Hello New Zealand!

The plane arrived in Auckland on time and we collected our things that had thankfully made the transfer successfully. I needed to make a call to the Happy Camper company for them to pick us up from the airport and take us to what would be our home for the next month. I found a phone box and made the call. Rob answered in a typically Kiki voice and I advised him of our booking and that we were at the airport and ready for him to pick us up. But Rob had no record of our booking. My heart sank. My face fell. My stomach turned. You get the idea. But there was another company that sometimes got their bookings as it had been done through STA travel in England and Rob would check with them and ring me back. So I waited by the phone, having not told James about the mix-up because I didn’t want him to worry about it and also so that he didn’t start having a go at Stewart (our STA man who had arranged everything for us) again as he didn’t trust him for some reason. After 10 minutes I gave Rob another call and thankfully he had our reservation and he would pick us up in 5 minutes. Fantastic! I proceeded to tell James about the error, safe in the knowledge it would all be sorted out soon, and sure enough a little Stew-bashing commenced. Rob turned up shortly and we climbed into his van as he apologised profusely for the error. There was no need, as it seemed like it was out of their hands anyway, but as we chatted it seemed like he knew a little about England. It turns out that he was English and had only been in New Zealand for 6 months but already had that twang to his accent. He was trying to get permanent residency in the country with his girlfriend and had only good things to say about the place. It got me thinking about my own plans for the future and whether there was a Unilever somewhere on one of the islands...

When we arrived at the office we went through the usual contract procedures and formalities, with more apologies from Rob regarding our lost booking. They really went out of their way to please us and got a camper ready for us in no time – there were plenty in the garage but as it was out of season they were not all ready to roll out and use straight away. We got the guided tour of the camper, a Toyota Hi-ace that sleeps 2/3 people, and we felt ready to take on the world. Or at least New Zealand. Our first stop, however, would be at the nearby shopping plaza where we would be stocking up on food, drink and warm clothes! As we had mostly summer clothing we would need some big thick jumpers (or pullovers if you are reading this in the US), jogging bottoms, hats and gloves, etc. Warehouse was apparently the “Primark of New Zealand” so we (tentatively) headed out of the garage and down the road, all the while making sure that we were on the LEFT side of the road after our brief experience in the US. We got the warm clothes, the food and the drink (me - 3L box of red wine, James - 3L box of white wine) and identified a route north that would get us heading towards 90 Mile Beach at the northern tip of the North Island. All we had to do was find Highway 1. It was clearly labelled on the map, just follow Highway 20 and it becomes Highway 1.

The Happy Camper !

It was my turn to take over The Mighty One and after a couple of laps in the car park to get the hang of it we hit the road northbound. It was rush-hour and the light was fading, but we would soon be through Auckland (which accommodates over a quarter of the entire country’s population) and heading up the coast to a camp site we had seen on the map. We found Highway 20 no problem. All we had to do was stay on it and it would become Highway 1. And that is exactly what we did, and that is exactly what didn’t happen. Somehow we ended up in the residential areas around the outskirts of Auckland and just couldn’t get back on track. We came across the same stretch of road 4 times and still couldn’t get it right. Rob had told us that the road signs are not particularly useful and it turns out that he was right. In the end we had to double-back to the airport and start again, but we found the legendary Highway 1 and carried on our way. We had been told that it should have been raining all day that day, but it had only been slight showers on and off. Suddenly the heavens opened and as we passed through Auckland there was carnage on the roads. Rain like you’ve never seen it before was hammering down onto the road and the wipers that were set to full wipe could only just cope. We made it through Auckland, but much later than we had anticipated and our evening of sitting down with a glass of wine and reading through our heaps of literature (that we snaffled from the airport) looked unlikely to happen at all. We were miles away from the campsite and jetlag was setting in. So we decided that our first night in the campervan would be a “side of the road” effort unless we found something soon.

It was dark, it was raining intermittently, there were people close behind us trying to get past and the roads were weaving. This made it incredibly difficult to identify a spot to pull into and set up camp. After a couple of failed efforts whereby we ended up cruising down a road that just connected peoples driveways we found a spot that seemed good enough to park up. It was similar to the other failed attempts in that there were houses/farms nearby but we had managed to get a spot in an abandoned area which was away from the road enough so that any vehicles would be able to pass by freely. The warm clothes were doing their job (we had changed into them almost immediately after leaving the shopping plaza) and now it was the turn of the food and drink. I managed to force a banana down me followed by half a glass of red wine before I fell asleep on the left-side couch/bed. It was time for me to turn in. But again, easier said than done. Even a tactical toilet break meant getting the shoes on and braving the cold, cold night. And then I had to make my bed. I was sleeping “up top” that night and so had to slot 3 heavy sections of wood into place before setting out the 4 cushions that would be my mattress. With about half a meter between the mattress and the ceiling there was ample room to stretch out and get comfy – the sleeping bag and duvet made sure of that. And so I drifted off to sleep for the first time in a campervan, a new country, a new continent and a new hemisphere. That is until a heavy goods train went past only meters from the campervan. And then when James hit the wrong light switch and almost blinded my with the halogen bulb just by my face. But soon I was asleep and trying to get the ol’ body clock back on track