PRETRIP:
DAY -7:
Hitchhike to meet my friend Kim in Auckland—little over three hours! Faster than if I had drove. Look at vans to buy. No luck. Head to Wharf and look at boats. See one of only 37 Wylos in world (my dream boat). At the same time, am spied by Peter, a friend from Tonga, who coincidently is also a Wylo owner, different Wylo. We drank beers together until I had missed the last shuttle to the airport.
Instead of spending night in airport waiting on Kim, I meet random streetwalking insomniac and chat all night.
DAY -6:
Sleep a couple of hours; wake and wait at the wharf for Kim—who randomly finds me there even though she hadn't read the email I sent her of my whereabouts.
Spend a day around Auckland with Kim, catching up. Sunny and wonderful. Get a bed at her hostel for the night. Eat awesome Indian food for dinner.
DAY -5:
Wake and luckily get a free tour (a rare thing) around the surrounding areas of Auckland. Old artillery stations, nice beaches, cool suburbs, and a great under-bridge walk to a bungee station. Riot of a free time. More city walking in the afternoon. Found nice high-rise bar to watch sunset and have pizza. Great time all around. Kim would leave for Rotorua in the morning.
DAY -4:
Kim left for caving adventures and I hunted vans. Made good investigations, but no success. Found Will and caught up on his adventures sailing down to Auckland from Opua.
DAY -3:
Back to the vans. Find one I want, only have to pay cash and don't have enough. Girls agree to sell to me anyway. The three of us head out of town to camp on a beach with two bottles of champagne. Good time, nice fire.
DAY -2:
In the morning I extract the necessary funds from the ATM and seal the deal. Vanetta is mine. Still have time to kill before Martina arrives. Hang with the two girls and this cool blind guy at his place for the day and night. Play music. First night in Vanetta. Love at the first!
DAY -1:
To the airport. Not far, but didn't want to risk being lost and driving on the left side of the road was not a pleasant thought. All goes well. Luck out and find great camping spot just a skip from the airport. First of many. This was a working farm—an interesting spot for a public camping facility. First contact with the sheep I would come to love. Great sea-side run.
DAY 1:
To the airport in earnest. Allergies flipping out—blame Vanetta but could be wrong. Realize on my way to the airport I really have no idea what Martina looks like. I've only seen her once—5 years ago on a train in France and only for approximately 7 minutes. Not hopeful. Hopefully she'd recognize me. (She has a picture of my face.)
I leave the queue for just a moment, come back. Then I imagined I heard a faint, "Jonah?" from behind me. I think then turn briefly. There was a woman there; she might have been looking at me. I wasn't sure. I turned again. I think she was. "Did you say, 'Jonah', I asked?" She nodded. I apologized profusely for not recognizing her immediately. Not an auspicious beginning, but I got over it.
HERE BEGINS THE TRIP IN EARNEST:
Drive from Auckland to Opua. No radio. We'd never listen to it once in three weeks. We always talk, talk constantly. Much to learn. Arrive. Eat pasta. Read poems. Allergies galore
DAY 2:
Clean Vanetta (the van). Drive the Bay of Islands. Evening with Monkey's Business. Monkey's Fist Wine. Stay one last night on Araby.
DAY 3:
Leave. Drive to Keri Keri to buy auto insurance. Amazing drive NW through rainforest to see the mighty Kauri trees. Epiphytes galore. Lucked out with a great camp after some nice short hikes around the trees. Night hike. Saw great eel, heard Kiwi bird.
DAY 4:
Continue drive south, past Auckland and Hamilton. After Martina notes how much the scenery looks like the Shire from Lord of the Rings and I note that, although we are looking for climbing, there is no rock to be seen anywhere. But around a corner comes a river, and with the river a lush gorge with basaltic / andicitic crags.
No town, but a techy climbing shop. The owner, Bryce, said the weather was calling for rain—so we went and hopped on the rock immediately (5:30) and got four routes in before dark and the coming showers. Found a little deserted picnic area to park Vanetta for the night. Beautiful and strange black swans on the river.
