Category: words

Thailand, the islands. We headed from Langkawi on the ferry a few hours North to Ko Lipe, or Koh Lipe, depending upon which map you look at. It was an odd experience, to say the least. The boat was marginally better than the one we had travelled on from Penang to Langkawi, but it had the bonus of having no commentary on the movie they were showing. The Langkawi trip had been plagued by a French lady who simply couldn’t get her head around the plot of John Wick, at least not silently, waiting as a movie unfolds like the rest of us do, she had to make comment on everything…she couldn’t quite grasp the idea and even if she failed at that you would have thought she could at the very least grasp that movies aren’t real life, that not everything that happens in them is true, and sometimes it’s just a little too convenient. Nope, despite her flawed comprehension and reasoning, everything was punctuated with a ‘ridiculous’, ‘that would never happen’, ‘come on’ or ‘how would he do that?’. I wanted to slap the words out of her (this is not misogyny, had it been a boy I would have liked to do the same, nor is it anti-French, I know many solid French folk and as such would not judge) mouth. There were however petrol fumes. More interestingly, we had to surrender our passports at the start of the journey, which is somewhat worrying to say the least. Then we have to change boats, something that the travel folk failed to clearly explain, so a bunch of puzzled looking tourists were we as we were bumbled on to a long tail boat in the bay. It appears that this sort of odd, not quite informative version of travel is standard in Malaysia. When we took the bus from Cameron Highlands to Penang, we were advised, by the travel agent, to take the bus to Butterworth, then the ferry to Georgetown as it is simple, easy and cheap. We booked for this very service. The bus however did not actually make it to Butterworth, on the mainland, but it did manage to drop us all, once again puzzled looking travellers at the bottom end of Penang Island, having crossed the bridge. We weren’t really told where we were, so while most of us tried to say “no this isn’t our stop, we are bound for Butterworth”, our driver, failed to convey in his English, that his bus was not going any further, and that we had to alight. It took another representative to tell us that this was indeed as far as we were going and that we had to catch a taxi or local bus from here. How very odd.

Back upon Koh Lipe, the sea was beautiful azure blue. The sand beautiful and white, my feet were wet, having to jump in to the water at arrivals and immigration…a hut on the beach. We settled and had a coffee before getting a somewhat mad rickshaw ride to the accommodation we had booked at Adang Sea divers and eco lodge. Again, not the Ritz, but what is when you travel like us. It was however clean, the welcome warm, the room plenty big and right by a beach and moments walk from the pedestrianised zone that essentially is Koh Lipe. Again, amazing food abounds. Be it on the beach or in town. It was nice to see. Massively touristy, but not too much of that Benidorm style Brits abroad tourism. Folk from all over, plenty of local eats and nothing too rip-offey in terms of price and shit shop stuff. A few souvenir places selling tat but that’s to be expected.

The two great marvels of this stretch were new experiences for both Conny and I.

Marvel Number One: Thai massage at a hut on the beach.

Lugging bags around and sleeping on buses and boats can be a strain on the back. So we decided to get a Thai massage. Given that we had spent the afternoon at the beach (despite our suncream), we had done the very euro-tourist thing of becoming various shades of pink (Conny) and red (yours truly) so opted for the addition of an Aloe Vera massage. It was a bit odd, when the old lady told me to get down to my pants and she chuckled sexy at me. I had thought this may be the case however, and had donned my loveliest newest fried-egg print underwear for this very moment which I stridently bust out for all and sundry, proclaiming that I had done such. So, I lay face down. Thinking back to the last time I had a massage professionally, that was bout 6 years ago, and it was one of those couple massages, performed by some Germanic lady types, it was nice, but my biggest take-aways from that were the realisation that the two massages were both identical for Conny and I meaning that when she was massaging my leg, sure enough her counterpart was doing Conny’s, then when she was at my chest, sure enough I looked across and another lady was handling Conny’s tits, quite fully. The emotion of that was confusing. The other take-away was the paper banana-hammock which they gave me to protect my modesty, if my modesty was limited to my penis because balls were busting out all over the shop. Anyway, back to Thailand. I lay down and the little lady started to climb on me, but it felt good, even when I thought my knees were about to pop. She then lays blankets on me and uncovers the area of body that she is set to focus on, legs, arms, back and so on. The massage is a delight. At times a bit of a pummelling, at others the smooth caress of gentle hands at others it felt like water running purposefully through my muscles. On occasion, I was surprised by a hand stroke to the edge of my nuts (no this isn’t a happy ending type service, more that I think the lady was just oblivious to the fact I have sexual organs) her finger even brushed my bumhole, which I’m almost certain nearly fired and involuntary puckering to the extent she is still lucky to have a finger and that it wasn’t sucked in and bitten off by my tighteneing balloon knot).

Then came the stretches and squishes of my inflexible limbs. Due to the fact that I have become a massive fat fatty over the last 5 years or so, I have sadly lost flexibility in these limbs, to the point my one and only season in Liga 5 of Swiss football was hampered by inflexibility and fatness related muscle injury. So as she is pulling and pushing on those same muscles I couldn’t help but fear a pop. A pop that never came. The massage continued, my body, my legs again, my head, but only the top of my face, she wouldn’t attempt to penetrate the beard-barrage. There were several cracks of fingers, and a couple of crack failures(each of my big, messy formerly broken big toes) same goes for the fingers without failures. Then there is more pulling, cracking, some pinching. The pinching was particularly good, she seemed to find an imbalance in my spine, one side hurt an awful lot more but felt a damn sight better for it after, then there was the piece de resistance, quite literally, a move where she positioned herself around my sat-up body, she took my arm and made a circular swirling motion, counting to three and on three, one big yank/swirl that stretched the very soul of me to my limits. Then the other side one..two… and BLAM, I simultaneously thought “what happened to three? OOOOOOWWWWW that hurts! And Woooowwww that is awesome”

Conny had suffered much the same fate, except for she got a lesson in Thai boxing when the lady massaging her went to swat a mosquito that was set to assault Conny, only she got it wrong and became the assaulter, boxing Conny more than the flying assailant.

We did both however walk away feeling relaxed and awesome, our pinkish glow shiny and effervescent with the Aloe Vera and our new aura, with the same thought.

“How and where should we learn to do that”

Marvel Number Two: Diving.

We chose to do a discovery scuba dive, well, two in fact. Our Dive Master was Manu. A blonde dreadlocked man from Barcelona, all tan and interesting tattoos and piercing blue eyes. I should have hated the dude from the off through jealousy as it was clear, most ladies would fall in love with him on sight (this was confirmed later by Conny’s sisters telling us that they would have been too busy doing exactly that to even start to learn to dive). However, he is a thoroughly pleasant and cool dude. Clearly a solid diver and great teacher, he got us doing exactly what we needed in no time. I had a little trouble as we got in, something wasn’t quite what I was expecting, especially that I didn’t expect to find it difficult, I think I just fucked up my entry and got a fuck ton of water up my nose that made me feel uncomfortable. Anyway, he said the right words and I was fine and dandy in seconds. Similarly Conny had problems equalising pressure further down, no hassles, he kept her calm and sorted it all without words, just a couple of signals and those baby blues. The first dive was shallower, clearer, but obviously we had more to concentrate on. We saw moray eels, lionfish, a huge stonefish, groupers and such. We even stopped by a coral too look at a seahorse that Manu had spotted and was pointing at. I followed and looked, pointed and smiled too. Conny followed our points and looks. She kept looking, and Manu asked if she had seen it with the OK sign. Conny told him she was OK with the OK sign.

We got to the surface and, knowingly, I asked Conny, what about that seahorse. “What seahorse?” I knew she hadn’t seen it but Manu was like “I told you when I saw one I’d let you know, you’d come to my shoulder for a look…we just did that”

“oh I know, but I didn’t see the seahorse”

“He did exactly what he said he was going to Conny, we both even pointed right at it, how did you not see?” I chimed in.

“Ah well”

The second dive was that afternoon. If I’m honest I felt the air was coming a little too forcibly into my lungs this time, unlike the first dive, and wasn’t as comfortable, but nothing off-putting. I had another wobble also when going through the safety routine, to recover a lost regulator. In my previous attempts I had felt the tube against my arm, when I didn’t this time I got puzzled and went through the first three motions again and again expecting to feel it…when I didn’t Manu had to tell me to do the next part, and sure enough it was there. Strange how that little difference tricked me into simply not following the procedure. Clearly, I am not as smart as I like to think!

The water was not as clear this time, but we did go deeper and more importantly there was quite a lot of current which made it an awful lot of fun. We saw the same stuff, plus many thousands of fish swirling and whirling around, the beautiful coral and rock of the imposing cliff underwater along which we were moving. Conny was my buddy this time, she was as inconsiderate as ever, doing her own thing rather than realising we were two. This made my job a little harder, but still it was excellent. Somewhere along the way I missed a giant barracuda, which sucks a bit but does not detract from the day. It truly was excellent. I know we paid, but I think we were very lucky to have such excellent divers/teachers with us in Manu and his cohorts, and I would like to both thank and highly recommend them for their service.

We left the next morning on rickshaw to the next ramshackle boat trip, equally as ramshackle but this time an hours trip by sweaty hot speedboat, to a hard to find office for onward travel by minibus for the next few hours to reach our next island, Koh Lanta. The bus ride was a bit nuts. All seats taken including the one next to me, which was stuffed with luggage, not leaving me much in the was of space. The transmission was also under my feet ad getting hot fast, but there was aircon and save from a few dead bum scenarios this didn’t phase me. The driving to this point had been somewhat mad, but what would we expect? We took a rest stop about 40KM from Lanta. We all came back, a drink and snack taken in, the various loo requirements taken out. Pretty solid I’d say. The driver however. Different story I have no idea what was on his sandwich or in his cup, but I want some. He was in a special place from here on out. Strong bursts of breath, like those when punching a bag, kept on coming, seemingly with no reason. Then there was the occasional air fist pump. His driving got more erratic. He tried to converse in English with a German, only even I had no fucking clue what he was saying, so the German had little hope.

One taxi ride later we arrived at Relax Beach, much to our confusion. The place was lovely, but not the same as we were led to believe by Air Bnb. It was way too swanky. It did say Relax Beach RESORT, but despite our protestations the taxi driver said this was it and shepherded us to the reception. Reception informed us that this wasn’t the place and that we had to trudge along the beach to the opposite end with our packs in the blistering sun. We did this and came upon the last beach bar, as we had been told, called the Lazy Days, we asked them, and they informed us that we were indeed in the wrong place and we had to go back down the beach, to the bar before the Relax Resort that is called Sea Culture. At Sea Culture we ask for Abu, the host, we ask about the bungalow as it is called on Air Bnb, they have no idea. The owner even tells me that his family own the whole beach and he has never heard of Abu. At this point nerves are starting to fray, but the Sea Culture owner lets us use his internet and an English chap gives us the lend of his Thai phone. Abu doesn’t answer. Conny decides to head off for a stroll to see what’s what and returns triumphant. We are 20 metres from the bungalow. Two bars down. When I say bars, I mean beach shacks operated by local hippy dudes* enjoying the sea and sun and serving the odd drink. Relax Beach is just as you could hope. Super chilled, beautiful, warm sea, white sand, not too many folk. Our bungalow is definitely on the basic side, but that is exactly what we had signed up for.

Honestly Koh Lanta is lovely. Brilliant to explore on a scooter (cost 5 euro a day from the Sea Culture). The roads are rough and fun. The East side is barely touched by westerners, where the West side is, well, very Western. Still all done in a way that only the Thais could. We popped on the bike and headed to the Old town on the South East tip, passing an elephant taking a dip en route. Had a coffee in the Old Town coffee house on their back deck and got chatting to a lovely family from Chang Mai. Then we came back up and cut across the heart of the island, and descended to Last Beach. A wifi free zone, with a lovely cabana bar and a beautiful long white beach, with some impressive waves breaking and keeping us suitably occupied. After a day lazing in the sun, we headed back up the beaten track amongst the monkeys to the road. To our right is a national park to our left the coast road. We opted for the latter and headed North once more. A local market beckoned us in, where we got to try bamboo smoked rice for the first time since our friends in KL had recommended that we absolutely must try it at some point. They were right it was bloody delicious. A mixed grain sticky rice with coconut, wrapped in banana leaf and stuffed in a stick of bamboo before being burned on a barbecue. Nothing short of wondrous.

I am currently back on Relax Beach while writing this piece. At this very moment, the proprietor of Sea Culture is butchering a shark in the surf that they caught last night. The sun is strong, the breeze a refreshing aside. I really do like this place and would recommend it to those who like a life less hustled and bustled as I do.

*Our favourite proprietor of such a bar was John, the proprietor of U Way bar, that you could easily not see, but just follow the gentle music that draws you to it. It turns out that he knows Abu, but we didn’t know that until 2 nights in. The first thing he did was offer us a joint, I think that we do not partake may have let him down slightly, but he still had some good chat and a cheeky chappiness to him that one could not help but find endearing. Plus he made good coffee and was insistant that his beverages be of good quality.

Malaysia. Kuala Lumpur to be exact. The first stop on our Asia leg of the mosey. More Proton and Perodua cars than you can shake a stick at and home of some of the most horrendous driving I have ever witnessed. Fuck me am I thankful for Uber here. I’d have been dead in minutes. Either that or I would have been overwhelmed by the fumes of my own bowels emptying each time I attempt a manoeuvre. Boy is this place a shock. Our first lesson, never trust a booking.com picture or description of a room for rent. Pudu 88 was ok. Not spotless, not ‘nice’ but definitely acceptable. It was however a bit stinky and nothing like what we expected. Still, it was cheap and in a great location. From where we were we were in striking distance of all that KL had to offer. If that is we could negotiate the traffic without succumbing to actual death. The streets are mental. Cars bikes vans everywhere, swerving and honking. Pedestrian crossings are merely suggestions of where you are entitled to chance your luck with marginally better odds of not getting mowed down. We swiftly learned to follow the locals, strength in numbers and such. There were however some public transport stations close by, and they more often than not had entrance via footbridge. The public transport in KL is great. A little confusing with which lines go where, but I would hazard a guess that that is more owed to the completely unfamiliarity of foreign names than it is to the system itself. I have a theory that it helps being familiar with the words themselves that make up the names when understanding what’s what regarding the lines and where they go.

KL is a strange place. Massively capitalist, which in itself leans against my sensibilities, there is building and ‘progress’ left right and centre. As a result, the city is quite mucky, but not unpleasantly so. Plus, when you factor in the climate here, it would be almost impossible for the city to maintain the cleanliness seen in some of the nicer cities we have visited, plus all cities, by their very nature produce mess and clutter. What I would say, is that the people are friendly, helpful, and at no point did I feel worried.

Our first day proper there, we went for a walk in the shadow of the twin towers, at which point the heavens broke. Fuck me I have never been in a thunder storm like it. A couple of hours of intense rain lashing down while booming thunder, louder than anything I heard while living in the Swiss Alps, bounced around the skyscrapers. It was near deafening at times and the sky was pierced with brilliant forks of electric light all around us. I would have loved to have been up one of the towers when this hit. Alas, Conny and I were stuck in a tiny pagoda in the park, which by the time it was done had started to flood, we didn’t even wait for the end, we chanced it in a momentary lull, although not complete stop of the rain to run back to the shopping centre for a coffee.

This leads nicely into lesson two.

Everything in Malaysia seems to be sweet. Coffee, more often than not comes loaded with sugar, and if you want it white, artificial creamer. Tea, sweet. Bread, sweet, Butter(probably margarine), sweet. Even when you ask for no sugar, its sweet. That is if it’s not monumentally fishy. One dinner we had was with some acquaintances…Conny could not believe the level of fishiness in everything that was on the table (except my vegetables). Not only mildly fishy, but that pungent, stinky shrimp paste fishiness. Conny, had her fill of fish for a while. On the whole though, once you realise how to negotiate the food and it’s sweetness and/or fishiness, it is spectacular. And spectacularly cheap. Its not cheap everywhere, if you try and be western you will get poor imitations of western food loaded with shit and you will pay a pretty penny for it. However, the key is sticking to where the locals eat. Bistros from food cart kitchens under little tents, Conny and I had a full dinner each with a cup of tea and it cost 2€ for the lot. Food courts in the clearly local malls and not the western ones, China town, and little India. All have really good food, really cheap. All could quite easily cater for vegetarians too. So long as you explain no meat, no fish, no chicken, no oyster or fish sauce, you are grand.

