Hamilton Academicals to Auckland

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February 12th


One look out the window made us immediately glad we hadn’t done the extra hour towards the coast to Raglan, NZ’s “perfect surfing town.” The rain was torrential, sporadic, and warm. The hotel we’d stayed the night in was so hot and airless we had to chuck the pillows off the bed, soak the towels in cold tap water and put them on our necks and behind our knees. The wide-open window gave us no reprieve, but by morning had allowed a damp fog to move in above us. The ceilings, which were unusually high, had almost begun to drip with their own weather systems. The whole place had an unnerving, Jumanji-esque effect, as if a jungle might break through the walls where the wallpaper was peeling off.


We lugged our hastily packed bags down past a man with a tattooed face on his way up the Haus bar, where Korean TV had blared loudly into the night. We were into our Mitsubishi and on the road to Auckland. Parts of New Zealand are experiencing unusually high heat for the summer, and it seems to be front-page news every second day. Old people dying and all that. Could be worse, everyone mentions, as Australia’s on fire, so we’re glad for the rain.


We followed the GPS off-piste to find a lake to sit by for a pit stop. We had driven right up to a fence, so the lake was out of the question, but about twenty deer cautiously moved up to inspect us. We got low to the ground, and they moved even closer in. I’ve never seen deer like this for longer than a glance, and I just can’t get over the fuzzy antlers. What is the point? Wishing I could reach out and touch them, I thought of Hamish: DO NOT GRAB.


George eventually dragged me away and we drove around Auckland being picky with the hostels. Pay phones that accept coins are few and far between these days, so we drove to all of the options and eventually settled on the first one we looked at.


We dropped off the car after the best part of 900kms, and this time I had to drag George away. It’s great having the best car in the parking lot, and even better when you got it for $30 NZ for three days.


We crawled into our mercifully cool room and “we” watched Twilight. Can I just take a moment to say: O.M.G. I wish I hadn’t seen if because now I can’t go back. Think sexed-up Harry Potter without any of the complicated literary techniques (like plot). It does Harry an injustice to compare him with Bella Swan. I feel like I’m comparing the very best French Brie with spray on cheese, but dammit, this is the best canned cheese I’ve ever had.


At this point in the story I’ve actually turned into a thirteen year old girl, and promptly fall asleep next to George who, by the time the movie’s over, is already about an hour into his dreams.


We slept for fourteen hours and woke up at 8am, ready to start afresh.

February 13th

We had the whole day to do nothing, so we wandered about the town and eventually cruised into Victoria park, which was huge. There were three cricket pitches picturesquely surrounded by big, old trees that provided us with a handy bit of shade. From the park we could see a chimney reaching into the sky and higher than anything else surrounding it. It was Victoria Park Market. I gave it a better introduction than it deserved because it was full of tourist boutiques all selling the same tat that all had slightly different layouts. One fun bit was when we found a wall of magic eyes and we quickly lost half an hour.

We then wandered towards the city centre and bought a few books. Then we quickly cruised through another park while flitting through the first few chapters in the shade under some mad looking trees before deciding that a film could be a good idea. After checking the map and arriving at the nearest cinema, we were one of about five people in the whole auditorium; we bought tickets to the new Steve McQueen film, ‘Hunger’, sneaked a bottle of the local red in, and relaxed.

It was then back to our hostel to pick up our bags and on the next bus to the hairy-port. Our flight wasn’t until the early hours of the next morning so we picked a nice row of three seats each and tried to sleep with all the hyper, overactive and sugar high children running around and, naturally, playing too hard until they tripped, completely burst into tears and then waddled over to mummy wailing.

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Photos

iGod
this should be an audi advert