DAY 5:
Continue south toward Taupo. Realize that where we had been climbing the day before HAD been the Shire in the Lord of the Rings movies. And realized that the forecast was dead-on. Rain. We café'd in Lake Taupo and begrudgingly passed Tongariro, which housed some mountains we had wished to climb. Perhaps on the way back. Pass a few dodgy camps (only ones on the entire trip) and find a grassy one with plenty of facilities—ie: gas cooker, toilet, and SHOWER!
DAY 6:
Made Wellington early and the first ferry to the South Island. Beautiful fjords into Picton. Drove south-east toward Kaikoura. Still sketchy weather. Rain on and off. Cloudy at the least.
DAY 7
Great sea-side camp. Windy and cold. I cook while Martina waits in the car. Take a nice walk on the black sand beach. Totally deserted. Rocks jut from the shallow shoreline.
DAY 8
Kaikoura. Can't get on a dolphin-swimming trip. Long waiting list, but we get on it. As we sit and deliberate the cell rings and the dolphin encounter people said they had a cancellation and we could go the next day. (We were still in the office—it was their café.) We took an amazing coast walk and saw seals and birds and dazzling coastal scenery. Headed back out of town to find a lady who sells cheap (relative) crayfish (like a fat lobster with no claws). Dined at a picnic table beside Vanetta. Beautifully landscaped place. Lady said we could park there for the night if we wished. Hurray indeed.
DAY 9
Woke early and headed back into Kaikoura. Suited up in wetsuits and hoped on the boat by 9:30. We found dolphins early—and not just a few, but the mega-pod, hundreds. It is impossible to know how many, but the biologist-guide estimated them at around three-hundred. We dove in and the dolphins (dusky dolphins, smaller than bottlenose and bi-colored) would rush up and play with you, maybe tease you—hard to tell. They would come so close, mere inches and you often couldn't see them approaching from the sides because of the slight tunnel vision of the goggles. They'd instantly appear and disappear just four inches in front of your face. Wild. And they want to play. They will swim a circle around you and see if you are a coordinated enough swimmer to keep up the circle. If you spin like mad they liked it and would continue swimming around you. If you only stare, they'd leave. It was a hell of a riot of a good time. I was surprised. I was only really going along for Martina's sake. I didn't expect to be so lucky. Amazing gymnastics as well, backflips and cartwheels. We also motored up to giant wandering albatross on the water. I had never seen albatross so close, maybe 5 or 8 feet away from the boat. Huge.
We left Kaikoura after a filling meal at the same café (Dolphin Encounters) and headed toward Christchurch. Martina had a contact there that had offered to give us a place to stay. This part of the trip was out of control. For more info read the story, Man from Menzies Bay. Suffice to say we had a wild and unexpected drive into the middle of nowhere and met a sheepfarmer who let us work on his farm for a few days. We worked the sheep and ate and socialized with great folks. The true and uncontested highlight of the trip for me. Want to go back.
DAY 10
Sheep Read, "The Man from Menzies Bay"
DAY 11
Sheep
DAY 12
Finally and begrudgingly leave Menzies bay for Mt Cook National Park. We drive through "Rohan" of L of the R and find camp on a stellar and huge lake with a tremendous view of Mt Cook across the water. Wind is whipping again. Weather is about to turn it seems.
DAY 13
Drive into Cook with serious wind. Laze in Vanetta for a bit. Take a short run alone, Martina naps. I come back and we retreat into the Old Mountaineer's Café. Great place. Drank much tea for many hours. Couldn't leave. Stayed for diner as well. What to eat?? Lamb, of course. Look at pictures and are amazed at how well they had come out thus far. Really nice time in Old Mountaineers.
DAY 14
Weather clear and we take an early, early morning hike up to ??? Lake. Nice walk but brief. We load up and head south again toward Queenstown, the "adventure capital" of NZ. We make Queenstown, check it out briefly to stock up on a few things and head south toward Fjordland. Find a quiet spot with the expected spectacular view. And still alone. Near Te Anue.