We were lucky enough to know some folk here in Malaysia, so we went up the Maxis tower for a view of the city. To be honest we had no idea of how vast it was, we thought that in the days leading up with our little expeditions here and there we had seen most of it. Nope. We had seen but a fraction. We were never going to cover all this area in one stay. We did get around a bit though. We went to the National Mosque. Hardly a classic piece of architecture but nice all the same, and nice that we infidels, so long as we held respect to some of their customs were allowed to take a look around and learn a bit about how Islam is done here.

I have to say, the most overwhelming and heartening impression of Malaysia and it’s people that I get is one of tolerance and multiculturalism. At least from an outsiders perspective the mix of different peoples, religions and ethnicities here is wonderful. Their cultures happily co-existing alongside and among one another. With all this talk of Islam being the devil in the world it’s easy to forget that when done right, it IS a religion of peace and respect to others. Malaysia is a shining example (as far as I can see, I wouldn’t claim to know if there are any problems further beneath the surface) of a Muslim nation that doesn’t adhere to the framework that many believe to be what Islam is about due to the proliferation of Isis and it’s relative coverage in the media. Personally I am not a fan of any religion, but I am a fan of people having the ability to choose their own way to live, so long as it doesn’t hurt anyone. It is often made out that Islam is the bad guy, and while it does have a disproportionate number of madheads at the moment, that is no worse than the current crop of madheads of Christianity (and don’t get me started on the good old “when has Christianity done anything like ISIS” stupidity), Judaism and even Buddhism has it’s extremist murderous monks. Atheists have the exact capacity to be extremists, and as the apparent proponents of rational thinking have the least justification for doing it (the war on Christmas anyone?). Point is, it was pleasant to see that country can be considered to be of a given religion or belief and particularly one that is oft demonised for it’s intolerance, but those within that country are allowed to practice as they will without persecution.

Speaking of religion, we headed out one day to the Batu caves. 272 steps up the side of a cliff, the temple and its surrounding buildings seem to be in a permanent state of repair, like much of KL, but what did surprise me was monkeys. Loads of monkeys, I saw one steal something from a guys pocket, others just chilling on the railings. The temple itself was beautiful, if a little lost on me, the cave magnificent, but for the humans. I must say, I don’t like humans much. Particularly traveller type/touristy ones, I know, ironic given that is exactly what I am (although I try to minimise my twattishness, I am sure I invariably fail). Not people who go to places and look and learn and/or appreciate, but those fuckwits who go to a place, stand next to a sign that says “don’t feed the monkeys” while they not only feed the monkeys, but encourage their child to. Then guess what, the next child or tourist sees it, and you have several monkey feeders there. As I said, fuckwits. Plus the amount of litter created by us human folks. Admittedly the Malay people seem to be as bad as the tourist folk at this. This is a human condition, I have noticed everywhere that there is a concentration of humans, there is a disregard for what to do with one’s spent packaging or waste.

Moving on from such topics, once we were done with KL we decided to head to the Cameron Highlands. Up in the mountains it was a few hours by bus to the rolling hills of the tea plantations. The weather sadly was not in our favour as we took a trip up one of South Asia’s highest mountains and through one of it’s oldest forests. It was muddy, and wet, and cloud meant that there was essentially no view. We did however get to go to the BOH tea plantation and factory, plus the weather cleared. We were with some of the more obnoxious kind of traveller in our convoy as we headed to the Strawberry farm and the Butterfly farm, one of their number asking the driver if we could leave, just of her own accord, and then the whole group of four just walking in the butterfly farm past the lady at the booth, not paying as if to say ”what are you going to do about it?” It really pissed me off particularly as one of the girls reminded me of one of my favourite Danish people, if not people in general, only this one was taller, Dutch and a dickhead.

Our original plan at this point had been to head in to Teman Nagara national park, for a bit of trekking and such, but, given that the weather was only suggesting big storms for days, we opted to head straight for the coast and the island of Penang, particularly it’s old town, Georgetown.

This place is a marvel. I kind of imagine it to be what I expect Cuba to be like, if only Cuba had a population of South Asians and the long gone rule of the British Empire. It is a world heritage site, which means the buildings will stay structurally at least as they are, their facades are notably adorned with some of the most beautiful murals and street art I have ever seen. From tiny little cats (apparently these are done in support for the local animal welfare charity) to the large three story paintings with sculpture and anything else in between. It truly is a breathtaking part of the world to just walk around and take in. That multicultural thing I mentioned, on one street here you have the central mosque, the incense of a Buddhist temple, right by a Christian church and a Hindu temple.

I mentioned the food in KL, the food in Cameron highlands was good, but we chose to eat at a local Indian each day that was cheap and tasty. The food in Georgetown however is about as good as food gets. I’m not talking artsy fartsy high falutin’ stuff. Street food. They have halls, with every kind of food available, all tasty and quite nice. Better still, they have genuine street carts, often clustered on street corners and you will see locals in either of these, they sell snack bits that you can taste or put together and make a meal, all super cheap, some entirely vegetarian, others of no known origin, probably all entirely delicious. Not only do they have awesome food, but awesome coffee. Not everywhere admittedly, but it is easy to get a good one. In KL the only good one I had cost me 13 ringgit, whereas an entire meal could cost 16 ringgit. Here, for about 6-8 ringgit you could get a nice coffee, for example at the post card shop down by the port, opposite the Container hotel. There they have Illy coffee and sell some beautiful postcards and trinkets inspired by Georgetown’s street art. My personal favourite was called Easy Drip coffee. A stunning coffee bar and local roast house. They roast their beans in a roasting room in house, you can even go in and watch, chat and discuss with the proprietor. She loves her coffee, and knows an awful lot about it, she even gave us a lesson in roasting and how the location of the bean and it’s roast affects the flavour of the coffee.

We stayed at the Little India Heritage Villa, which was a pleasantly clean and lovely place with a delightful chirpy chap on reception/shop duty. It really was as perfect as we could have wished for again as everywhere was in walking distance plus right by a stop of the free circular bus. At this point I should include the standout place in Conny’s opinion. We had dined some way across the city, in China Town, Conny had required dumplings. But for dessert, she required something sweet from a bakery we saw down by the port. Conny informed me that when she had walked in before she had got a whiff of what they did there and it was apparently the greatest smelling bakery in existence. Obligingly I trekked the breadth of the city to fulfil her fancy, admittedly with a treat in it for me at the end. I walked in and was hit by the smell. Fucking delicious, I eye the sweet pastry balls that this place clearly specialises in and think the salted egg and caramel sounds intriguing, at which point Conny asks if they are all vegetarian.

“No”

“What there are some that aren’t?”

“No, they all aren’t”

“Excuse me?”

“We make them all with only chicken fat”

Fuck. Conny said they were delicious.

Otherwise, our only day trip was what we as tourists are supposed to do, and head up the hill on the funicular railway. Which we did. We had breakfast saw a fucking weird giant squirrel, and spoke some Chinese for some kids doing a project. I am pretty sure they tricked us into name calling ourselves but who cares. It is a nice view up there and could at times be quite relaxing to be out of it all. That is until we realised it was a Saturday and there was a large fun run event on. The place was swarmed with sweaty runner folk, and going down on the train I truly wanted to punch children, square in the face. Not only were they the last of three queues to line up, but when we were asked to move on to the train they rushed and pushed and cut in with no regard. Fine by me, but not the elderly couple in front of me or the chap with downs syndrome to my left. They piled in the car, massively over filling it with their stinky sweaty paws all over us. Not only at this point did I want to punch their faces but puke on them too. I held my nerve.

Next and last on the list for Malaysia was Langkawi. An island by the Thai border in the Andaman Sea.

We got off the ferry and headed for town, having not booked anywhere. Conny, being a bit shit at the backpacker thing, and not really into the walking in sweaty heat thing, was starting to flag as we neared the first motels. Add to this that the first one looked like we might die, the second we didn’t even reach as we saw a dead snake which left Conny hyperventilating, we had to make alternate arrangements. I left Conny at a stand with a beverage and the bags and went off on foot. I secured us a clean room in a hotel with our own shower and breakfast included. It was pleasant although double the price we were looking for. It did however have wifi which meant we could look for suitable lodgings for the next few days. Conny tells me she’s found a gem and asks if she can book. Of course, I say, without checking. It turns out that it wasn’t even on the island, which Conny hadn’t noticed. It was in fact on an entirely different island. We had to get a ferry out the next morning. The ferry itself doesn’t have a schedule per say. You kind of wait until its full. Luckily for us, that happened after the monsoon like storm that hit the moment we got to the pier. Then we got off the boat and tried to call our host, but my phone no longer worked. We were given the direction of the place by the locals and set out in the sweltering heat. Fifteen minutes later we came across some huts, Conny asked if this was the place, the lady said yes and got her husband. He sat us down, asked if we had booked, put the fans on, checked our booking. Then told us that this isn’t the place. That we need to go another five minutes down the road, but if we don’t get a room there we can pick one at his place!

Further down the road we come to Barkat Chalet. It’s no Ritz. It’s a little rough’n’ready, but that is what we were described and expected. It was right on the sea and then when we couldn’t see anyone we called out.

A voice from the sea called back “Hello!” and a head popped up from behind a boat. Our host, now friend, Shades was coming to welcome us. His wife Bara popped out and gave us a coke, while Shades came and rather than just giving us the keys and getting back to it, sat down for a chat. He offered us use of his canoes, his scooter, as and when we want free of charge, “live freely” was his motto. They offered us food at a discount daily due to our vegetarianism and really we were blown away by the hospitality. It was indeed an accident to go there, but it was a very happy accident in the end. We truly couldn’t have wanted more. The place has three funny dogs bounding around, my favourite of which was a stray who recently just joined the pack, somewhat randomly, he is called Mafia. There were eagles hunting and diving all over the shop, there were water buffalo that lazed in front of our beach. We went kayaking, we rode the scooter around the island and across the ricketiest of rickety bridges on to the next island. Shades and Bara took us out for tea with another guest, Adi. Everything was marvellous. Adi, is a frequent flyer at Barkat Chalet. He loves the place so much he comes every couple of months and is even building his own hut there. He helps Shades and Bara out a bit and looks after the likes of us, he is an all round lovely guy. He even came to fetch Conny and I one evening as he had heard us speak of bioluminescent plankton. So two nights we got to partake in this natural wonder. At around midnight, with high tide we went swimming and sure enough the further from the light of the land you go, the more you notice it. The water, wherever you disturb it glows green. Flickers of magic at your fingertips turn into clouds of glowing light with a swipe of a hand. Light bursts as you stroke forward, dripping through my beard and chest hair as I roll. Fucking amazing. It is hard to put into words other than that. Fucking Amazing.

Adi also took us out in his boat, up and down the river, giving us both a go at the helm.

I really could not rate this place enough. If you want to relax, enjoy a hammock or two, make some good friends and enjoy the beauty of somewhere very different, this place is it.

Steven, he’s the one who we met in Nice a while back and visited in Wanaka a few years ago. It is he that is Grandson to Gordon, the patriarch of the OAP crew that took us to the club and let us camp on the lawn in Wanaka this year. He is also the second born son of Gay and Gary, proprietors of the Bean on Thames and most wonderful hosts to Conny and I in Oamaru. It is clear that Steven is from good stock. He’s a cheeky chappy with a glint in his eye and a tale for all moments. He tells us how he was raised to chat with anyone, and this for sure is the truth. In short, we like Steven, he is a good dude.

Currently, Steven resides in Perth where he is a miner. We landed at silly o’clock in Perth from our China Airlines flight. For those not in the know, think Easyjet, only about three times as long an aircraft.

When we arrived, Steven met us in October. A recently acquired brutish beauty of a Land Cruiser. Now I am all for an eco friendly car, but these things are my little hypocrisy in that I find them ace. The truth is, where they are needed, they are unrivalled.

We decided, well Steven had it all planned, to head down to Margaret River where he had rented a house. We did manage to stop at the least successful service station ever en route. We thought we would get fuel, air in the tyres, a coffee and a toilet stop before moseying on. Only having got the fuel, we were informed that they had to switch the water off, so no coffee, or toilets, of course there was also no air. So all in all, pretty shit…they did turn the water back on eventually, but not before putting quite the delay on our trip and one of our number near ruining their underwear. Here we could stop at a brewery, which we did, he and Conny got suitably liquored, we could cook, we did this also. We even went to the pub. Conny who had decided to be Steve’s wingman and ably assist in getting him some lady company, kind of fucked that up near instantly. Mere moments after having walked into the bar, pints were ordered and Steve went for the arm-link pint drink. The thing is, this is a customary friendship drink in Austria which is finished with a kiss on the lips. The drunken awkwardness of this moment and the beffuddlement of all around in essence meant that not only was she a crap wingman, but she had basically stamped her brand on Steve right off the bat, by making out with him for all the ladies and their menfolk to see.

Now that I had become the 3^rd wheel in this scenario, my thoughts turned to the stomach churning fact that it was an open mic night. Something that I had not predicted. You see I kind of fancy myself as a singer. I actually think I’m pretty decent, but I also understand the craft and delivery of people who do it properly. I practice at home, I have recently allowed Conny to hear but other than that, nerves essentially make me shit the bed and crash the Ferrari all at once the very moment I think someone could be listening. Pitch goes out the window, as do lyrics and also sometime so does guitar playing ability. Worse still I look like a nervous wreck with an eye twitch. Plus, microphones scare the shit out of me. In the last 10 years or so I have sang approximately three times in front of people, with varying degrees of supershitness that have not helped my ego any and one even where I over heard a guy whisper to another chap I knew “Car crash” as I walked off stage past them.

This time however, was different. First I went to my old favourite, Disarm, by the Smashing Pumpkins. I tend to do songs differently, which also makes me shit my pants, but this one I feel comfortable with. Surprisingly, despite forgetting how to play it and even at one point whether I had sung the right words or not, it came to an end with a bit of an applause. Who’d a knew? Then it was time to bust out a bit of Neil Young. And again, a few minor fuck ups but no disaster. They asked for a third…I thought “Fuck, I don’t really know anything you’ll know” As such I told them exactly that, said “fuck it” and sang some Editors, fuck ups, forgotten lyrics, chords and all. But this time, I just laughed and carried on. Today, for me was a triumph. As a certain Orang-utan buffoon would say, a huge win.

The night carried on, with Steven, who it may be said likes a beverage, ordering at least one, sometimes two sixteen year old malts to go along with his beer. We got chatting to some pretty ladies, one of whom was single, but by this point, Steve’s speech, although clear, had descended into odd tales with, as far as I fathom, no beginning, middle, or end. The patience and decency of these fine ladies was remarkable as they listened intently hanging on his words. Sadly Steve himself said he had no idea what to do…at that point he needs someone to just tell him to stop, change the subject or to but in. This never came. With that kind of patience, those ladies should be snapped up and married ASAP. Steven said as much himself.

The next day we headed out to the beach to put October through her paces. We went through some of road tracks that to the mere mortal Sunday drivers like Conny and I, nothing would get through, yet we were assured that they would be no hassle, that it was just a stroll in the park for the burgundy beast. And it was. Now I’m not saying it was like Rolls Royce comfort of floating on air while the bumps dissolve in spongy suspension. Oh no, there was a large amount of whiplash inducing bounce and wobble, Conny even decided a sports bra would have been the best option my thoughts leaned towards no top and a video camera, but alas, that is to where my thoughts would always turn. I learned swiftly to hold on, if not for dear life, but to at the very least refrain from repeated window blows to the head. What it was however, was an immense amount of fun. We had a blast along the beach, got our feet wet and had a little picnic before Conny took the wheel and drove us back to the road. No dramas, we knew she was a natch ever since she drove down the hill from Mike Magan’s house a few years back. However one less talented lady had tried to travail the road in her rented Kia Sportage. Needles to say there was a blockage in the road, while two local boys and their monsterous Cruisers towed her out. Tonight’s dinner and evening was much more sedate, we cooked and ate, in then a spot of TV and chat before bedtime. The next day was another beach, but first a beverage in an awesome pub that had been burned down by fire, but when it was renovated, they kept the burnt bits as much as possible. This time we headed to more rocky shoreline, it was all holey and ancient looking, a bit like the moon but at once a bit animal. Then it was my turn to drive back. Not as eventful, just a few bush scrapes here and there, as Conny’s but still fun all the same.

