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As I write this entry it's dusk. My legs are folded up against the steering wheel of our little rental car and I'm looking out through the windscreen (which is starting to steam up as night falls and the temperature drops) at pink tinged clouds, a huge mountain covered in thick dense green forest from peak to toe and a lake swimming around the toes of the mountain. The lake is completely still and the whole vista of the mountain is reflected in it like a looking glass. Wills is listening to the commentary of one of the Rugby World Cup games (next up is Italy vs. Ireland) but the car radio is so crackly that sometimes it's difficult to make out who exactly has scored and we both lean in to try to catch the words, because we're parked up on a Department of Conservation campsite in the middle of nowhere on the rugged West Coast of the South Island. We've been attacked by a pack of killer flies at this particular campsite tonight but we were too tired to keep driving, after a day when we drove through snowcapped mountains above Queenstown and along a beautiful coastal road, running right next to the sea, stopping off in a National Park, to take in some waterfalls on the way. Our road trips have made the whole trip for us and we think nothing now of sharing the driving each day, stopping off somewhere to eat our packed lunch sandwiches of cheese, onion and mayo, cracking open the flask of hot water (that took us an hour to boil on our camp stove!), for a well needed strong cup of coffee, and seeing where the road takes us.
Pretty soon we'll need to turn our little car "lounge" with reclining car seats, car radio and snacks all included, into our "bedroom" with the same reclining car seats (now pushed all the way down to a horizontal angle). To finish off the effect we hang my towel across the windscreen, wrap our double sleepingmat around the back to block the back windows and trap huge sheets of newspaper in the other windows. I don't know who we think is going to peek in on us through the night but somehow it just feels a bit more snug and secure afterwards and blocks out some of the night noises from the campsites that have sometimes felt like horror movie sets as well as being so damn beautiful. We layer up in our clothes, liners and sleeping bags to snuggle down for the night. I realised recently that as we've perfected this way of sleeping over the past 4 weeks (we've slept 17 out of 28 nights in the car), my sleeping 'outfit' has got progressively weirder without me even noticing. I think nothing anymore of sleeping in my thermal leggings from Bolivia (best purchase ever), bright yellow stripy travelly trousers I bought in Peru over the leggings, huge Bolivian Alpaca woollen jumper over all the other layers, which, the only way I can describe is to say it looks like a Bridget Jones Christmas jumper, a Bolivian woollen hat with ear flaps and a purple sleeping mask that we got free on the plane! This whole outfit has crept up on me man and I only realised how ridiculous I looked when I popped out of the car on one of the campsites and a couple took a second look at me and burst out laughing! But I don't care cos all this South American alpaca wool has saved me from chills on many a night sleeping in our little metal bedroom. I wish I could tell you about Will's sleeping outfit but he's so hot blooded he doesn't need any alpaca wool.
So that's pretty much a typical night on our New Zealand travels. In 6 weeks we've travelled across the North and South Island, we've been offered beds by lots of friendly Kiwis along the way (this must be the friendliest country in the whole world), we've stumbled out of our car each morning to stunning scenery, mirror lakes, mountains, Milford Sound from the Lord of the Rings and so much scenery just driving along that pops up and nearly makes you crash, we've eaten amazing pies (our fave was buttered chicken pies in Havelock), we've become addicted to coffee mainly to wake up enough to drive, we've been swept up in Rugby World Cup fever - we saw South Africa and Fiji play live which was AMAZING and we've watched the games in so many different places, bars, pubs, fanzones outside on huge TV screens and bantered with every Kiwi we've met about the games because everyone is so into it here, we've learnt about Maori culture, just gawked open mouthed in glow worm caves which look exactly like a starry sky, been told off on a brewery tour for pulling pints of just beer head (that was me - Wills managed pretty well to pour his SEVEN tasters), seen an earthquake disaster zone in Christchurch where the city centre is like a ghost town and caught up with old friends over rugby, red wine and the first BBQ of this trip.
New Zealand hasn't been relaxing and it hasn't been like any other travelling we've ever done but it's been a huge coffee-drinking, rugby-filled, jaw-dropping adventure.
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