DAY 15
Wake and drive into Milford Sound. Martina goes on the morning cruise as I sit in a café and write about our sheeping excursion. Good times all around. Leave Milford and hop on the Routeburn Track for a day hike. As we set off I commented on the shame of not camping. We quickly retreated and grabbed our tent and bags and were off again. Glorious weather—a lucky thing on this trip and for this area. Nice camp off the trail. Tremendous views, as advertised. Nice time, but very little food, no cooking.
DAY 16
More hiking but then back to Vanetta for some miles, now miles out and back north. Pass Queenstown and Wanaka. Take a good dip and wash in Wanaka Lake. Head NW to the coast. Great camp but many sandflies. Perhaps nicest (camping) view of the trip, just south of Haast Pass.
DAY 17
Big drive north. Pass Fox and Frans Joseph glaciers quickly. Much driving and some serious story telling. Make it all the way to Nelson in time for dinner…..I think. Expensive dinner. Very tired. Not overly impressed with Nelson, but my green-lipped mussels were superb. Camped just outside Abel Tasman National Park, exhausted.
DAY 18
Perfect weather for the beach, which, coincidently is just what Martina has been waiting for since she arrived now over two weeks ago. Abel Tasman has beautiful waters. [Allow me to switch to present tense here if you don't mind.] We hike to a pristine and deserted spot and lie down in the sun. Kayakers float past us but no one else bothers our solitude. Where does the day go? I leave for a good long run on the classic Abel Tasman track, one of the "Great Tracks" of NZ. Top views of the coast and clear waters. Reluctantly we hike out as the sun descends. Craving fish 'n chips—why pass a restaurant that we are already parked next to? [That'll do.] The Park Café looked good. More than that actually—it looked great. Big wooden tables, huge wide-opening windows. The menu looked equal to the challenge minus the fact they didn't have fish in chips. The meal was top and we stayed on for a long while. The waitress commented that we were the first customers during her tenure there that had succeeded at making it through all three courses. I asked we deserved to eat for free. She said no.
Our plan had been to catch the night ferry, but it left from Wellington, not Picton. The next ferry would be at 5:30 am.
DAY 19
Wake on time but poorly planned time. Rush for the ferry. Have hardly a chance to make it. Am disgusted at myself for missing a potential shortcut. Martina is a racecar driver (almost literally—has raced motorcycles and cars offroad). We are rocking. We make it by maybe four minutes. And there is room on the ferry. Bloody miracle. We would have wasted half a day waiting, and we made it! Triumph!
Look briefly at Wellington and then head north to Tongariro NP. Our goal is to climb Ngauruhoe (2287 m)—better known as Mt Doom in L of the Rings. Beautiful volcanic cone. After a long stint through a continual construction zone we find the visitors center as the doors are being shut. We explain to the ranger we only need to know the length of the climb, . . . oh and a map, . . . and what was the forecast, . . . and how much snow…….she relented and let us in. This was, again, no small feat. If she hadn't let us in we would to have had to return in the morning and wait for them to open. Instead, we headed to a camp nearer to the mountain.
DAY 20
Wake at dawn to a ferociously cold morning, sub-zero for the first time. This was supposed to be winter. The hike began on the famous Tongariro Crossing (another of NZ's "Great Walks" and then scrambled up the northern face of the mountain. It was a steep scree scramble but we managed to find a nice buttress to rock scrambled up most of the way. The cone was magnificent, still smoking profusely around the rim. The rock looked like basalt but was mostly andicite from what I was told. We circumambulated the rim, sucking up the view. Clouds were gathering. We thought better of taking our lunch there and head down instead. We were fortunate to find a good stretch of light scree and descended quickly to the shoulder where the climb began. Took lunch and enjoyed the tea we had smartly packed along in a thermos. Descended the trail back to Vanetta. The sun was shining on us, but a great cloud loomed over Mt Doom. We loaded up Vanetta once again and set out toward a warm meal in Rotorua.