So ever since we met the Smith family, we had basically been told that Steven’s brother had really lucked out in love, and managed to get himself a beautiful hot Columbian bride. Next on our list was finding out the truth of this tale. We headed out for coffee with a view, served, coincidentally by a stunning latina, and then we headed in to Perth proper, not that Perth proper has loads to offer, but the park was nice, it had an incorrectly named glass bridge, which was not anywhere near as exciting as it had been made out to be due to the fact that it wasn’t that high…NOR WAS IT MADE OF GLASS! It was a standard metal bridge, with some glass panels on the side. Still the view of the city and the coast line was lovely. It was incredible to see what used to be the airport, now a seafront strip, but I imagine landing there in days of yore would have been one of the more pant ruining landings one could have.

We headed to a sports bar. A big fucker of a sports bar, I forget its name. It never fails to make me wonder why bars are so big and bar tenders are so sluggish. I’m not saying that all bars need to be breakneck speeds at all times, but there were so many people for so little to do and they all did it so slowly(and messily) it was infuriating. Anyway, on to our lovely Latina. Her name is Sandra and she arrived in brilliant white jeans and silvery sparkly shoes and is indeed stunning. Moreover she is an absolute treasure of a lady. Fun, bright and talkative from the off, I can only confirm that the legends are true. She took us to a little Chinese place for dumplings (Conny’s favourite. Told you, she’s perfect) where Steven, several pints in at this point and I had taken over driving duties, proceeded to knock a glass of darkest red wine straight into her brilliant white lap. She laughed and carried on, as any trouper would. She clearly has been out with Steven before. The food was delicious, the company even better and a great night was capped off with ice cream before heading back to her flat for cocktails. They were worried as there was not much left in the cocktail store at home as she and Bevan(Steven’s brother) were about to move house. Never fear, David’s here! I may not drink, but I like to think I’m the muts nuts when it comes to tending bar. So I bust out a couple of diesel strength specials from some honey liquor, aperol, whiskey, frozen berries, a dribble of prossecco and some juice. The cocktails clearly worked as conversation flitted from everything to work, food, drink, religion, politics and vagina waxing. Yes! Vagina waxing! Somebody sparked up a clove cigarette, now I don’t smoke, but this intrigued me. I took a puff. It was fucking rotten. Smoking and dentists combined. Eugh.

The next day was spent nursing hangovers and by nursing hangovers, I mean heading to a brewery for beer. Several beers in, Conny and Steve decided that the cidre brewery next door was also a good idea. Now, both places were great, beer lovely, cidre lovelier still, but there are only so many hours of a day being the sober dude with a couple of piss heads succumbing to their ways a man can take.It was nice chilling in the beer garden and such, watching the troupes of clearly underage but monied youth celebrating a birthday. As I got bored of their chat I took October and hinted at our impending exit by waiting at the gates. The evening spent hanging with the flatmates who had graciously put up with us. Conny was, however on the booze, I was actually packing the bags for our early morning flight. It can be said, that occasionally, Conny like many, can let the booze get the better of her. Now I can relate to this, it’s fine. Apparently, I didn’t hear, but one of the flatmates said something disrespectful to his partner, like I say, I couldn’t say what it was. However, Conny decided(for which I am quite proud of her) to call bollocks and stick up for her new friend! However, as booze tends to do, it got in the way of her doing this in an appropriate fashion, and instead she got all mouthy and silly and acted exactly as disrespectfully if not more than he had. In short. Tensions rose. I told Conny to wind her neck in. She called me a wimp among other things. I left her to it knowing the regret would come in the morning! The regret came alright. It didn’t help that they stayed up til past one am. Our flight was before 6 am and we had a 4 something start. Sufficed to say that Steven was not up for the drive to the airport as promised but he did call us an Uber. He has since reassured me that no real offence was taken and guilty parties barely remember. We headed to the airport below a stunning golden moon, Conny swearing not to drink again until June (this is April), with another hungover flight beckoning it did not look promising for Conny. Onward! To Malaysia!

Lottie and Conny used to work together. Not only that, but they did this on a boat, where they had to share a cabin. As such they became good pals. It was to go see Lottie and her husband Ryan that we were headed to Geelong/Queenscliff. Normally, we would have stayed at their house. However it was completely gutted and amidst a full renovation. Instead we had to settle for a room at Ryan’s Dad’s house. When I say settle, I mean bask in the glorious luxury.

Barry and Tessa, Ryan’s father and his wife have a beautiful house. Up on windy hill the view is stunning, basically my perfect house, this place has epic high floor to ceiling glass and looks out to the sea, over the fields and is a mix of simple elegance with a touch of luxury, the views even extend to when having a shower. There are hobby cows milling around, a collection of hounds and even a workshop and art studio or two. To cap it off, a pool! Most importantly however, we were welcomed as long friends despite having never met, for which I can only ever remain eternally grateful. I got my “I’m a vegetarian who doesn’t drink” statement out early, I usually expect a little judgement, but there was none! Barry had to fly out on our second day there but the evening before was spent learning the finer points of Aussie Rules and discussions as to how it is a much better sport than ‘soccer’. I’m not entirely (read: at all) in accord with this sentiment, but I certainly did enjoy the chat and the game. Having never met Ryan previously it was pretty nice to get to know him too. A solid chap we had a great chat one evening putting the world to rights with discussions of everything from politics, even at the local level (Ryan’s Dad was formerly Mayor of Geelong) to the much broader ever present spectre of the volatile situation of world politics as it stands today. We talked on cars, electric and otherwise, sports, economics and lord knows what, I must say Lottie has done well, I thoroughly enjoyed our natter, however little it achieved in fixing the world. Geelong is a very nice town. They have excellent fish and chips* served from a boat house above the sea, the calibre of the fish and chips was greatly up for debate, as was my ability to judge them, due to my lack of fish consumption. However as a voracious consumer of the chips and their accoutrements I fell I am of prime position, whereas Ryan disagrees, he also disagrees that a proper British chippy is the worlds greatest, but then again, he is just plain wrong. That said, the chippies are great at this end of the world and I love that they serve potato fritters/scallops/flips/cakes depending on what you want to call them. We ate at a swanky restaurant in town that was delicious, Conny and I took the bikes out for a day and best of all Ryan took us out sailing. A Perfect size beautiful boat, big enough for one skilled sailor to handle, and also not too difficult to give us delinquents a chance to feel all Captain Jack Sparrow. I want a sail boat. To your average sailor, I’m sure what we did was very simple and mundane, in essence, we just steered a wheel. However I was feeling ebullient and was convinced my new title should be David Alexander South, Master of the Southern Seas. Plus I am entirely convinced I am a natural sailor and would require only 20 minutes more instruction before being able to circumnavigate the world entire.**

One more thing about our hosts, Tessa***, a beautiful Yorkshire lass, long emigrated to Australia, is an artist. Hence the studio. Her art adorns the walls of the most beautiful house I know, and not only does it not look out of place, it serves to beautify it further. She truly is a talent of many media and styles. Every piece she does is stunning and inspires that kind of “I’d like to think I could do something that wonderful, but realistically I have no chance” awe. I most definitely would love to have some of her work adorn the walls in my home…that is…if I weren’t homeless.

Further to the wonder of them letting us stay in their beautiful home on the hill, Barry and Tessa let us stay in their holiday home by Anglesea, a bit further down the coast.

Here we got to hang out with Lottie and a bit more and went to the seaside. At one point I saw a bright white deer. I told the girls this, who were in the front seats, but they were in disbelief, their response came thus: “Are you sure it wasn’t just an albino kangaroo?”. I shit you not. One of the girls said that. Luckily, I can’t remember which one came up with that gem, but they can both share the blame/credit as they were equal in their disbelief. To the point where I bade them reverse as it didn’t seem too spooked. They did. Their response was thus: “Oh look, a white deer”

We decided that at Anglesea we would cook. Ryan told me the one thing he just didn’t get was tofu. So I whipped up some fine Tofu in a barbecue chinese gravy and I think I may have shown him the light. I wouldn’t want him to say that tofu is the greatest thing ever. Just to know that when handled correctly, it can be delicious. Ryan however out did himself with dessert. He had spoke of a sponge cake in brief, said that he would pick one up, and pick one up he did. He told us it would be light and tasty. He told us it would be delicious. More to the point, we believed him. Still, we weren’t prepared for this. The single most airy and lightest sponge ever created, combined with a good slab of whipped cream(not usually my thing, but it works) and topped with the most delicious passion fruit butter-cream imaginable. Oh My Fucking Jesus Hairy Balls. We had intended to eat a small sliver each. We ate the whole thing with Ryan and I smashing down the last two chunks in fatness and delight. To day, it might be the single most talked about thing from Conny’s perspective of the whole trip. It is definitely the new benchmark for cakes, which Conny now sees as a challenge to find another that comes close, and/or recreate such a beauty when we get home. It is, in her eyes the pinnacle of all things baked.

The next morning, Conny and I took a stormy bus ride down the coast road for a picnic on the beach. To be fair, we couldn’t concentrate on the view due to the pure fact that the spirit of Colin McRae had taken possession of our driver. I’m entirely sure that he bottomed out at least twice, once while going around a 90 degree bend at the bottom of a hill on the edge of a cliff. I would like to think there may have been a few power slides in there too. We took Klaus, Lottie and Ryan’s excellently monikered dog to the beach and had a super relaxed time. We boarded the train at Geelong and headed back to Melbourne, home of a cohort of mine from the very old days, practically the middle ages when I was a running shoe salesman, James Sherratt. Back in the days we used to work together at the recently deceased Bourne Sports in sunny Stoke On Trent. He and I were always of a like mind about many things and spent many a night at the Underground, the Sugarmill in Hanley or Gatsby’s in Newcastle. He’s always been a nice lad. He’s a bit younger than me. Much more polite and a genuinely decent fellow. It’s been over a decade since last we met so it was very nice for me to see him doing well. Now he is a teacher of history at a posh Melbourne private school, and he let us stay at his place. As happens in the good friendships, there was very little of that tiresome catch up chat and straight into the silly shit.

Melbourne, is a great city. Easy to get around. Friendly people. We had a nose around the hipstery places and junk stores of Fitzroy, we had a mosey around the CBD and even took a day trip to one of the suburbs which had its own little retro-community vibe going on and the fabulous Sun cinema. First we partook in the most incredible vegan ice cream I have ever tried(not that that’s many), from Goje. I actually had no idea it was vegan until halfway through, up until that point I just thought it was fucking delicious. We then went to the cinema to see Beauty and the Beast. I love Emma Watson. Straight up, Conny knows, and understands. She is a perfect beautiful person. Much like Yarraville itself, the Sun cinema is an eclectic retro kind of place, the chairs are lush and the toilets stinky but all in all its a wonder. Melbourne is for the most part clean, but quirky, with some fantastic food, from the Yum Dumplings in little China to the Veggie Bar (an absolutely outstanding place for my particular breed of fatty, and those of a more omnivorous persuasion enjoy it equally) in Fitzroy the food was nothing short of wonderful. One night we met up with an old friend from Nice, Julian, who used to live with Conny, and we hit up a little food truck market just out in one of the suburbs. Another day we met up with a different friend from Nice that we used to work with, Sally, who about to bring her offspring into the world and we haven’t seen since the heady days of summer 2008 (I think, it’s hard to keep track). We met at the NVG, an entirely free gallery of art and antiquities where I was surprised to find an awful lot of stuff from my home town of Stoke On Trent. Odd that I should be in Melbourne half a world away a decade after leaving Stoke looking at its (admittedly quite exquisite) pottery. I could have told them a thing or two about it myself, they did miss some knowledge gems. We also had tea there with another of our acquaintances Michelle, who we looked after in Switzerland alongside her husband David who broke his back in several places while on a cycling trip there. Amazingly he was back on his bike within a matter of weeks, and walking was just a matter of days. She brought with her her daughter Caitlin, it was a busy time! It was nice to see Sally so happy. She has a husband in the army and quite enjoys the army wife life, is about to welcome her child into the world and looks all set for the adventure. You may or may not have guessed this, but a big part of this trip for us is seeing some of those familiar faces we came to know and love whilst living our lives of old. All in all, I have to say I am happy to say that most of these fond folk are doing well and enjoying their lives, which is what matters. The beauty of living the lives we have is that it has allowed us meet people from all over the world and forge bonds with them across international boundaries. Although we may not speak often and see one another even less, the fondness for these folk does not diminish and it is super heartening to see them in fine fettle. It turns out that I might be the one that didn’t quite grow up yet.

From Melbourne we headed to the airport bound to Perth where we would continue our catch up trip with the fine and dandy Mr Steven Smith.

*Excellent but nowhere near the quality of the Dancing Octopus in Newcastle Under Lyme

**I’m lying.

***Search Tessa Dodds Art on google if you are interested.

We arrived in Sydney, not really understanding why we had found the hunt for accommodation so tricky. We had initially wanted to couch surf. We like the idea of getting to be in a real place, meeting local folk and getting an educated perspective on an area, hopefully making a friend or two and let’s be honest saving a penny or two as we do. We haven’t got a house to do it yet, but when we are no longer homeless, we do intend to let some folk surf our couch(again, dependant on us obtaining one). Sadly, Conny didn’t get much of a response from anybody she had asked, except for one lady who denied her and even messaged a one word reply. It read “LOL”.

Then we looked for backpackers, but all were taken.

The dreaded curse of Conny and David in the city seemed to be in full effect. We settled for a room that cost about 100€ a night, not exactly extortionate, but not the backpacker rates we had hoped for, but it was nice, in a nice area and it was clean. Couldn’t grumble. We realised soon enough that the curse was indeed in full effect. True to form, it was fucking Mardi Gras weekend. We headed out to the parade, which in all honesty was as heart warming an experience as one could imagine or hope for. Yes we had to buy a crappy little blue stool, to stand atop and peer at the passing troupes of dancers and prancers and such. Yes Conny had her beer taken off her by an over-zealous rozzer, even though she had literally just bought from the shop behind us, unknowing of the ban on alcohol (I know, who ever heard of an alcohol free carnival) and yes there were some nobheads who didn’t quite get it and were out for their own kind of fun. But what the parade and it’s legion of revelling spectators was is simple. It was a giant, camp, fun, over the top celebration of love. People respecting the right of all to love, not just respecting it, but embracing it, and supporting those who might sometimes be downtrodden. It was obviously about LGBTQI folk, but to my eyes it was a coming together of all of us with hearts and souls to show one another that no matter who you are, or which variety of human you are into, it’s ok, not only that but it’s great. A demonstration that it doesn’t and shouldn’t matter if you have two dads, two mums or a dad that was a mum or whatever. Watching those in the parade bust out their fiercest moves, in their spangliest outfits and to then be able to rush to a cheering crowd of men women and kids with smiles across their faces, clamouring for hugs and high fives, letting those folk in the street know that they are not on their own is something to be savoured. I really really really thought it was humans at their best and was glad to be there to witness it. Plus it is funny as fuck. The costumes were ridiculous to sublime. Some folk were having a giraffe, others being as serious as a heart attack. Politicians, educators, sports teams all busting out the glam and glitz to have a bit of a laugh and show some love.

