It was a good nights sleep that
night. And much needed too, as my body had been screaming at me since that
morning after throwing it out of a plane high up in the sky. The morning
routine commenced but additionally we needed to use our last bit of Wi-Fi to
search for a few things, one of them being a computer shop in Wellington. The
problem we had been having (in addition to the broken netbook) was that Wi-Fi
broadband is very much in its infancy in New Zealand. It costs the companies a
lot of money to get it out into the sticks so they have to make their money
back by charging exorbitant amounts for its usage. That is why each campsite
offers a certain amount of Wi-Fi for a set fee, depending on the campsite and
depending on the service provider. The worst we got was $5 for 50Mb of usage.
It was gone in 5 minutes. Not even McDonalds or Starbucks could help us out as
you only get a certain amount free each day per device before it blocks you. We
would wander round the towns and villages using my phone to “sniff out” any
free Wi-Fi spots, but usually to no avail. I swear I will never complain about
it when I get back home! We identified a couple of computer stores that might
be able to help us and noted their phone number and address so that we could
call them later.
One of the things still left to
do in Taupo (and that was free, of course) was Huka Falls. I had seen plenty of
brochures advertising power-boat rides and guided excursions but it seemed to
me that we could probably see them for free if we just went there for
ourselves. After having taken a big hit in the wallet-department in Rotorua
(and, for me, Taupo) it was good to see something for nothing. Apparently 250,000
litres of water flow over the falls every second, and it was pretty impressive.
Not least because the sun was peeping out from behind the clouds, as we had
been warned that it would not be a very nice day. After nearly (and
inadvertently) getting into a ruck with a bunch of teenage Maori rugby players,
one of which was carrying an open box of cheap wine…at half 10 in the morning,
we trundled back into town to find some free/cheap Wi-Fi and a call box.
Without wanting to spend a
fortune on calling them from James’s mobile we reverted back to the stone age
and picked up the phone in a phone box in town. After $3 and a couple of
minutes of quick-talking I confirmed with the guy at A-tech (seemed like a good
place to start) that he would get a bunch of new hard drives in on Tuesday so
we should look at dropping in then. With that sorted we left the phone box and
crossed the road back to the campervan. And who should be crossing it in the
other direction right in front of us? Kate, the girl from Southport who we met
at the skydive place. We went through the usual pleasantries before realising
that we had all stopped bang in the middle of the road so stepped back onto the
pavement (I can say “pavement” now instead of “sidewalk” although I do every
now and again still say “restroom”). She had the day off as it was too cloudy
to jump and we were needing to get on our way down towards Wellington so we
said our goodbyes and realised that we will probably bump into each other back
in Southport one day.
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| Remember to follow-through... |
With our chores semi-complete
we picked our free-camp site for the night and set off. We had had a busy last
few days so we thought an early camp would give us chance to catch up on a few
things. It is also unbelievably more difficult to locate a quite place to Park
up the campervan when night has fallen, even with full-beam headlights on! And
with it being “winter” down here the days are much shorter than the long ones
we had been getting used to in the states. It meant that we would start looking
for a camp between 4pm and 5pm, as by 6pm it becomes a very unenviable task. After
a few miss-hits (finding a man-made sluice possibly containing sewerage of some
kind and an underground power station) we nailed it. A 5 minute drive down a
winding road brought us to a gem of a spot in amongst the trees. Once we had
made initial camp we took a stroll down the road to the bridge we had seen. There
was a good reason that we didn’t camp there. Two old wooden crosses were
hammered into the ground by the side of the bridge dating back to 1985.
Apparently a few kids had gone rafting and all four had drowned. It was easy to
see why as the raging torrent of water below looked very unforgiving. As we
walked back to the campervan we saw a 4 x 4 parked up in the road on the left,
with what looked like a small child sitting down in the road next to it. As we
got closer the “child” moved quickly towards the jeep and circled it. The owner
of said vehicle stepped out in camouflage gear head to foot and we realised
that the small “child” was a hunting dog. We said hello to him as we walked
past and when asked he replied that he was hunting for deer. He had a large
silencer on his rifle so it looked like he meant business. The dog was wearing
a luminous yellow jacket, presumably so that he didn’t accidentally shoot it.
Once we were back in the Hi-Ace
we set about making dinner and it was not long before the hunter was driving
past us and back towards the main road, with nothing on/in his jeep. Unlucky
for him, very lucky for the deer. Darkness fell and James had stuck his box of
white wine in Natures Fridge (outside the Toyota) to get nice and chilled for
the evening. As I finished cooking my own dinner (a big tin of hearty Campbells
soup) a car pulled up next to ours. We had heard a couple of cars whizz past
earlier but thought nothing of it. One of them had made the return journey a la Mr Hunter, but this one screeched
to a halt right opposite our home. Me and James both looked to each other and
mouthed “what the flip”. James dug out his multi-tool and I finished pouring my
soup. They sounded like a couple of “frat guys” who were just larking about,
but why would they drive up to our campervan and stop right next to it. Nobody
got out. I sat down to eat my soup and it seemed like an eternity before they
finally revved the engine and sped away into the night. We breathed a sigh of
relief and James leaped up to check they hadn’t stolen his box of wine. Thankfully
it was still there. Oh well, the things that happen to you out in the sticks…
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| What a big stick I have! |
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| It had been a long day... |
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