealand, we did so. We parked and pitched the tent in a rest area and called it a night.


That first morning

What we didn't stop to realize was that we were right next to a busy highway, along which trucks whizzed all night long! Every half hour or less, a truck would blow by so fast and so close that the ground would shake. Needless to say, we didn't sleep so well.

The next day, we drove to Wellington and stayed at a motel outside the city that has campervan and tent sites. The nice part about it was that they let campers use the facilities! We enjoyed a nice soak in the jacuzzi before showering, doing laundry, and watching a movie on TV. It was the evening, so we decided to wait until the next day to go into the city.

I was woken suddenly at 7:15am by loud hammering. When it didn't stop, I unzipped the tent and peeked out to discover that right next to the tent site was a house being remodeled. The workers were prying off the roof, making pounding, creaking, and cracking noises. There was no going back to sleep, so I read while I waited for Farley and Matt (sleeping in the slightly quieter campervan) to wake up.


Farley preparing a tasty breakfast

Our campervan is equipped with a gas stove which works quite nicely. We had a big grocery shopping trip the first day and have more or less eaten that food instead of eating out. That morning, we enjoyed toast, eggs over easy, and baked beans.




Wellington, from the top of the Gardens

We spent the day walking around in downtown Wellington. There is a cable car going up from downtown to the Botanical Gardens, which is up on a hill with a nice view of the city. The city is built on several hills as well as a harbour, which makes it particularly scenic.






I got to climb a tree

I spent some time experimenting with my (relatively) new digital camera and took some good photos of plants:

It's harder to eat your campervan groceries when you're in a city with a large variety of tasty restaurants. We indulged in delicious Indian food for lunch and an Italian meal for dinner. After stuffing ourselves thus, we saw the movie Snatch (good).

The ferry from Wellington (north island) to Picton (south island) is very expensive. For each sailing, they sell a certain number of "super saver" tickets, a certain number of "saver" tickets, and all the rest are regular price. So, booking ahead or taking a less popular crossing is the way to pay less. We had not booked ahead, so we signed up for the 1:10am crossing (we booked it the day before, when we arrived in town).

We caffeinated in a cafe, then drove to the ferry landing and queued up in our van. After the required hour-long wait plus half an hour delay, we boarded. All was well until we got out in open water and the boat began pitching. Farley is susceptible to motion sickness, so we moved as far to the middle of the boat as possible. All of us were tired by then, and kept ourselves awake by groggily playing cards for the three-and-a-half hour journey.

We arrived in Picton relieved to be there, but in desperate need of somewhere to sleep. We had heard of a park where we might be able to camp, but it had "No Camping" signs posted, so we drove on. When a smaller road diverged from the highway, we took it. After driving another 10 or 15 minutes, we pulled to the side and set up camp.


Our van, that morning, with canopy up

The road was not very busy, so we managed to grab about six hours of sleep from 6am to noon. We slept uninterrupted except for a brief interlude where several sheep came down the hill and baaaaed at us. Farley treated us to banana pancakes for breakfast before we packed up camp.

We drove to Nelson with Farley at the wheel. By now, she has mastered the old van's stick shift and driving on the left. I'm the only one left who has not driven. I'll probably give it a try when we're in more desolate territory. I'm less worried about it now because I've adjusted to being on the left side of the road.

As it turned out, we reached Nelson on the day of the full moon. This is fortuitous because Nelson has a reputation for good full moon parties. We spent the afternoon sightseeing and trying to get info on where the party was going to be.


One of the party-goers

We heard it would be on Tahunanui Beach outside of Nelson, so we went there in the late afternoon to hang out and catch some rays. We made dinner and had a few drinks, then walked on the beach ready to have some fun.

But the beach was fairly empty. There were a few bonfires, the biggest of which was surrounded by some friendly highschool kids who made us feel welcome but old. However, no real party developed as we watched the stunning full moon rise.

Sunset

Moonrise

We had some fun of our own by playing on the extensive playground for a while before going back to the beach. Eventually, I tired of the company of sixteen-year-olds (who were mostly just sitting around drinking), so I retired for the night. I pitched the tent right on the beach and settled in for my first good night's rest of the trip.

And it was a good night's rest. I woke up a few times, happily noted the sound of the surf, and went back to sleep.


The white thing (on left) is my tent

In the morning, Farley and Matt woke up in the middle of a rollerblade race. We had parked the campervan at the end of a little park road, and in the morning, it had been transformed into a racecourse, complete with cones. Every so often, a skater or group of skaters would whizz by, turn around in the little cul-de-sac by us, and whizz back. It made for pleasant breakfast viewing.

We returned to Nelson and hiked up a hill to the "Centre of New Zealand". There was a great view of the area and we relaxed at the top a bit. After we went back down, we had lunch, with periodic squirt gun fights.

Our plan is to drive to Abel Tasman National Park tonight, camp outside the park, and explore it by kayak tomorrow.

Kayaking in Abel Tasman Park

Matt & Farley kayaking

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