Sydney is a beautiful city. It feels nice, it feels safe, the Opera House was somewhat underwhelming, particularly to Conny (you may see a trend here) but it was easy to navigate, has some beautiful architecture and more importantly it has a Dan Mackey. One of the plethora of old Nice folk that we have and shall bump into along our travels and a fine gentleman. He met us after work one evening and he had a plan. His plan was to take us to some of the places that the tourists can’t find and he pulled out some corkers. We went to a random rooftop bar (Sweeney’s) we had to climb through 4 empty floors of run down pub to get to, with a full terrace at the top. The jewel in the crown was a secret speak-easy style place that was devoid of signage (called Baxter’s, so I’m told), down an alley, past some bins. Here you would have to enter an unmarked door, and walk down some stairs and around some beer kegs to an innocuous looking door. Behind said door lay something that was halfway prohibition era speak-easy and halfway harry potter magic and marvel. A whisky den with an epic collection that required our (beautiful to the point that I even told Conny I might be in love) server to climb ladders like those in a library to get to the booze (it might have been her solid ladder work that made me love her). Those of you who know, might wonder why I am so awestruck and happy in such places, given my teetotal-ness, but really, that is not down to a disdain for the beverage, merely it doesn’t work with my head chemistry. I love places like this, a good bar is the best place on earth. In this one I even got a green apple juice pressed to order(the beautiful server goddess’s idea…again, possibly a reason for my silly infatuation). The lighting was candles and the décor was old style brick, brass, wood and leather. The only food they served was super salted pretzels and the atmosphere was thick with people having a great night, a sparkling conversation or a straight up belter with friends. Top marks Dan. To round the evening off we headed to another pub, it wasn’t actually Dan’s initial choice (that was GDR), but it was still amongst his favoured haunts. A place (Arcadia Liquors) that served tasty beverage along side toasties. What’s not to love. Dan said he used to go there for dance nights where the campest Austrian DJ, with a giant teddy bear frame would get dressed up in his spangliest tightest disco wear and rage all night as he span the cheesiest disco tunes he could. Sadly his visa ran out. I would have liked to have seen that. We said our goodbyes and retired for the night to start afresh the next day.

We took the ferry on a bumpy and stormy day to meet up with another of the old Nice crew at Manly a day or two later, Kieran worked with us back in our Thor days, he again is a proper decent sort. Also, he is mostly vegetarian. Always good in my books, and he witnessed a time when the girlfriend of my brother once tried to fight me in accusing me of stealing from my own restaurant. Awks. But still, we had a very pleasant night out at the very lovely Manly, made me kind of think of the Santa Cruz of the Sydney area. We ate pizza, we chatted, we met his current lovely lady, with whom he will shortly be moving to Byron Bay. He’s one of those guys you would always like to see. Brings a smile to your face and warms the cockles of your heart. I’m happy to see him doing well and happy.

To be honest, I can’t remember the order of things in Sydney. One day we went to Bondi, but it was stormy and the sand whipped the shit out of my eyes. There was an awesome coffee shop/library/bookstore there though, that encouraged you to read what you wanted whilst enjoying your beverage. I opted for the origins of Kung Fu, written in 1981. A solid read I would say.

We saw parakeets in the park walking around the sea front. We chatted to an oddball or two. All in all very pleasant. Next up we had to hire our car for the next few days as we headed to the Hunter Valley.

We were picked up by Sarah in a big Ford Falcon, we went to collect a couple in from Adelaide as we made our way, ensemble, to the rental car company HQ, Sarah telling us that despite having been born and raised locally, she didn’t really know where she was going. As she turned into the lot at pace, she bottomed the car out and as she reversed into her spot, she casually halted after long and virulent protestation from her co workers.

“Oh I didn’t realise there was another car there” she notes upon exiting the vehicle. I look at the distance between the falcon and said vehicle. I couldn’t see any.

“Welcome to Rent a Bomb” the more senior looking cohort says, “Sarah is the one that makes them bombs, we give her cars, they come back bombs”.

Yes folks, Rent a Bomb. Not, as one poor guy from Singapore found out, where some would assume the hiring of incendiary or explosive devices (his bank blocked his card and told him it was being used for terrorism, that someone was trying to rent a bomb in Australia, come to think of it, renting a bomb is a bit of a silly idea, you would invariably lose your deposit), but cheap as chips car rental (20 bucks a day). The car we landed, made Jucy’s El Cheapos look like a shiny Maserati. The interior cloth of the doors and roof had been either stapled or screwed on. The automatic box gear lever was as wobbly as a manual. The bumpers taped on, the sides covered in scrapes and scratches, the wing mirrors so shonky and wobbly they were practically rendered unusable above 30 Km/h. Still, it got us where we needed to go.

Where we needed to go was the Hunter Valley. Famed for its wineries and it’s horse studs, we happened to know the owner of one such place, the Kia Ora stud by Scone. It’s only a boutique stud by the scale of some of these places, but it was still vast. Paddock after paddock all neat and wonderfully groomed. Backed up by thousands of acres out back. We were lucky enough to be offered one of the houses on the stud for a few days, and it was exactly what we needed. We pulled into the driveway and a flock of parrots flew off. To be fair, a lot of Australia, and New Zealand for that matter, is reminiscent of England, due to their shared heritage. The wildlife, flora and fauna set this bottom end of the world apart. The flora are spectacularly exotic in their spikes and grand blooms,. What I find most striking however is the birdlife. Turning a corner here and a flock of red, gold and green parrots take flight. Bumbling down a country lane and a giant parakeet flops out of the bushes, or the flocks of Galaas and such. That’s even before the magpies. A magpie in Europe is a scoundrel of a bird. But worse still, it’s like the thieving scally of the avian world. Likely to pick your pocket and try and grope your girlfriend. A magpie on this side of the world looks more like a big fancy raven, only, to continue the theme, he is dressed more ornately, like the old highway man from tales of yore, romanticised in a way of refined elegant thievery to which he would not only steal the contents of your purse, but also the heart and very hand of your wife, with a dash and panache that even the victim has to admire.

Back to the Hunter before I let my literary notions of bird thieves/thief birds run away with me. Hunter had plenty for us to keep occupied, a trip to a winery or two for Conny, chilling out in the sun, a visit to a lake, Kangaroo spotting, a look into the world of thoroughbred breeding, we got the chance to hang out with a 30 million dollar stallion. Most important, we met the crew of the farm. Alex showed us around the stock, we hung out with a few weanlings and yearlings, and Brandon showed us the farm itself and more over took great effort to look after us. We went out for dinner at a nice restaurant in town and we even went for dinner with him and his family at their house. A true gent if ever there was one and a lovely family to boot.

It is impressive being around the horses. They are beautiful creatures. I have my thoughts upon horse racing and the treatment of the animals once they can no longer race and such, but at this stage, they are simply just well looked after, beautiful animals. Obviously when you see them for sale or in show or on TV they look very prim and proper. Staid and calm, but we got to watch them play, and run about. I found it amazing that they took one of the old brood mares who no longer was breeding, and threw her in with a bunch of young ones to act as a nanny, it was a delight to see. All Too Hard, the aforementioned stallion however, was not all too long legs and cuteness like the foals. He was a big beast. Full of muscle, he cut such an imposing figure I defy anyone to feel un-awed in his presence. These boys, in season, sew their seed up to three times a day. What a life! To be fair, at tens of thousands a pop(so to speak) you can see why there is money in it!

After the Hunter, we headed back to Sydney for rental 2.

This was the camper we would take down to Melbourne over the next 8 days. We went for the eco-option. A tiny 1.6 litre Suzuki van, that made our US van look palatial. Similar idea, basic sink and kitchen in back, bed in the middle, drive at the front. No tent though, and no going above 90km-h really. But it was exactly what we needed, despite the guy who rented it to us telling us how we get what we pay for with it and stuff…it would appear that he couldn’t see the reason behind not choosing a house on wheels and going for something more simple.

Luck, as it happens, was not on our side. As we rolled down the coast from Sydney, so did a storm so bad, they called it a super storm. Frankly, I could see why. We were at times on roads so overflowed they were indistinguishable from rivers. As we passed one estate, I looked ten metres down the road to see a car, window deep in water, abandoned, via said window. It was chaos. It didn’t quite allow us to enjoy the splendour of the coast road, but we did find a couple of nice spots. Conny went for a swim in the local sea pool at one such place and we had a few walks by the beach and stuff as the storm died down a few days in.

Then, all of a sudden it changed. The weather got glorious, we visited a cave system, full of crystal and stalactites and mites thousands of years old, the formations were beautiful as one would expect, a little less expected were the ones resembling vaginas and even one looking like bacon. Australia, is brilliant for free camping. So much that I would go as far as to say it is what I think NZ should be and what I thought it was going to be. We slept at several free camp sites, with varying facilities, but generally with a toilet of some kind. One was even a disused private campsite that had been taken over by the municipality and maintained for folk to use for free. OK they didn’t keep it sparkly and nice but it was certainly a solid spot to stay considering its lack of charge. It had toilets, electric barbecues, there was even a pub across the bridge. That said, the village in which it sat existed of only the pub and three shacks. It was a little on the grubby side, I’m pretty sure the drip mats hadn’t ever been taken off the bar and I doubt one could achieve such a feat now. I think they and the bar are one. Conny insisted that when the barkeep gave me the coke I had ordered that I didn’t touch the glass. We found another site in a forest somewhere, with pit toilets and a fire pit, it was obviously reasonably well known as we found ourselves surrounded by the Germans. Noisy buggers. That said, they weren’t nearly as bad as the French folk that I neglected to mention in NZ. It was a night on the tour of the South Island, at one of the DOC campsites. A beautiful bay with cliffs and rolling seas, the romance of it all had clearly gone to the heads of some of our fellow site dwellers. Next door were some French folk, and as night set in Conny and I set to reading before bed as we tended to. Then the groaning started, a little feminine moan here or there, and Conny asks if I hear, I say I didn’t but my ears are keen now…and sure enough, there it was. Now, you may think that it’s to be expected, nothing too much out of the ordinary, but the thing is we saw this small tent erected. By four French folk. Two boys two girls. As the moans intensified it was clear that it was not the one lady, but two, and a few more masculine tones to boot. They were most definitely enjoying themselves and each other to the fullest, we couldn’t help but hear the sound of climactic crescendo and ball slap and frankly one doesn’t know how to feel about that.

Worse still, the morning after I caught one girls gaze as she looked out of the tent door in the morning. Her retreat was swift and I can’t tell if it was embarrassment or pride that I saw in the fleeting moment. Perhaps it was a little of both.

Anyway, back to Australia. There are places all over to stop, and if not officially made for that they seem to be ok with people staying pretty much wherever so long as you respect the place accordingly. The areas of beauty all come with electric barbecues and sheltered tables, most with toilets and drinking water. It was a fantastic trip down, until we realised that we had only got the van for one more night…not the two we thought we had! Clearly one of us wasn’t paying attention when he booked it, plus, I’m a bit crap with knowing what day, date or time it is at any given moment these days, it seems irrelevant, and for the most part, is. That said we realised we had to draw closer to Melbourne and skip our last day at the Pomontory, but we did find a nice spot, right on the cliffs just outside Melbourne to call home for the night.

Next up we had to find a place to sleep in Melbourne. We found a bed, cheap enough at Spencer backpackers, but Lady Luck had once more smiled upon us. The hostel was plain, nothing to write home about, although Oli, the check-in guy was faultlessly kind and welcoming. Moreover it was right by the Queen Victoria Market, which, as we headed out for food that night, was on its last night market of the season. It was awesome. The smell of all these delights cooking, the smoke, the lights, the stalls of hippy type interesting stuff. I couldn’t have asked for more, that is until the Sugar Fed Leopards hit the stage. A glam disco soul rock act, fronted by three ladies each looking like teachers from 1986 secondary schools in Nottingham on a staff night out (I’m somehow mixing This is England ‘86 with Grange Hill in my head here, Lord knows how or why, but that’s what springs to mind), complete with animal print and gold lamé jackets. They were ace, and it looked like they had their quirky headmistress on drums, and a sequin catsuit bedecked teaching assistant on bass.

We had some dumplings and some curry and several coffees (Conny opted for Pims, not coffee, then beer, not coffee) and we finished off with some strange pancakes that are cooked in halves and stuffed then cooked some more, but they were ridiculous. At this point we met Miss Würmli, a Wucher sister cohort (she and Ulrike even have matching tattoos), from Switzerland who also happened to have just arrived in Melbourne that day. She and Conny sprechened some Deutsch, we all spoke a little in English and had a very pleasant evening indeed.

The next morning we woke and headed for our next destination. Geelong!

The third instalment of our NZ leg, was our ten-ish day road trip around the South Island.

The plan was borrow brother Paul’s Pro-box (a uniquely simple and awesome car, that in a previous existence had only been driven through a Japanese factory), strap a kayak to the roof, and head off with a mattress and a boot full of food and such.

This is exactly what we did.

The Pro-box is as basic as a car can get. A square machine, a small engine, and hat makes it super for this kind of trip, a folding bench back seat that drops into a flatbed at the back. This little car became our home. We set out to Cape Foulwind. Why on Earth we picked a place called Foulwind for our first night is beyond me. It didn’t disappoint. The weather was shocking, somewhat unsurprisingly to me, given the name of the place. We had to be a little careful, as our car was not a self contained van, and as such we had to be picky/bend the rules a little on where we could stay. So we opted for a car park on a cliff that had no “No Camping” sign, just off the national park land, that was just far enough from the other car park’s “No Camping” sign to not be illegal. We hadn’t really thought our kayak through however. It was strapped with ratcheted straps to the car, and rested on pool noodles, a brilliant may I add idea on my behalf, and not a roof rack) this meant the straps brought with them into the car a large amount of rainwater. So in the cape’s foulwind and it’s rain, we had to get out and strap the kayak to the side of the car to stop the water pooling in our rapidly deflating air bed (a different one this time) I essentially spent the entire night shitting my pants that it was going to be blown away or destroy the car and was super uncomfy. But still, it was a beautiful spot. Even in the stormiest of weather, I always marvel at the sight of the ocean doing it’s thing against the coast. Sometimes even more in the stormy times, you can see the temper of nature at work bashing and shaping the land. Interestingly, Cape Foulwind was not moniker’d as such due to the inclement weather. It was indeed named thus because the wind stank. The seal colony that existed there used to fill the air with it’s savoury aroma and waft on the breeze.

Next stop was Hokitika. However to get there I had to bust out full McGuyver styles. You see with every touch of the accelerator that notched us above 60 kmh, the straps locking the kayak in place would make the most annoying trumpeting sound, due to the wind passing over its taught reaches, effectively making it a rhead. In my head I thought simply all that was needed was to disrupt the air, so I tied my purple toed socks to each side, it did indeed work. I later was told that all I needed to do was twist the strap, but hey, lets not diminish my brilliance here. Turns out socks can solve many things where kayak straps are concerned. I solved the strap leakage problem by tying my Hilly coolmax socklets where they dripped. Job done. I’m not sure the type of sock was important, but I like to think I engineered a precise solution as such would like to believe a sock of lesser caliber would not have sufficed. Back to Hokitka, it’s a great little seaside town with a beautiful beach, but it also had a nice artsy side to it. We went to watch some glass blowers. Big burly looking blokes, in rugby short shorts having a chat about whatever cars they had or the rugby, oh so casually doing the most delicate animal sculptures with molten glass. The ease with with they rolled the glowing glob on the blow stick was remarkable, and as they did it they poked and prodded here or there to extrude, bend and shape the object, spraying here or there to get the effect they required. These dainty little things with such artistic and finely tuned skills was quite the conundrum for ones brain to process. Further still, at the beach our timing was superb. The beach was full of driftwood sculptures, not just a few, probably a hundred or so, from the local competition they had recently had. Professional artists battling it out with family groups or even school kids. Hanging head sculptures, to sun dials, pagodas to elephants, word play to abstract imagery it was all there and all wonderful. To further add to the wonder of Hokitika we had home made ice cream and then headed for home for the night. We had decided to camp out at Sunset Point. We thought we were pioneer thinkers as we were, for a while the only ones there. That however changed as the sunset drew closer. By night fall we were but one of a number, all settled in to take in the sunset and abuse the fact that no one would move us on. The sunset was incredible. The most amazing colours not only took the skies but also the water. In doing so the very air seemed to change. It truly was the most memorable sunset of my life, I have never seen the sea change to a Turkish delight pink, waves of rich rose breaking by my feet as the skies blazed and bloomed like none I could remember. The hue of the air was lush and rich and despite the blowing gale we watched in wonder. As light left us we headed not to bed but to the glow worm dell. The glow worms are quite remarkable, only slightly marred by some prickety prick, English no less shouting at Conny, admittedly, she had misunderstood a sign saying the worms are sensitive to light, and in thinking we had a walk to the dell had her torch on. The guy boomed out “TURN THAT BLOODY LIGHT OFF” before sauntering down and on the way out giving another little jab from the darkness of “read the bloody sign you idiot” I sounded out that she had, and a further mutterance of “makes it bloody worse then”. Now, I agree he had a point, but the hypocrisy of the dude is quite unfathomable and I being a petty nobhead had wished to pursue him and point this out, followed by a dry slap if necessary. I didn’t, which bugged me long after, of course only I am allowed to speak to Conny in such a manner. His hypocrisy is this. Right underneath the bit that says lights are to be dimmed when you get to the dell (which Conny to her defence didn’t realise she had) there was a line stating that the worms are also particularly sensitive to sound, so voices must remain hushed. His cocky bellowing was exactly as bad as Conny’s more innocet slip, especially when considering his little jibe on the way out, I would have liked to chide him and remind him but that would have made me no better. Still, would have satiated my petty man syndrome. Trust a motherfucking Englishman abroad to ruin my night. Well, he didn’t ruin it, but darken it. So seething a little and swayed by the wind once more we headed back to Sunset Point, I wouldn’t call it a peaceful night but we still managed to catch some solid kip.