When we had set out from Opua it was my wish to find a good hotspring. I quickly and sadly learned that seemingly every spring had been turned commercial. I gave up the search. Now heading toward Rotorua, a stumbled over a sentence "only un-commercialized hotspring in NZ". I was stunned. (I would later learn that this isn't true either—there are more.) I didn't know whether to be excited or not. It was likely crappy. The guide didn't talk it up—this good be a blessing or a hint. But it was on our way—we would have to find out. Sore legs called out.
We found Kerosene Creek easily and I was dumbfounded to find out that it wasn't a hotspring at all—but a hot river! And it wasn't luke warm either, but down right hot. Amazing. This blew the mind. A hot river, free and not many folks to share it with. There was a little waterfall and everything, shallow water. We veged there for an hour or more until our legs were satisfied and our bellies cried for like treatment. We found the "something"-dog Café and ate the best meal of the trip there for cheap. Left town near-exhausted and found camp north. We were headed back toward the Shire and the fine rock climbing and the trip was winding toward a close.
DAY 22
Woke and found our way into the Shire (somewhere south of Hamilton: Wharepapa South). Have nice weather once again. Upon arrival we fell to the ground and vege on a blanket. I don't know how much time passed. We managed to get a few routes in before lunch. Such fun. Good climbing, but we both tired quickly. Luckily the routes were short so we were able to cram a few in. A couple were really great fun. We laughed a good bit, but climbed well, no top-roping, all leads.
Tired, we headed to the local school that allows people to camp on the lawn. This would be our last real camp. Tomorrow we would head back to Auckland and stay somewhere near the airport.
Martina packed her things as I cooked dinner. (I always cooked dinner. She always drove.) We ate and looked at photos as we downloaded all mine to her memorystick and all of hers onto my harddrive. We drank much tea, as was our want. Slept reluctantly.
DAY 23
We dissuaded ourselves from climbing by the fact that the weather was only marginal—really we were sore and tired. Martina was encouraged that the weather was perfect for a town day and she hadn't seen Auckland. I wasn't as encouraged, but had wanted to take her to a really great restaurant in Auckland called Oh Calcutta—and at least I'd be able to do that now. In Auckland we'd scour the book stores for a book Martina had wanted and searched for the entire trip, an out of print collection of NZ poetry. The day passed quickly in town and there was only time for one last bookshop before we needed to head for dinner. We find the shop and, of course, they have the book. But, of course, they can't find it. The lady looks and looks, but it is Martina who finds the book—of course. She had worked to hard to find it to have someone else hand it over.
We enjoyed dinner, then more tea, then as we got in Vanetta to leave Martina breaks out in hysterics—right next to the Indian restaurant and now just across the street is this icecream shop—not just any, but the only one she eats. It is Swiss ice cream (she lives in Geneva) and she has never seen it anywhere else. We naturally go for an ice cream.
It is getting late now and she has a morning flight. We drive south toward the airport where I know a spot to park for the night. It is a sad night and I don't sleep much, also we were parked in a parking lot with people coming and going.
DAY 24
Doom's day. Martina left at six. It was a rough good bye. I left the airport and drove north, first to Whangerie, then Opua. Went to bed at 4:30 pm. No dinner. Not hungry. Slept hard.
2 DAYS LATER, DEC. 19TH:
With a light pack and a shoulder bag I walk to the road in the rain and hitch-hike back down to Auckland. I hitched so I wouldn't have to leave Vanetta in long-term parking. The hitch was a little tough—got dropped in some tough spots. But I made it plenty early because of a great lady who took me directly to the airport even though she wasn't going there herself.
Meet Will at the gate—it's been six weeks since we last spoke. He tells some hilarious tales about penguins and monster trout. The flight was a breeze.
--
Jonah Manning
S/V Araby
Online Journal -www.freejonah.blogspot.com
Email - bellyofthewhale.gmail.com
128 Holliday Rd
Columbia, South Carolina, USA
Emergency contact:
Dibble Manning
phone: 001 - 803 - 787 - 4352
email:cmann1960@aol.com>
also check addresss in "to" column
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