Raining On My Parade

I arrived in Wellington around 5:15pm on Thursday the 19th. It was a comfortable ride of about three hours, and the ferry service sure has it organized such that everybody who has a vehicle is at it and out of the ship by the time it reaches port. When I arrived, Sophia decided she was going to be difficult about thing and initially informed me that I had to drive over nine hours over the channel to the North Island. Honestly, I named her just so I could yell at her. Once I got on the road, I gave Jodie a call to see if she was around to meet up for the evening. Unfortunately she was on a 24 hour nursing shift, but James was home so she had me give him a call. I was in the city, terrified of the driving situation--one way streets, crazy lights, millions of roundabouts, confusing intersections--my nightmare come true. This being the case, I just followed Sophia's directions to a motor camp that I'd plugged into the system before I called Jodie and figured I'd ring up James on the way, but when I glanced at my phone ten minutes later, I noticed all of my bars had dwindled to nonexistence, so I had to turn around, and return to the city centre (pretty much what they call downtown everywhere here). Now about thirty minutes into being in Wellington, I got back into the city and finally got back my reception (curses at Vodafone!). I rang up James, and he told me that he was literally a two minutes drive from the port, and I told him that meant I would probably be there in twenty minutes. I plugged in the address into the GPS, and was pleasantly surprised to see the street I needed in the system. Unfortunately, when I make a number of wrong turns, stop at rest areas along the way, or take detours, Sophia becomes disgruntled with my inability to follow her exact directions and eventually tells me that I have arrived at my destination even when I know I'm miles away. This ended up being the case on my way to James and Jodie's place. I decided to swing into a gas station and ask a cab driver for some help. It's a bad thing when the cabbie isn't familiar with the street for which you're looking! He pulled out his map and compared it with a map that a patron had handed to me on the street. Upon doing so, we discovered that that particular road was not on the map. He showed me where I needed to be, but unfortunately he didn't show me where I was. I sort of figured it out, but ultimately asked a man while I was en route who showed me exactly the way to go (what with one-way streets and all). I FINALLY saw James about 40 minutes later. A self-fulfilled prophecy.

I met a few of his flatmates, and we hung out that night watching pretty much all American TV and noshing on some pizza. I intended on exploring Wellington in the morning (lots of museums and exhibits and the such), but it was pouring out so I decided to be on my way. On my way out, Jodie came home for a quick break, so we hung out for a few minutes and she told me about their soon to be adventure of cycling through Malaysia and working in the jungles of Borneo. I was on the road by about noon, and she was kind enough to give me directions to the easiest way to get onto the motorway. With rain coming down (nothing like it is in Florida though, but the primary risk is of rivers overflowing and flooding major roadways), I made my way north towards Lake Tuapo. I've had my car for about three weeks now, and I'm on my way, driving along at a decent pace but cautiously. During the time I've had the car, I've been on gravel roads, dirt roads, muddy roads, roads under construction that are being sealed with the awful chip seal that they have here (I'm sure it's an economic ploy to sell tires) and haven't had a single problem. What do you know, I'm going along and the road must have just been sealed with that awful chip seal and a series of oncoming cars and trucks fling multiple little rocks--pebbles, really--in my direction. This is not out of the ordinary as the woman at the rental place said not to worry about paint chippage on the front end of the car from this, but all of the rocks managed to hit the windshield. Of course, one of these manages to chip it. Bon of a sitch! I have two days left with the car, and I chip the windshield now. And what does my partial pay insurance policy say? That it covers everything BUT the windscreens and windows. The customer is fully responsible for these. Dammit! So, all that I can do is say a little prayer, and hope that my winshield that has been rained on and cleaned of bird excretions and dead bugs manages to get dirty again and cover up that one particular spot. Or hope that they just don't notice it when I return it to the shop.

I arrived in Lake Tuapo, and then decided to go on towards Rotarua since it was too late to do anything and I needed to be as far north as possible. During the drive, the surrounding land was covered with natural hot springs, with clouds of steam rushing upward into the sky all around. I saw a sign that said "Natural Springs Walk" and decided this might be an interesting thing to do on the way. I turned off the road. Sophia became annoyed with me. I headed up a dirt road turned to rock and mud from the recent rains. Even the surrounding rivers were nothing but a muddy brown color. I should have known, heading up the path, that I should probably have turned around when I saw the turnaround made by other visitors. The road up was bumpy and messy, and the car, I'm sure, was having an identity crisis of whether it should be a van or an SUV. I kept going, and there were no more turnarounds. I'd lost interest within about a minute of driving, but there was nowhere to go. This is what they do here. Some of these tourist attractions with hook you with a sign of interest, and then take you down an eternal unpaved road so that you cannot turn around once you've decided to not pursue the activity, but rather must continue on to the destination whereupon they assume you'll feel obligated to partake in the given activity. Well, seeing the time I had spent going up, I pulled a two-point (actually three) turn the first chance I got and continued on my way. Sophia continued to badger me as I decided to take the scenic route to Rotarua, so she took a little nap on sleep mode as I drove through the amazing scenery that had a cretacious feel to it with all of the surrounding pools in the country.

Arriving in Rotorua around 7:30 pm, I found this great little motor park that had a cafe AND thermal pools for just $14 for the night. Pools alone generally cost $10-$20 for a single visit, so this was quite a deal. I headed over to my campground, set up, and then decided to get dinner rather than make it. The simple chicken burger I ordered was excellent, with amazing presentation--they are an artsy country, so presentation seems to mean a lot to them, which is fine by me. I also tried a Red Lion which was a nice change from the Monteiths I'd been having. All the beers and ales I've tried have been pretty light, even those that aren't meant for summer. So after my meal, I decided to indulge in a Kiwi desert of pavlova, a sweet meringue cake served with fresh fruit and ice cream. Absolutely amazing, but so much that I couldn't finish the entire thing. This is definitely something I'm going to have to try making when I get back home. From here I decided to go to the pools before they closed, and met a few very friendly Kiwis and a couple from Colorado on their honeymoon who was motorcycling through the north island with them. I eventually went back to their cabin for a bit (another night of beer and pizza), and was given some suggestions for today. I have decided that with such little time remaining, I want to see the Kauri (or is it Cowry?--no idea) forest and then head to Auckland. Time (both in travels and on my clock here) is running out, so I'd best be on my way!