To this point we had not got the kayak off, lest you count to avoid seepage, however the next day would change that, Lake Mahinapua. It was a prime breakfast spot, and our kayak expedition was somewhat spontaneous. But the water was still and the sun was glorious, so we could not do anything else. The paddle was lovely, giving us views to the Mount Cook range. Conny got to practice her paddling skills, and boy is it needed, but all in all a pleasant day, before heading on towards Fox Glacier.

The last time we came to New Zealand, we had driven along this road before, it was odd to see the post earthquake roads and it was also funny to see the ever present German tourists fully afflicted by the sand flies. These two met beautifully at one point where I stopped as I recognised a particularly beautiful lookout spot. I alighted the Pro-box to see half of the look out cordoned off as a large part had slipped into the sea. The last time I was here was a dark and stormy day, much like this one, only the balustrade was complete and it was autumn, this meant there had not been sand flies. Today, was definitely not autumn. A convoy of German youths screeched up, they got out, hoody pulled tight, trousers tucked in socks, and waving their arms as if shadow boxing their way to the loo. I dread to think of the wayward toilet action when engaged in such a fight while dealing with ones’ toilet business. We checked out the little town and planned the next days walks to the glaciers, both Fox and Franz Joseph, with a relax in the hot pools (and of course a shower, as we were somewhat ripe at this point) deciding upon Gillespies beach for the night. That took us down a gravel road of beastly proportion to a small DOC campsite. The dreaded sandflies were rife, but I was prepared. I donned my long johns for a walk along the coast and see some of the “historic remains” of the gold dredging hey day of the area. I put the parentheses there as really, its just lazy rubbish from when they realised the money well was dry, and the machine had stayed exactly where it was. But it was an eye opener into the methods of the early pioneer folks. We arrived back to cook dinner before the beach, then taking inspiration from Hokitika I wrote the long mosey in driftwood as another stunning sunset fell upon us, with Mount Cook in the background. One camper even marvelled at my creativity, I didn’t want to let her down, nor did my ego wish me to be honest and tell her I had directly lifted the idea from up the road.

We reached Franz Joseph in the AM and had a happy stroll to see it’s gaping mouth. Franz Joseph was a little grubby looking, but Fox was beautiful and blue, it is quite impressive to see the power that these behemoths wield, carving the land scape, even pushing into full on rain forest, you don’t generally associate the two! More alarming still is the rate that they are receding. Before anyone jumps up and says “Aw yeah, but that’s natural, don’t you start about global warming you bloody hippy”, hold your horses. I know that there is a natural recession to a glacier. Contrary to my appearance, I am not purest thoroughbred buffoon, and I do have some grasp of scientific processes. But the world is fucked. And we are fucking it. Roughly. We aren’t even romancing the world-mother, just straight up raping it. Anyway, I digress.

Hot pools are awesome. Hot showers are also awesome.

Onward, to Wanaka! We had one night stopped at the roadside by Haast, having tried to sleep by the river, but been swamped by sandflies. To be honest, I got out the car and thought initially that it was ok. Boy was I wrong, as I looked down at the white of the door frame I could see the gathering cloud of black death. We travelled as far as we could towards our destination and spotted a little lay-by where some other folk had parked up, we chose however not to even give the little fuckers a chance. No doors were even opened that night for more than a second or two, and even after, I set a trap and became a mastermind of bug genocide. It involved a lamp, a tea towel and abundant death. Conny and I had once been to Wanaka a couple of years back on our last visit, to see our friend Steve, and we also met his Granddad, Gordon. First though, we had to hit a hardware store to buy a net for the windows and a mattress/foam to replace the dreadfully uncomfortable airbed we had used til now. We purchased some flynet and what transpired to be some shit tape, but the helpful chap in the shop who steered us to the shit tape made up for it in wonderful measure, by suggesting we forego foam purchase there and head to Wastebusters. Wastebusters is a dream of a place. A second hand heaven, recyclers den/rubbish dump. I could have spent days there buying just about everything, but most importantly we found an old outdoor lounger mattress which Conny duly paid 5 dollars for then destroyed to remove the foam insides. It just happened to perfectly fit the Probox’s rear and from here on out, the perfect stealth camping car was born. Next up was a little paddle on Wanaka followed by a call to Gordon’s house. Admittedly, he didn’t remember us at first, but hey ho, it was a few years since we met for one afternoon. However, despite his full house (his partners sisters, and one husband were also visiting) we were welcomed as old/new friends and honestly we spent a wonderful couple of days with the crew. There was Gordon (90), his partner Ann(74), her sister Kay(74) and husband Owen along with Val (a spritely 84). Honestly hanging around these folk goes to show that age is but a number. They were, and are, awesome. We chatted, we went to the social club, Conny drank beer with Gordon, they won money and meat on the tombolas, we slept in the van on the lawn, ate breakfasts and lunches, Gordon played a prank on me when I ask to borrow some tools and gave me the biggest most ridiculous tools he could find. I honestly didn’t know how to react, until I realised he was fully pulling my leg. They are a remarkable group of people and Conny and I feel it a great pleasure to count them amongst our travelling friends!

We were from here heading towards Milford sound, via a ridiculous number of bras hung on a fence. Honestly the intent was to raise awareness for breast cancer, I mostly day dreamt of all the boobs, as a man with my propensity for boob love does, that had filled those brasiers so fully in their previous lives. At this point I lost focus so Conny took driving duties to head via Arrowtown, Queenstown and on to the DOC campsite by Milford sound. We got to cooking in the shelter, I am still proud that the German’s marvelled at my knife skills in their Muttersprache calling me a Messer-Profi thinking I didn’t understand. I did, and I am somewhat smug about it.

Milford Sound is stunning. We got a slightly wet day, but to be fair, spirits weren’t dampened. A bit of rain brings the falls out to play, and as the steep sides creep out of the mists, one can not help be flawed by its ethereal beauty. We partook in a voyage along the fjord, for that is what they are, not sounds at all, to the Tasman Sea, the tip of the boat getting wet under one of the falls along the way, taking a close look at some of the seal colonies along the way. There were many options available to us of varying luxury and cost, but we opted for the cheap and cheerful Jucy variety. We were even given a bite to eat and a cup of juice for breakfast. All in all exactly the lazy day of sight seeing we required.

No trip around the south end of a country would be complete without a trip to it’s southernmost point, it’s very own Land’s End if it were, or in fact it’s actual Land’s End, as signified by a signpost. We decided to head to Bluff, via Invercargill, with a brief tour of the Park Gardens and a visit to Henry, a more than a century old reptile. Somewhat more akin to a dinosaur than modern day lizards, he is a Tuatara. I three-eyed beast(the third eye is under the skin though, native to New Zealand and only extant in this habitat. Henry is, or was, a bit of a cantankerous prick of a lizard. He has been in the breeding programme in Invercargill since the nineteen eighties(like most species, the arrival of man has had quite the impact on the Tuatara in the wild and they are only now found on protective islands), only he tried to fight his potential suiters and competition for decades, forcing his carers to keep him in isolation. He even managed to bite the tail of his future love. However, at the ripe old age of 111( educated guess, he may be older) he became a dad.

As the day drew on and the rain started to fall, we continued to our destination, a cafe at lands’end to enjoy a coffee at the south of the south. But alas despite many signs pointing us in the direction of said cafe, we arrived, parched to find it closed for renovations. The pricks.

The rain cleared and we set out for home for the night, dejected at the lack of coffee, but when we arrived at our destination, we were more than pleased. For some reason we had chosen Monkey Island to look for a spot. What we weren’t aware of, is that Monkey Island is an awesome free campsite, with indeed an island, but sadly no monkeys. However, it was beautiful, Conny and I walked out to said island for sunset with the tide out, we took advantage of the most pleasant vault toilets in the history of world vault toilets(I’m not sure there is such an official award, but if there is, this is surely a contender, genuinely smelled of roses!) there were fire pits, water and no sand flies. It was heaven!

Next we were to head on towards Oamaru, if I’m honest, having been somewhat lazy, I am writing this some time after the event, and as such, can’t for the life of me remember where we sent the next night, can’t have been that exciting though!…wait, I take it all back, we spent another night at a beautiful DOC campsite and we found a beautiful spot on the coast the next night, Valentines night no less. The valentines night, was not as raucous as one might think as were were in a free camping spot, with near neighbours, and to be honest we were both a bit stinky. So we moseyed our way up to Oamaru.

Remember Steve, Grandson of Gordon in Wanaka? Well, next we were to visit his parents, Gay and Gary. Proprietors of the Bean on Thames(The World’s Greatest Cafe, according to Steve, who is obviously unbiased, but to be fair it does have to be up there). Gary and Gay didn’t know we were coming either, but did look after us as if they did. We had coffee then on their advice Conny and I went inland to a series of reservoirs(Benmore, Aviemore and Waitaki) along the Waitaki river and kayaked one of the lakes. I am so glad that the Smith’s suggested we went, it was absolutely stunning. Hot but with a bracing wind we took to the water, as we tend to do, we paddled against the current first, then Conny got tired, then she changed her mind, we yoyo’d back and forth for a bit before setting our target of a little trip around an island or two before heading back. Boy was it hard though, especially with a lacklustre performance from the number 2 paddler, but we managed it, and felt suitably exercised for the day before heading back. Had we not been told to go here though, we never would have. We wouldn’t have even got to paddle that day as the waves around Omaru were reasonable that day and with Conny having probably only ever been on 3 canoes, we thought it perhaps best to avoid the high seas!

We returned home a little later than expected and had actually missed Gay and Gary at the cafe. Not having a number, but a rough idea of the area they lived in, we headed that way, hoping to find it. We really had no chance, but upon seeing a kindly gentleman with a pleasant look about him, we thought it wise to chance our arm. He pointed us directly to the house! What luck! Gay hadn’t heard my knocks and was somewhat startled to see me standing on her porch as she passed, but she welcomed us in, and we were given the luxury of an actual bed for the night, a shower, a good showing of the photo’s from Steve’s awkward adolescent years and upon Gary’s return we headed out for pizza and chips at the local brewery. Result. I being the horrible person that I am, realised upon entering the brewery that I had forgotten my wallet, but Gary insisted anyway that I wasn’t going to be permitted to pay, as Steve, apparently, would possibly never speak to his parents again if they had not shouted us to dinner! To be honest, Scott’s brewery was, as you can probably guess as I only tend to mention the delightful places, a delight. Only about 5 things on the menu(including awesome skin-on chips served in an enamelled tray with chili sauce), good beer and even ginger beer on tap. Couldn’t go wrong, but not only did they not get it wrong, they get it very right. Gary and Gay left us, at our behest, and returned home as Gary starts at quarter-past-way-too-early of a morning. Conny and I were intent on watching the Penguin Parade as the local penguin colony arrive in for the night. We are however cheapos and were not going to join the chinese bus folk in paying a good number of dollars to watch the spectacle. No Sir-ee Bob, we decided to skirt the edge of the penguin centre, and peer around the security wall that the centre has constructed expressly to block such pesky cheapness and gate fee evasion, all as their security scowled and prowled on the other side. Sure enough, we were not alone, as we and about twenty others uncomfortably watched with necks a crooked as the little blighters bobbed in unceremoniously on the surf before waddling up the beach looking a bit stressed and befuddled.

Conny and I set of on foot for home, we thought we knew where we were going, but Conny, a few beers in, was not listening to my thinking we might be going the wrong way, so much like the penguins we waddled befuddledly on a somewhat scenic route home having walked about three times the necessary distance, but it was a pleasant evening, so who cares?

We arrived back to the Smith family residence and watched a documentary on the sheer bonkersness that is Scientology and their harassment of those who dared to leave and/or speak out about them, anyway, once more I digress.

We hit the hey and slept in quiet comfortable luxury, we opted for breakfast at the Bean and what an option it was. Eggs Benedict and another concoction with mushrooms on toast with pesto sauce were both supremely scrumptious. We decided to head for a little tour of the quite wonderful Oamaru, Steam Punk Capital of New Zealand, and headed first to Steam Punk HQ. It was well worth it, essentially a steam punk themed gallery with lots of fantastic sculptures and installations, the most magnificent of which was the Portal and was in essence supremely simple. A room, with mirrored floor, walls and ceiling, a bunch of fairy lights and some well timed flashes with some psychedelic music. It was wonderful, so wonderful I did it a few times.

The old town of Oamaru has an old fashioned industrial vibe to it, wool markets, fabrics, booze brewers with odd ball book shops and antique stores dappled amongst them. It really is a nice place to visit and one of our favourite places in New Zealand.

We decided to head back to the Bean to say our thanks and goodbyes, and to purchase some savoury wonder for the road…Gay however obviously did not think we were sweet enough as she heaped a slab of the most delectable sweet and sticky slices upon us for the road also, not something I would ever grumble about. So there it is folks, the Bean on Thames, definitely among the top 2 cafes in New Zealand, if not the world. We left suitably stocked for the long drive up to Kaikoura.

To be honest, we knew Kaikoura wasn’t going to be up to much, a sleepy town on the best of days, we had been there before on the aforementioned previous trip to NZ. We had, that time, tried to swim with dolphins, but alas, there were orca or shark or both and the pod of dolphins were moving too fast for us to be able to do so. We had no such intent this time, but we wanted to go as Kaikoura had only months previously been hit by a devastating earthquake, which had changed the level of the very seashore, exposing much of the sea’s floor to the drowning air. The roads had only just opened and only on one side, the north route in was still unclear. The rail tunnels were broken or blocked, great swathes of mountainside had shifted, buckling and braking the tracks with what a will of their own. This, in essence, was why we wanted to go to Kaikoura. We aren’t exactly big spenders on this trip, but if we were going to spend some money, we wanted to do it somewhere that really needed it. I had read somewhere that even though some Kaikoura businesses had been ready to reopen for a while, the community had banded together and tried to get everybody back to a good place, plus, the road had not long been open and the town had essentially been cut off. We went for a thai dinner, a belated valentines treat if you will, and we went to a cheese shop to pick up a few delights for the NZ South branch, all of whom(Mamma Kerry South in particular) love a bit of stinky cheese. We met a wonderfully passionate young English lady in the cheese shop. A devotee of cheese with a penchant for raw milk cheese and even a work in progress of a book on the subject, who had travelled to New Zealand to work in that cheese shop. Her name is Camila Ker and her instagram is renegade_milkmaid. I could have chatted the cheese shit with this wonder for hours. I thoroughly recommend any other cheese lovers look her up.

We left the town and drove the coast for a moment, taking in the most glorious red skies at night before settling for a night in a picnic area just out of town. Only in the morning upon exiting the area did we notice the no camping sign, but to be fair, we are decent enough to not leave any trace so I think the only real problem was that we emerged halfway through a semi-closed section of road, allowing only one lane of traffic at a time, much to the confusion of the guy at the end turning the stop sign.

Initially we had thought we would spend a further night in Hanmer springs, but due to the weather turning shite, Conny just decided enough was enough, no more rainy camp nights and we headed home, to the warm embrace, and climbing upon of the two little tykes back at South Manor.

We spent the next week doing the usuals, Adventures at the creek. Parties at the railways. A trip to the swimming pool. Building a beach shelter and camping out. Barbecuing. Pizza making. The standard stuff that the Glen offers and before we knew it, our time was done.

We headed out on the bus for Christchurch, past the scorched and smouldering earth of the bushfire that had just claimed the homes of 11 families. It was a potent reminder of the power of a mother nature that would appear to be fighting back with all her might in this one small corner of the world(now hold your horses once more, I’m not suggesting causality here!). Sadly, this is one of the corners of the world that although far from perfect, tends to hold her in higher esteem than many other places that reap the benefits, but don’t reap what they sow in terms of the destruction so much. Not that I would wish such tragedy on anybody, it would be slightly more acceptable if some of the less green and caring countries that shall remain nameless bore some of the brunt of that wrath.

Our night in Christchurch was a bit of a nostalgia trip. We went to New Brighton, where my brother and his family had lived when we last visited. This time we stayed at a simple and not too wonderful but completely acceptable backpackers. We walked the pier and even saw a shark. The plan was to be cheap and head for fish and chips for tea, but instead we saw a place (BearLion Foods) that from the dress of the dapper host to the choice on the menu (2 starters, vegetarian or meat main and a couple of desserts) of food clearly made with passion and love for ingredients and goodness we couldn’t not dine there. It just so happened that they only opened one evening a week and this was that evening. Fate had guided our hand. And some hand it was. It wasn’t cheap, but it wasn’t pricey either, but it was worth every penny. A true delight to chat food and about the ethos of the chef owner (with our server, a chef by trade himself from London and an appreciator of good food who helps out on the one night a week dining special but he’s not the chef here, she was busy making our wonder plates) while sampling some truly remarkable food. Both Conny and I had sumptuous dishes bursting with flavour, texture and even joy. All made in house from scratch with seasonal, well sourced ingredients and a flare for the beauty of simple honest healthy food. The main stay of the place is as a delicatessen. Small salads and house made pickles, fermentations and other preserves. Honestly this place was a gem, and I would whole heartedly suggest anyone near Christchurch make the special effort to seek it out.

With full bellies we headed to the backpackers. The next day was breakfast at another cafe (the other in the top 2 in NZ if not the world) Hectors. A casual surf themed cafe, serving more mexican tinged fare for breakfast in one of Christchurch’s oldest malls, that just so happens to be owned and operated by Troy and Eve, who are friends of my brother, that were indeed living at his house when we last came. Eve was busy looking after her child, however, we did have a good old natter with Troy and sampled a delicious Quesadilla breakfast before heading into town then airport bound. Next stop, Sydney.

We landed at Nelson on the 20^th of December. Just in time for our first summer Christmas. Our first Christmas with the niece and the nephew.

Nelson is a lovely little place. It has a microclimate, which makes it nice and warm. It is a nice little place, with sea fronts and beaches and stuff. It has cafes and markets, it even has a homeless guy who has a house (I know, odd isn’t it).

It does, sadly also have sand flies. Now I mentioned them previously, but let me just extrapolate. Those things are right motherfuckers, and they loved my blood. They dined on my nectar like I was a sweet buffet delivered by the Gods. Not only were their bites numerous, but as a particularly sweet blooded Limey, it would only ever be the way that I was also somewhat reactive to their drink holes. The bites would blister, and itch like buggery, the blisters would occasionally meld into one another to create mega blisters. I looked like I had the Pox. One particularly unnerving moment (not for me, I quite enjoyed the brilliance) was when I was at a pharmacy trying to get some repellent that would work. As I had previously gone through every single natural option and product first, I was in need of something toxic and chemical, we got talking about the severity of the reaction, the pharmacist asked if she could see one so I obliged. As I did the double blister erupted and seeping gunk trickled down my ankle the very moment she clapped eyes upon it. The timing was impeccable. Her face skewed in disgust and I can only assume her gorge rose at the site, and she muttered “ooh no…never seen anything like that” and beckoned the head pharmacist over. He in turn said he had also never seen anything of the like, but helpfully chipped in the ridiculously obvious opinion that it must be a reaction to the bites. No fucking shit.

We were staying in the Glen, a little community just North of Nelson-proper along the boulder bank and just before the headland towards Cable Bay. It is a beautiful spot. The first week we were there, a pod of dolphins passed by everyday. One day there were about 40 of them, no more than a few metres from the water’s edge, leaping and broadsiding right in front of us(on another day, Conny was out with the hounds and the sister in law as they passed, she dropped kit right there and then and bust into the water for a swim with them, one even came up close I believe, but I am told it was a brief encounter…and behind her). They were bloody big to be fair. We had gone to the beach that time actually to look for whales, as we had heard through the Face-vine that there was a whale in the bay. The dolphins were pure bonus, as was the stingray, that swam past our toes in it’s efforts to avoid the giant dolphin pod, that was in itself avoiding the giant sperm whales that were nearby although not to be seen. After the pod had passed we kept looking to see, but Queequeg and Ahab we are not and no whale sign was to be seen. Then, just as we were turning to go home, I, David “Blind-eyes” South, the most visually impaired of our number, spotted a water spout, a hundred or so metres out. Or at least I thought I did. Then… Hark! Another. We watched as a couple of whales move slowly South towards the Nelson bay. Even though these were quite far away, I never tire of seeing these giant beasts.

The next day the Face-vine trickled down some more sombre news. One of the whales we saw had beached itself on Rabbit Island, a large sandy peninsula the other side of the bay, it had indeed succumbed to what was supposedly old age or ill health. From what I understand, it is not known, but generally accepted that the whale will likely have beached itself purposefully knowing its fate, and will have simply wished for a more restful last moment where it was not being buffed and tossed by the sea, but could lay on a gentle sandy bank and go to sleep.

This led to a somewhat unique opportunity in born from a quite sad death. The whale was beached in an area that took a forty minute walk down a beach when the tide was out. So the entire South clan and the next door neighbour Linda with her boy Eli went on an expedition to see the big beautiful beast. We weren’t the only ones paying our respects to the giant of the deep. Many families and folk of all ilks were strolling to or from his resting place. The DOC (Dept. Of Conservation) had even posted a wildlife officer to keep an eye over him until they could do the necessaries to look after him.

He was magnificent. A large bull sperm whale, according to the officer and the scars on his face he was quite mature and it would appear he had lived a full life. The huge toothed bottom jaw on these things coupled with their scars from their battles against the colossal squid that serves as their main prey evidences the awesome strength and hunting prowess of the creature. He was a big boy. Conny even noted that his schlong was about the size of me (not my schlong, but me as a person, I am more hung like a seahorse than like a whale, although I might often be confused with the Great White Devil when I lay upon a seashore, but one check upon our undercarriages would dispell any notion that I am of Cetaecian lineage).

What was remarkable was the amount of noise that was coming from the corpse, and the amount of blood in the water. The sound was like a waterfall, as in the sun, the black skin soaking up the summer sun and the insulation of his blubber around the huge stomach had turned his insides into an oven. All the moisture was bubbling away inside some had seeped out into the pool in which he was sitting. I, being much smarter than your average dude that looks like me, decided not to do the complete circular tour of the beast. This turned out to be a smart move. I was first of our number there. I wandered one way, took note of wind direction, then turned around and went back around the other side until I could do the same. Others, however who shall remain nameless, did not approach this with such logic. I watched intently as I saw a group of our number head down wind of the bubbling beast. Hahahahahahahahaha! The retches and the faces told a beautiful story of the stink of death and I could not help but chuckle as I saw it again and again amongst the folk that came to see.

I think that emotionally, the day must have taken it’s toll amongst the youngest two of the South South’s. They couldn’t help but have complete breakdowns on the way back. From not wanting to walk, the type of food on our picnic, or even the order of food on the plate, but most memorably an apparently very special “favourite most special stick ever” or in fact the loss of that stick.

The main reason we wanted to be there at this time of course was a Christmas spent with family, a very rare occurrence in our recent history. And it truly was lovely, if odd. Firstly we had to assemble the huge trampoline that my brother and his wife had got their kids. Obviously this had to be done after bed time on Christmas Eve, so it meant building in the dark, but we got it done. Then, the next day, as he would in a summer location Santa came in a bright yellow mini moke to drop a couple of gifts to the local kids. The traditional meal was replaced with a big barbecue and the cold was replaced by stonking heat. As I said. Odd. But it was nice for us not to be working and particularly nice to be around family. Watching kids on Christmas is quite the delight.

Paul and Kerry (my brother and his wife) had decided to purchase themselves a kayak for Christmas. So a couple of days later we headed to the beach for its maiden voyage, we were a veritable troupe, with the entire family, some friends and some dogs and the maiden voyage went a dream. I even thought it was quite cute that the dogs wanted to join in on the boaty fun and followed down the beach as their family moseyed down. The peace however did not last long. We through the dogs some sticks. Normal with the dogs. Not normal however is that the dogs got particularly possessive over one such stick. The ensuing fight started to get a little aggressive so when Paul stepped in I thought ok, no worries. Until he turned to me and his wife and said. Quite calmly “OK Kerry, we have to go to the hospital, I just lost the end of my finger”. Yes, his delightful, cute labradour-ish thing had bitten, and likely swallowed, his fingertip. I being the younger brother, learned from big brothers mistake, but had to get amongst the fighting hounds. Which I did, and with all fingers in tact. I approached from a different angle, somewhat tentatively and just managed to get them calm as Kerry had come with a large piece of driftwood to start a bopping. Luckily that was not necessary so as Paul and Kerry headed off with Tripper, I was stuck with Honey, the guilty party, and Kerry’s horrified looking friend Jen, scoring the surf in case we could indeed spot his lost fingertip. No such joy.

So Paul, had lost the fleshy tip of his finger, the bone that was exposed had to be shaved down and then the raw end just had to be dressed and allowed to regrow skin. Which was gonna hurt. For at least six weeks. Which he could not get dirty or wet. Not exactly ideal for a marine scientist. Still, he dealt with it like a man, Kerry did tell tales of him falling apart on the way to the hospital but I didn’t witness this so I will give him props for his solid turn and matter of fact way of dealing with such an issue.

Days in the Glen were spent at the beach or adventuring up the creek with the niece(Elouise, whom Conny even taught the art of the Wild Pee, a skill she had perfected on our US trip) and nephew(Jem), sometimes the local Glen kids came too. Mid January time my mother flew out for her now customary month or so in New Zealand to kick off the new year. It’s not often there are three independent branches of the South Wandering Show in one spot so this was quite the joy!

We had the odd excursion, walks over to cable bay, a camping trip to the Marlborough Sounds (pre Mother South’s arrival, I’m not sure how a camping trip would fare these days if she had been among our number), where we met a lovely family of Grandma Rose, her son Carlos and his son Sebo and daughter Stella, who made our stay great, and provided friends for the kids to swim, adventure and play Uno with. The sounds, like most of New Zealand, are spectacular. Beautiful inlets of water giving gentle harbour and fantastic bush walks with epic scenery. We even ventured out on the kayak, well, Paul wasn’t going to use it was he.

Conny and I also spent a couple of days at Nelson lakes camping. The weather was atrocious. The sandflies were even more atrocious, but we did manage one day of good weather and we hiked a mountain. To be fair that signified the death knoll for my back. I have learned much in my time in New Zealand, particularly pertaining to the realm of parenthood and I have come to appreciate the strength it takes to be one. The mental strength with dealing with unruly kids is immense, and should be noted, but boy did I underestimate the toll it would take on my body. With days picking them up in fits of rage, or carrying them on the shoulders while one rides on the front, general playing and such, before we went camping my back was succumbing to the arduous nature of being a fresh uncle (in the sense that we don’t get much physical time with them due to our geographical hindrances) the mountain hike, although beautiful, was hot and sticky and fucking steep. Combined with the fact that the airbed in the tent deflated overnight, I was the walking wounded by the time we got back. Conny, wasn’t very good with this. I just wanted to rest. Conny understood that exercise is the only way, because she is practically a doctor and knows everything despite here absolutely zero years of training or interest in anything remotely related to sport or muscular injury. It amazes me exactly what she knows simply just because she knows it. Anyway, point being, I wanted to rest, but Conny would then secretly plan things so I never got the rest. But then she would complain that I was always resting, and that my way wasn’t working. She can be a bit of a dick. Result is my injury was somewhat protracted and Conny bitched to the inlaws about me to the point that future-maybe-father-in-law straight up told her she’d be better off with a nice Austrian boy. Now don’t get me wrong. Exercise is needed, she just would not have it that rest, then exercise was needed, and couldn’t see that she had spent weeks stuffing that up with her “she knows best” surreptitiousness. That said, the back eventually fixed, Conny stopped being a proper bellend, as much as she does, and all got good again.

We took a delightful day trip to Picton for it’s Marine festival. A dank day of rain and wind it turned out to be, but that didn’t dampen the spirits of the kids or the performers, Elouise even managed to earn herself a brand spanking new hula hoop from the guys doing a hula hoop/juggling demonstration, for someone so excited and eager when they asked for volunteers, she did appear quite quiet and somewhat glum on stage but still, she sort of did what was asked, and looked cute as can be doing it, so a hula hoop well deserved I’d say. There was some singing, some dancing, a spiralised battered and fried potato (my personal highlight) mini train rides, then we all went to a friend of a friends house for a barbecue. A rag tag collective of old travellers and young, some with their kids, some no kids to bring. Amongst the crowd were an old Kiwi octogenarian and a young twenty something Aussie flying nurse(he and Paul even discussed the extent of their each mangled hands and lost fingertips, at one point it became a bit like that scene in Jaws with the scars, anyway, I digress…), visiting an old hippy friend from travels way back when, alongside a family from England who had recently made the move. Home brew was drunk, barbecue (and salads) were eaten. The shit was chatted and a thoroughly pleasant evening passed by. It wasn’t even dampened by the lack of fireworks we had treaded out ensemble to go and view.

There was a day out to a petting farm, where I learned that Angora sheep is awesome, Alpacas are basically the same as llamas only a llamas ears are shaped like bananas. I saw what is possibly NZ’s largest pig (unconfirmed) and definitely NZ’s cutest piglets (not official, but I declare them such).

Another day was spent at a food and wine festival, I again procured a spiralised spud (there immensity is hard to comprehend to the uninitiated) and other treats, all while being burnt to a crisp and being highly disrespected by a coffee/ice cream lady. Now it might be petty of e to go into this, but hey, I am petty. The harlot upon my request for two ice creams and a coffee told me that they were too busy for coffees and she showed me the set of ice cream dockets. Having been “in the shit” before with an overwhelming number of dockets I thought “hmmm a bit silly given that you only sell coffee and ice cream, but I’ll accept it” and I quietly moseyed off to one side, with a three year old on my neck and a six year old crouching under an A-board for shade, as the harlot (I didn’t think her such at this point) served the next lady. Here’s where she became a harlot. The next lady ordered coffee. I thought to myself “oh poor dear, waiting in line for a coffee they aren’t doing…” but wait, without batting an eye, or a cursory glance to check I wasn’t looking, the same harlot just went “OK” and served it up. I couldn’t help myself as the words “Are you bloody serious” spat out of my lips, at least I was so incredulous I couldn’t help but smile…but on the inside I was seething, a mass of boiling piss and bile was coarsing through my veins “you told me I couldn’t have coffee?” I looked at her puzzled, eyes wide and bemused. She looked at me, and rather than saying sorry or that she’ll get my coffee, she tilted her head to one side and said in the most condescending tone imaginable “Aw, would you like a coffee now?” she might as well have thrown in a “Aaaww diddums” to start it off and followed with a baby voiced “Its just not fair the lady gets a coffee but the fatty beardy englishman doesn’t…aww boo hoo hoo…now I’m going to cry” and I’m amazed she didn’t stick her bottom lip out in mock sulk. Typically, I wanted to smash her jowls in. Instead all I could muster was a “no, don’t bother” and then I had to wait, at near boiling point for twenty minutes, coffee-less until my first ice cream came out, and then another five for the second, whilst Jem looked upon me empty handed somewhat distraught, and his sisters ice cream filled face until it came. THE FUCKERS ONLY CLAIM TO SELL ICE CREAM AND COFFEE, HOW THE ACTUAL FUCK COULD THAT BE SUCH AN ORDEAL?

Anyway I quietly retreated bitterly, retelling the tale to anyone I could and repeating it in my wallowing self pity as often as possible.

It was nice to get to know the community of the Glen. From the neighbours next door (Mark and Linda truly are a breath of fresh air) to the other families up the way or the house behind and so on and so on. We were not only invited but welcomed to brazier fires, pizza nights, beach bonfires and more and truly appreciate the Glen and it’s inhabitants for doing so.

There is obviously so much more I could go into, but I fear it might become(or indeed maybe already became mundane) or a boring list of not so exciting things that we did, but I think the general arc is that this was a great time. Honestly it was nice being based in one place with the ability, if not as much as anticipated the inkling, to pop off for trips here and there. We had become accustomed to the road life and, as fulfilling and wonderous that can be, we needed a break. It was nice to be among family and meet new friends. Have a place we could call home, even if it wasn’t ours and just for a little while. It was especially nice to see the wonder that is the next generation Souths. The pair of them are a proper set of tykes. Cute as a button, wildly free spirited in the best way, and at times infuriating to the Nth degree. Wouldn’t change them for the world.

The trip down to the South was to be our next adventure. For this, we chose a familiar steed. The Jucy El Cheapo. This is not the first time we have chosen such a beast, for on our first trip to NZ a few years back, El Cheapo had proven a worthy choice.

As the name would imply, El Cheapo is not a top of the line entry on the cars for hire list. What it is, is usually an old, basic, slightly worn rental car, with a terrible gearbox, is usually a Nissan of some shitty base variety and painted in the worst shade of fleet white imaginable, with a matching fleet tan/beige interior. They are however, also implied in the name, cheap.

We picked El Cheapo II up in Auckland and sauntered out of the city like we knew what we were doing. We did not. We had a vague direction(zig-zag) and a tank of gas, alongside a will to bust free of the shitty Auckland traffic and hit a spot by the sea for tea and perhaps the night. Heading East, the roadsides were taken mostly by avocado farms, all with stalls selling their wares with little honesty boxes. Personally I couldn’t see such a thing taking off in the UK as it would invariably be ruined by a dishonest number of inhabitants, yet, here it seems to work. The avocados, unfortunately were all too fresh, and are often picked to ripen at home, given we are homeless, we couldn’t really stop, but still, we did like the idea of abundantly cheap avocados. Side note: in my opinion, the only good banana is an avocado, you see they are almost identical in what they offer nutritionally, only one is delicious and wonderful, and the other is simply food made by Satan and modelled after his penis, Which he coloured brightly to attract folk to slip it down their gullets making it taste truly horrific while doing so(Secondary side point: the previous statement is declared null and void when said banana is served with custard, for that is a nostalgia flavoured delight, chomping on Satan’s cock, not so much). Anyway, digressions aside, we headed for the coast and hit upon Whakatane. We saw a strange setup of a pizza oven, in a mobile van-tent, next to a trailer with a glass door. Turns out the pizza oven is operated by a pair of dudes, one French, one Italian. They live in the tiny trailer next door and cook pizzas whenever someone wanting passes by. Their pizza was indeed delicious. Conny and I sat at the local surf club picnic tables and munched happily. We still weren’t done with driving though and headed along the coast to Opotiki. We slept, as a few others did, parked right against the sea front, overlooking a bird sanctuary and the Pacific beyond. It really was a perfect spot. In all honesty the El Cheapo, not being a camper, is not necessarily the most fantastic place to sleep, but still, we were in it for the experience and as many of these coastal stops do, we had clean facilities for the night and following morning. I even awoke to a rather viking-esque Scandinavian man flannel washing just over the road.

The New Zealand coast is abundant with little towns and delightful beaches, packed full of beautiful shells and long sandy shores. Ohope is a particularly pleasant one, where Conny and I stretched our legs before continuing on. We had even managed to stop at a little veg shop that morning that had some ripe avo’s and a few delicious home made pickles, so we chose this beach to brunch upon before heading to what was one of very few planned stops along the trip down.

Just North West of Gisbourne lies Rere Falls, and a couple of km along the road lies the Rere Rockslide. We made it there before nightfall and made our plan for the next morning. Rere Rockslide is about fifty feet of naturally gentle sloping smooth rock, ending in a plunge pool below. But for the night, we chose to head to the falls. Now, these falls aren’t Niagara, but they are beautiful nonetheless. They also have a nice secluded picnic site that nowhere upon them has a sign precluding one from camping. Excellent. We parked up, and before long our lack of conversation drove us to skinny dipping. It was a cold and windy night, but the dip was a little delight. As ever Conny managed to look at ease and lovely, I however looked more like an overweight Gollum searching for his Precious. Still, when the morning sun arose, we headed back up the hill to the slide.

The sun got hot. Well it’s always hot, you know with it being a sunny ball of burning stuff, but I think you get what I mean. We were alone at the rockslide. I had read that you could use a piece of card or a body board under your bum to prevent damage,. I spotted half a body board there by the stream, so armed with this and my favourite 1€ anchor print toggs, I galantly braved the first run. Conny you see is a bit of a chicken, and I am like this chicken’s guinea pig. I did suggest that she ought to suck it up and do it at the same time, but alas no, she just clucked back with a chickeny retort that she would go next if I survived. I waded across the frigid (read icy. The sun may have warmed, but the water had no such fucking ideas) river too the middle of the piste, I selected what appeared to be a smooth run and went for it. The body board lasted all of a second and disintegrated beneath me, I bungled over a larger than expected bump in the track and then BLAMMO into the cold icy depths I went. It was ace. Getting out was somewhat less fun, the rocks that were so slippy and slidey and great for hooning down on ones botty made for a very difficult exit. Several splashes and tumbles later, I found myself at the bottom of the hill, but on dry land. Conny, bent over in laughter. Upon summiting, I told Conny, the truth, that the rocks were smooth and didn’t hurt and that it was a lot of fun, also that it was her turn. Cluck cluck came the response. She would not do it with out me. The valiant boyfriend that I am once more shone through. This time I opted for cardboard as chosen bum protector. I knew it would fail but thought it might ease Conny along. The card board didn’t even make it to the start of the slide before destruction. I did manage to convince Conny that it was fun and painless with no devices to aid ones botty. So we decided to go on 3, Conny, however chose 2 as her preferred number, but also to grab onto me as she did. So I when spinning down the slide, hit the aforementioned large bump backwards and still managed to splat into the water face first. Still a fun time was had, and by the end of our slide based shenanigans, we were still alone, so Conny, nature lover she is chose to bathe in the stream. So in full birthday suit we lathered and scrubbed at our most indecent of bits in the unforgiving cold of the stream I hear gasps of “irresponsible” and “how dare you destroy such a beautiful ecosystem?”, but hold your horses. We two are quite keen to respect the wilderlands and their balance, our soap was made of nought but goats milk and lavender essence, perfectly acceptable for stream washing.

After the falls, a coffee was required. We went to Wairoa, a quaint little river town and headed to the local coffee den. We were however drawn to a small gathering of folk on bean bags outside the community centre, before a small tent with a guitar and microphone. Here we lazed away the afternoon listening to a few local artists, most notably a charming duo of brothers called 1.5men, before we pushed towards our most challenging drive yet. The dirt road of the Te Urewera pass. We had a picnic at some beautiful falls and chatted to the ladies in the visitor centre about our chances of survival. They said, take our time, we’d be grand, but just mind the locals. By the locals they meant themselves. They told us it would take us a couple of hours but if we saw a local to let them pass, because it would likely be them on their way home and what takes us 2 hours would take them 40 minutes and they have no patience for us slow coaches!

The pass is a torturous road made of rocks and gravel, winding up the steep sides of the stunning Lake Waikaremoana. The views are beautiful, the weather was bright and sunny, the road was fucking bonkers. It reminded us of the backroads in Iceland, only with out snow and in a much poorer state. The biggest difference however is that we were driving a car that ranked amongst the shittest (said with love and respect, I am a fan) on earth. The lady at the info centre was right about the locals, we feared death on several occasions as utes sped up behind us with local folk busier on their phones than their driving, but still, we saw no death nor wreckage, so can’t grumble.

The pass took us out towards the great lakes of the North, Rotorua and Taupo and we chose a little tavern in between the two called the Waitapu Tavern to get a bowl of chips and for Conny to settle her nerves with a beer. As I was at the bar, waiting for my instant coffee, I got chatting to some lovely ladies, from France. The barkeep was having trouble deciphering what they were saying, and they in turn had no idea of what her replies in a thick Kiwi brogue meant, so I bridged the gap with my internationally renowned linguistic service. I ordered them vege burgers, with chips on the side like a pro. The girls were lovely, we had a natter, they stroked my franco-ego by telling me they couldn’t detect my English accent. It was a lie of course, but I am happy to breeze over such untruths. Typically, while I was cosying up to the pretty Fench girls, Conny was out back, mingling with the men folk. She, however is much more successful than I and by the time my coffee had arrived, she had secured herself a bed for the night, at the house of a chap called Ian. Truth be told, Ian was an old gent who lived on his own, he kept the offer open when a bearded horror such as myself waddled to the table and really was just being a decent human. He also gave us a fantastic tip for the area. That part of NZ is famed for its hot springs, it is a hub of geothermic activity. There was a whole park with pools a mere stones throw from the tavern, however, Ian, in all his splendour, told us what the locals do, where they go. There is a free area mere metres from the expensive park, where you can go and hang out at the confluence of two rivers, the beauty being that one is hot, the other cold. That way you can even regulate the temperature of your hot bath. He even took me to show me where it was in his ute, while Conny sat and waited for the chips. A truly decent fellow, and a bit of a laugh. He told me that the river can get a bit messy with the young folk going there to party at night, and that many a local was made there.

We spent a good while chatting everything from politics to Hilux’s at the tavern and had a thoroughly pleasant evening. We parked up by some volcanic boiling mud and awoke sharp at 6 am for a dip in the pool. It was fantastic. The water silky smooth and warm. We were greeted by a big burly bee keeper who goes there all the time and a mad but wonderful Maori healer named Matu. Matu takes tourists on hikes through the spiritual places, he claims he can take them to UFO landing sites (but he doesn’t talk to the aliens) and that he can make the forest come alive, and dance, like full on moving around like a rave dance, not just blowing in the wind. No matter how dubious his claims, he again was a thoroughly nice bloke. We talked history and culture, we talked random stuff and we talked about what it is to be a good person. We seemed to find common ground, he offered us a place to stay too, should we end up at his place in the Bay of Plenty, which sadly we couldn’t but still, it was nice of him to offer and it would be a great pleasure to do so.

Onwards we headed, to Taupo, we had lunch by the lake shore, with the snowcapped mountains in the back ground and witnessed one of the most bizarre but fun Christmas parades ever in a little community called Tauranui. It was a hodge podge affair of just about every kind of vehicle you could expect to find in such a place, with a bit of tinsel thrown on top. Not forgetting this is my first Christmas in summer, the oddness was not helped by the Santa Sleigh bowling around in 30 degree heat or all the random decorations on the most unchristmassy of occasions. Still, the community turned out in force, and the families seemed to love it. We found a seclude little picnic spot on a lakeside road and set about sleeping for the night.

From here, the plan was to head to Mordor and Mount Doom, where we would do a nice hike, have a look at Middle Earth and tick some geek boxes. Instead we got as far as the cafe, which, with it’s intermittent interweb, my computer told me both of an update and a security threat, so I nonchalently tapped OK. An hour and a half in, Conny was pissed. I wasn’t pleased, but what could I do, the computer was reinstalling everything and said not to turn it off. By two and a half hours in Conny, who had been reading outside, was at boiling point. Some three or so hours in and it finished. Conny was no longer speaking to me, except for some vicious mutterings. But sadly, what I didn’t know, is that Conny had decided to use both the cars aircon and music, as opposed to that of the cafe we were at. The car battery was not really a fan of this approach and Conny, in her blind rage, simply decided that the fault was mine, as if I hadn’t put her in the situation to diminish the battery in such a way, she would not have done so, and as such, I was entirely to blame. To the point she decided I either get the car going or she would use the shit internet to book a flight home. To this day I fail to see the logic in Conny’s approach, and at all points I admitted that it was poor timing for the update, but we live and we learn and knowing what I know now it could be avoided. The lady logic however, will stump me evermore. A couple of friendly locals with brand new jump cables (the kindness of these locals was such that they purchased new cables to start our car. I even tried to pay for them, but the guy just said that he needed a pair anyway. FULL FLEDGED LEGEND)and a chat about Aussie V8s later, we headed to the West coast. The drive calmed matters down somewhat and we ended up at a little seaside spot where we picked up some chips and had a walk on the beach.

It was here that I was truly introduced to my most fiendish of foes. Now, I had already noticed a couple of spots where I was being bitten. I had come to worry that the El Cheapo was infested with fleas but that night at the seaside my legs were bitten to shit. I counted 60 bites below my knees the next morning. Fucking ridiculous. And itchy as fuck. Comic relief however came as Conny, decided to take a shower. Only the one option for a shower was the local surf club’s outdoor shower, and it was cold. We also happened to be in a gale driven rain storm. Funny doesn’t cover it. Conny still claims it to be her best ever shower and that she was glad she chose to do it. I however was happy that I chose to stink. I still wasn’t aware what the bites were on my legs, but at this point I didn’t care.

We were in the home stretch. We headed to a bed and the relative bustle of Wellington for the night before taking in the Te Papa museum and a stroll around the city prior to take off for our next leg of the NZ adventure…Nelson.

Next phase of our trip is New Zealand. We arrived in Auckland, and despite the queues and the grumbles eminiating from Americans and English folk of “this is ridiculous”, “you don’t get this back home” and “they need more man power” as we wait for our security checks, this time I am suitably un-nervy. The only incursion on my personal space is the people who for some reason, in a long queue feel the need to get right up amogst the other queuers. I’m not talking about being given room here, there was one lady who despite her husband being behind me, and my better half alongside me but towards the front end of our trolley, decided she must occupy the tiny square of space left right next to me. Every step I took I got a little glimpse of freedom, then sure enough she stole it away within moments. I have no idea why. There was plenty room next to her dude. Perhaps he smelled really bad, but I mean really bad, because I was in full travel stink mode. I looked around. There were red faced non-Kiwis everywhere, atop tippy toes, staring at the checkpoints like it was going to change everything, but not only that they were so uncomfortably close to the folk in front that they were practically dry humping, but complaining and angry while they did. I am at a loss as to why people can’t queue politely and consciously of the situation at hand and the people around them. As an island with a very unique ecosystem that is susceptible to invasive species at all levels, the subsequent measures to protect the beautiful land are quite stringent. And good on them. Rant over.

Danny, our host met us at a pub in town. We headed back to his and he gave up, nay insisted we take his own bed ready to see what’s what in the morning. Now, let me explain. We don’t know Danny. He is just a lovely dude who knows my brother. Upon hearing that we were here he said we were welcome to use his house. He had recently broken his toe at a bounce house, so was in some discomfort but still played the perfect host. I am also quite bitter as he clearly looks a lot younger than I despite this being quite not the case. He is also a conservationist working on saving Kiwis (birds, not people). What a gem. Danny Sir, we salute you!

We did a bit of moseying around St. Heliers. Lovely spot. We headed to Ponsonby and sampled some hipster area stuff with the great Andrew Kinnersly. A dude we know from Nice who had recently returned from South America complete with thouroughly amusing chat and stories from the journey.

I like Auckland, but I don’t love it. It’s alright. I do love that they have chippies here though and that they all sell potato fritters. I ate too much.

Next up we headed to Helensville. Helensville is home to one of my favourite people ever, Aisling O’Brien and an almost equally awesome person in her husband James McNab. Turns out the whole McNab clan is bread for pure wonderness. They are truly lovely people. On day one they bust out the big guns and let Conny in on some lamb slaughter, some cow wrangling and some sheep displacement. She arrived astride a quad with a grin from ear to ear.

Duncan and Jinny, James’s parents, could not have been more welcoming. I often have issues being amongst those salt of the earth, capable, farm type men who just get shut done, and usually with a good dollop of humour to boot. Duncan is one of those dudes (to be fair Jinny is the dudette equivalent). I always fear that my vegetarian, non drinking, non smoking slightly hipster looks and general girl hands will do all but endear me to these folk. I know that my Conquest of Conny is a big tick in my favour but I generally feel I am going to be misunderstood or made to feel a little awkward if not a lesser man. No such thing here. The whole family has a wonderful spirit and could not have made us feel more welcome. We went to a beach with navy blue sand, which was odd and beautiful. We played in the surf. We went to Puhoi pub and ate chips and did cartwheels. Conny rode a horse. We hung around with the 12 dogs. Conny had the most delicious meat of her existence (one of those lamb legs from day 1 went down particularly well apparently)We saw sand bars, harbours and general north island loveliness, but best of all we had a party. Ciara, Ais and James’s beautiful daughter turned 1. There was quite the turnout, more McNabs (equally as wonderful) showed up, friends, neighbours, a delightful chap who looked the spit of Sean Connery’s immortal Ramirez and all in all a blast was had. A couple of those coin-op rides you find outside supermarkets went down a treat, a teddy bear picnic and even a paddling pool with teddies replacing water served to entertain the kids, and beer and food took care of their carers. All wrapped up, when the babes were also wrapped up in their beds, by a Kiwi winning the world heavyweight boxing belt whilst we ate chip butties (with sausages from the butcher for those omniverous amongst our number). Pretty solid days entertainment I’d say.

Hanging out with Ais and James was a joy. It served to remind of the good times and wonderful to be just chatting the shit with folk I miss, but also serves as a solid reminder that we have all moved a long way from who we were back in those hazy Nice days of drinking in darkened rooms stumbling home amongst the tourists and the heat of Nice’s mid-morning sun when even those darkened dens had to let light in and chucked us out. They have a new life, not only the one they created in Ciara, which was done with fine babymaking skills, but the life they have been making as a family. Everything about what they do is ace, and they ought be congratulated for doing the life thing so well.

We both loved every second of our time with the Magnificent McNabs and we hope to see them again some day. They will all be ever welcomed in Austria when we are there.

Waiheke island is just off the coast of Auckland. It has a micro climate, and it also has a Kinnersly. Not the Andrew Kinnersly of the day out at Ponsonby, but his brother, Dan. He, as did his brother, worked with me in Nice, in fact, he worked with Conny too. Dan graciously let us use his house, he and his beautiful bride to be cooked us dinner. To be fair I think he was just showing her off, saying “look what I’ve done!” like a puppy, but rightly so, even though he’s a good dude, I’m at a loss as to know how he did it. We met his housemate Lenor, a lovely Toronto lady, who was mighty envious that we had more recently than her eaten at her favourite Toronto Mexican eatery. She even had pictures of THAT sweetcorn…mmmmmmm…that sweetcorn. We also met the cat, Fritz. Fritz was super cute, until he was chewing on your foot. Then less so.

Dan makes wine. He even made some with some grapes from Nelson, which fortuetously became a fancy gift for my Nelson-living brother. I have tasted it. It’s delicious.

I like Waiheke. It is beautiful and remote enough to tick my hermit boxes but also within striking distance of the mainland. However, back to the mainland we headed, to our old mates at Jucy to get re acquainted with a trusty steed from our past trip to NZ, the Jucy El Cheapo, but if you are not aware of what one is, you’ll have to read the next post.

A veritable little slice of tropical Heaven. The moment you step off the plane at the airport, with it’s misty mountain backdrop you know you are somewhere a bit more than a bit special.

Given the last minute change in our travel plans, Air New Zealand, kind folk that they are, put us up at the Edgewater resort for a night before we made way to our accommodation proper. Lucky for me, we got there early enough for breakfast on the first day, where I made acquaintance with amongst other things, toast, marmalade, toast, vegemite, marmite (Kiwi variety, much different and much lower grade than the UK variant) some more toast, cereals, yogurt, coffee, a bit more toast and the piece de resistance, Paw Paw fruit. I liked it so much that I had it in both juice and whole form. Paw Paw, for the uninitiated, is a bit like a cross between a passion fruit and a mango and is simply put fantastic.

The Edgewater is as pleasant as one would expect without going super fancy. They have an events guy there who had a ridiculously long Cook Island Maori name, so he suggested we called him Mr Amazing. A name he did not fail to live up to as he taught us the skills of coconut husking. In Rarotonga, this is done with a specific implement, with a very specific name in Maori, which I can’t remember, but it is, I’m told translated as a sharp stick. He also demonstrated how to climb a tree to pick coconuts with the aid of a dishcloth. He leapt up there like a cat. Made it look easy, but the way down looked far more scary. The way, if you are wondering, to shell a coconut with a sharp stick, is thus:

1: Shove sharp stick in ground with sharp bit pointing up.

2: Take soft end of coconut fruit and ram it down on pointy end of sharp stick.

3: Twist coconut to separate skin from nut.

4: Repeat as necessary.

5: To open once skinned, take a large rock and smack, hard on the appropriate seem (the coconut at one end has what looks like two eyes and a mouth marked on it, the appropriate seem to hit when opening is the one right between the eyes, but at about halfway down the coconut)

Mr Amazing did all this whilst simultaneously teaching us about the Tree of Life as the Raro people call the coconut tree, and making it look damn easy. As he did when he made coconut cream for the ladies to rub on their skin and made a basket out of the leaves. Mr Amazing is pretty appropriately monikered, I’m pretty sure that Conny even had the hots for him a bit.

The afternoon saw a spot of reading and a little snorkel in the lagoon, courtesy once more of Mr Amazing and the equipment he lent us.

A meal at the local Italian(odd I know, but not shabby) later and it was bedtime before round 2 at the breakfast buffet.

We boarded the bus, but sadly going in the wrong direction, the bonus is, the island only has one bus route that goes two ways, clockwise and anticlockwise, the maximum full loop takes 55 minutes, so really, we just took a scenic route.

Our home for the next week could not have been more perfect. A little hut with direct access to the beach, nothing looking over us, no bustle, even relatively speaking for Rarotonga. We could, and did while away the days between the beach, our veranda and the open hut, with dips in the lagoon from time to time to cool off from the tropical heat. These dips did lead to some turmoil, however, but more about that later, first things first, I must convey the majesty of the place appropriately!

Rarotonga is nothing short of a marvel, a true paradise island. The pointy green peaks of the middle highlands, shrouded in cloud and mist, swooping down to the crisp white shoreline, all encircled by a calm, warm, safe lagoon in which we snorkelled and swam through the coral gardens, chilling with the fish and the sea stars. Conny befriended a local boy harvesting the sea cucumbers (more particularly their gonads! This apparently comes in two varieties, one that must be cooked and the other that can be eaten raw) who didn’t actually know what it was. He was sure it definitely was not an animal, but wasn’t in fact sure what it was (wikipedia says its an animal, so no gonads for David). We managed to hang around with some of the local kids, drawn to us by the lilo upon which we floated, which in turn got us a slap up lunch provided by the local Sunday school lady who was providing them a picnic on the beach (while scaling the beautiful angel fish that the boys had speared on the reef). The people there are fantastic, a little quiet to talk to at times, they come across occasionally as submissive, but ask them about their heritage and they come alive. Island life is very important to them.

The sky at night was like nothing I have ever seen before, there were almost more stars than there was night. Millions of brilliant shiny wonders, uninterrupted by man’s foggy light. It was breathtaking. We tried to take pictures but nothing came close to capturing its magnificence. The big skies in America pailed in to insignificance.

One evening we went up to what they call an Islander night. The Highland Paradise is a tourist attraction that takes you to one of the ancient gathering/prayer sites of the old Maori tribe that used to own that hill. In fact all land on the Cook Islands is still owned by the descendants of those Maori tribes that farmed, lived and battled over the various parts of the islands. In order to get land, you must first call a meeting of elders and justify your lineage. To be honest, the evening got off to a shaky start. The ticket is for a traditional buffet style meal, some of which is prepared in an earth oven called an Umu, with a tour of an ancient settlement, the sacred meeting place and some traditional music and dance, all hosted by the hilariously charming Danny. Think a cross between Mr Miyagi and John Candy with a kiwi accent and a bit of a tan, then you are somewhere there. In our case though, the transport to the event had forgotten to pick us up at the bus stop. We were lucky that the bus stop was located at a local hotel resort called the Rarotongan. Thankfully for us the guys at the reception there are decidedly Rarotongan (ie nice) and that even though we weren’t their guests and they were in no way obliged to, called the Highland Paradise up. They scrambled some guys in a pick up truck to our rescue and all we missed was a little of the talk. The ride up there however was well worth it. The boys, about 18 years old I reckon, were already in traditional garb, they just told us to jump on the back of the pick up and hold on. Conny was slightly disappointed not to be squeezed in with the handsome Maori boys in nought but grass skirts, but hey, we can’t win them all eh. It was a spectacular ride, more spectacular the owners face when she saw how we had been picked up. Her jaw hit the floor I think when she realised that they hadn’t seen fit to vacate the cab for us and them ride in the back, which was later confirmed by Danny over dinner as we chatted. He nearly gave one of the lads a clip round the ear as he heard but I feel the fact we enjoyed it more and the fact that the lad so nonchalantly just said “Yeah, we threw’em in the back eh, sweet as” to Danny’s enquiry saved him, because one must applaud such a laissez faire attitude.

The food was as you could probably guess, fantastic. Simple salads, some local vegetable like tapioca and taro plus meat cooked in the oven that Conny says was to die for. The highlight however was the taro plant leaves, wilted, and cooked with onions and coconut. It was similar to some Asian spinach dishes and entirely phenomenal. Danny insists that it is full of iron and as such is the men’s favourite as it will put lead in your pencil, but only for the taken man, as no one should have such lead in their pencil with no one to write to.

The evening was rounded off by a trip through various dances by descendants of the ancient clan that inhabited the hill. The boys were full of vim and vigour, leading to whoops and cheers from Conny’s side of the table. This might be as much to do with their talent as it was the fact that they were tall, chiselled, handsome Maori boys, full of stamina and athletic prowess topped by their glistening in sweat…that could also have been the case.

The girls up next, beautiful girls in coconut bikinis doing their thing. What can I say? Their thing is talented. I never knew the shaking of a grass skirt (in what can only be a precursor to twerking) could be so remarkable. By God those girls could get some speed up, stirring parts in me that I didn’t know were stirrable, let alone had been stirred before! The music was full of tribal drum and rhythm with fantastic singing, and although I make the show sound steamy, it’s not. It is done with the utmost respect and reverence to their history. All in all a proper win.

Now. To my horror.

The strange thing is, my horror was simply a bit of sunburn. The day Conny and I got to the hut we set out to buy some reef shoes and snorkels. We did, but in her haste to get in to the sea Conny’s response to my meekly raised question “Sun tan lotion?” was “FUCK SUN TAN LOTION!” as she strode on to the beach dropping layers as she went. At this point I should say, I knew better. I am a grown 35 year old man. I should have either insisted or at the very least, not followed, but no.

An hour or two spent dordling around the placid lagoon seemed no bother. The next day, a bit pink but no worries, the same on day 2. I remember saying to Conny when she mentioned our pinkness that it’s no bother. Been burnt before, probably will again, but it wont stop me.

I rue the day that I ever spake those words.

Day 3 past sunburn saw me wake at 3 am. Unable to sleep as an itch started growing. I left the bed several million different positions later and went outside with a cup of coffee and a book, all the while, uncomfortable at the ever building itch across my back. By 5.30 the coffee and book were abandoned as I ran to the shower. When Conny awoke at 8 this thing was in full force (even now as I write, a couple of weeks later, I am becoming aware of flashbacks and phantom itches)

I was jumping in and out of the shower, trying to make it fade. But no. This itch was the worst thing ever. Worse than AIDS I reckon. Conny had tried every aloe vera or tea tree thing we had by 10 am and the thing was only getting worse. At this point I was really hoping that the woman I love would show me exactly why I do love such a kind and caring lady. What I got was fits of laughter to the point of tears and no more breath. She did not get it, which is understandable, for I do not have the words to emote the sensation on my back. The following is my attempt to do so:

I shall name it the Hell Itch. For this falls not a millimetre short of what I imagine Hell to be. The skin on my back was warm, but not sore like those sun burns we all get, but it was something else. Not searing pain, but entirely unpleasant. However the horror is that it felt like a million Hell Fire Maggots had been spawned into my back and under the skin. The Broad sheet of my admittedly too fat back was alive with these fuckers. The sensation the worst thing I can remember. All the while moving, changing not a moment of respite. As it swept in unforeseeable waves across my back I felt various areas spasm due to the unexpected distress. All I was left to do was squat, naked in the shower with my back to the water bringing little to no relief, but with every time I tried to exit and take it like a man the intensity grew so fucking much I was back in in moments. It was at this point the pressure in me boiled over, Conny’s red faced cackle was the last straw. I unwittingly channelled my inner Regan MacNiel (Linda Blair in the exorcist) and the voice that came was frighteningly guttural and foreign. Even to me, this was visceral hatred in that moment for I was left with nothing else “Don’t you fucking laugh at me” boomed the voice. So shocking to Conny that even the penny dropped with her. She went online and the first thing she found was an account from a former US marine who had befallen the same fate. When she read that he had put it way beyond any of the physical difficulties he had endured as an active marine and that it’s relentless horror was far worse than any torture for which he had been prepared, she started to take me seriously. All I had at this point was the voice of Beezlebub shouting profanity from the pit of my belly through the top of my lungs emanating from the ever running shower. Bless her heart, this is when Conny showed what she is made of. She called the pharmacy and prepared to head out on the scooter we had hired (for which she is not licenced to ride). I had no fight in me and honestly didn’t think I’d make it with the spasms, so acquiesced to her going. Sadly, Conny is no expert, so mere moments later she is quizzing me on how to get it started. I explain, “Nothing” I hear from outside the bathroom window. At this point, full of fire, grunts and the purest evil, I decide enough is enough. I throw on a helmet, a t shirt and shorts, in that order. Stride out to Conny.

“Keys.”

“But will you make it?” She enquires worriedly.

“Have to.”

 

She gets on the pillion position as I pull out of our lot. At this point my mind has gone back to the days of Kung Fu, ages spent in horse riding stance burning my thighs, or the chuckle as we are in splits and Brian the instructor kicks your foot that little bit further*. My breathing becomes focused and meditative and for the first 5 minutes I’m still struggling. But then a breakthrough. It’s still horrible, but I can cope. The distraction of riding, the breeze on my back and the focus seem to align to make it seem survivable. This place becomes my Zen. If the itch becomes too much (which it does frequently over the next few days) I take to the bike. I did it at all hours of the day or night, even through torrential downpours. Zero fucks given. This thing was not winning. I would enjoy this week no matter what. Even the fact that the cream we got (Vitamin A is the healer apparently) didn’t stop me. You see, the thing is, I had basically fried all the nerve endings, of which there are many in ones back and that fiery tickle is each of them trying to repair, but by their nature, these things are receptive to sensation. Anyway the lady in the pharmacy neglected to mention that the vitamin A cream she sold us was “augmented” with cod liver oil. Holy fuck. Not only did I now itch like a bastard but I stank of fish. Not even a pleasant fishy smell, if there is such a thing, but noooooooo, that horrible smell you get when you walk by the damn of a reservoir and see that stinky upturned fish with half of it’s belly refashioned into a stinky cavern. That stink.

The cream was only applied once. Fuck that shit. Man up. I nearly died of pneumonia once. I once slipped a disc in my back into the spinal nerves. Both of these were preferable to this, but fuck it. Nope. This wouldn’t ruin me.

Somehow, in all honesty, it didn’t. There was only really one full 24 hours of nightmare horror. The rest it was there but I had it licked in my mind. But I shit you not I would not wish that upon my worse enemy. Well there are a few names that spring to mid, but they shall remain behind pursed lips.

Back to Rarotonga and it’s awesomeness. From the people on the island, to the Paw Paws and the chickens in the yard. A place could not be more perfect. Yes the weather was at times a little too sweaty and stifling, but that just made the breeze that followed that teensy bit more magical. Even the fact that wifi isn’t freely available there helps you appreciate the place more. We even stumbled across a Pirates of the Carribean themed porno movie on the hosts movie drive that he provided!

I really couldn’t have asked for more apart from a better girlfriend, with a love of sun tan lotion, and a better brain and set of balls combo from myself.

Next, on to New Zealand, a short hop, with apparently no vegetarian meal ordered, damn that guy on the phone! The lady did scramble together some fruit from the other meals and crackers and cheese from first class, which I thought was sterling work and deserved a mention.

*Brian Nelson is a fine instructor of Kung Fu, I dare say the best. I would not wish that anyone think I thought otherwise for I would say I was privileged to have him teach me throughout the years growing up.