Chapter Two, RVing New Zealand

I found Highway 1 easily, and once on it, life was good again. It’s a freeway, so I basically just stayed in the left lane — the slow lane here — and watched the city turn to country within about 10 miles. Even though I had been preoccupied with driving safely, the beauty of this area had not escaped me — it’s gorgeous. Auckland reminded me a little of Seattle or Vancouver, B.C. The countryside around it reminded me a bit of that around San Francisco. But these are only early observations and I will likely have more to say about this later.

About twenty miles from Auckland, I pulled off into a Service Area, which a rest area complete with gas station and restaurant, similar what you’d find in Europe or the American East. I spotted a rented motorhome just like mine, so I pulled along side it to see how the driver was doing.

Nobody was home, so I waited. I pulled out maps and my tourist literature and began studying. It was only about 11 a.m. The day was beautiful — sunny and in the mid-70s with just a few puffy clouds and a gentle breeze. I opened my screen door and savored the warm air and sweet breeze. Unlike American rest areas, here there were no big rig trucks spewing diesel exhaust.

A few minutes later, a woman passed by on the way to the other camper van. "Is that yours?" I asked, glancing toward the van. She said yes. And then her husband walked up. "How are doing driving it on the left side of the road?" I asked. "Oh, we’re from Tasmania, and we drive on the left, too," he said. "We toured the United States a few years back, but we didn’t do the driving. I imagine it takes some getting used to."
Then was started talking about good places to visit. And this is when he gave me the bad news: I was heading south, not north on Highway 1.

All right, I decided, quite mad at myself. It’s time to get serious. It’s time to pull out my compass! My suitcase was still packed so this piece of essential driving equipment was not yet at my disposal. Because I am directionally-challenged, a compass is essential for me to me reach a destination in unfamiliar territory.

So I was back on the road, this time headed north. The traffic got heavier. And suddenly, there was Auckland again. But passing through was a piece of cake, and soon I was back in the wide-open countryside.

But I was feeling very tired, so I decided to find a campground fast where I could unpack, organize my research library and rest my eyes and nerves.

Friendly Australian Cattle Dog in Orewa.

The beautiful little tourist town of Orewa seemed like a good place. I couldn’t resist stopping in town, which I explored on foot for the next hour. The library offered cheap Internet access ($1.60 US for 25 minutes), so I checked my email and took care of a few other business affairs. How bizarre — and wonderful — I thought, to be halfway around the world and to be able to sit at this computer and have access to not only my email, but my online banking as well. From experience, I already knew that about 95% of the work I do at home can be done remotely from any Internet-connected computer, anywhere in the world. In the past, I have "taken care of business" this way in Canada, Mexico and Alaska, not to mention every corner of the USA. But to be able to do so in such a distant land made the process seem even more like magic.

At 3 p.m., I checked into the Puriri Park Holiday Complex, a 23-acre trailer park/campground with its own restaurant, swimming pool and even roller rink. My campsite, with electric and water hookups, cost a mere $6 US. "Is this an off-season rate," I asked the woman who checked me in. "No, this is our regular rate," she said.

I pulled into a grassy site w

There were quite a few permanent residents of the Puriri Park RV park. Most RVers in New Zealand travel in caravans — travel trailers — rather than camper vans (motorhomes). The brand names of the caravans are not familiar to Americans, with rare exception. I saw a handful of Jayco travel trailers, but that was the only American brand I saw during my entire trip. American made motorhomes are virtually non existent — no Winnebagos anywhere to be found.

ith 12-foot high wall of bamboo behind me, hooked up the camper van and then unpacked. And this is where I am now as I write.

The beach is only a five-minute walk away. How beautiful! It stretches for miles, and is apparently a popular place in the summer. I experienced my first moment of aloneness there, a good feeling in the sense of feeling free, but a bad sense, too, because my wife and daughter were not here to share it with me.

Back at my RV, I settled in.

At 8 p.m., I could stay awake no more. I was "out" within a minute of climbing into bed. At 4 a.m., however, I awoke wide awake and could not get back to sleep. Now, at 6 a.m., I am typing and will break soon for a shower. The sky is still dark. The light of day should break any time now. Because it is fall here in New Zealand, the days are short —like late October back home.

On my Air New Zealand flight there were a couple of interesting technical innovations I have not seen before. The Boeing 747 had a video camera mounted on its nose (or thereabout), so passengers could watch the plane’s takeoff and landing on the inflight movie screens. After the plane took off, for about the next half-hour (and about half-hour before landing), the movie screens displayed a map of where the plane was located, and showed its elevation, airspeed, and distance from departure and arrival points.

Before I left Seattle, I told my wife I would check in by phone about once a week. I assumed phone calls would be expensive. Wrong! It costs ten cents a minute to call the USA, not much more than I pay on my U.S. road trips. The way you to get this great rate is to buy a prepaid calling card. They are for sale everywhere, including in just about every convenience store in the country. But check around before buying, as the rates vary.

From now on, when I talk about how much something costs, I will use U.S. dollars, not New Zealand dollars. Basically, the currency exchange is one U.S. dollar buys 2.2 New Zealand dollars. So when you are spending money here, you figure that to calculate the price in American dollars, you multiply the amount by .4 or 40%. So a $10 admission to a museum, for example, costs $4 in U.S. dollars. The coffee I bought at the airport cost $2.50 in New Zealand dollars, but only $1 in U.S. dollars.

Before I went to bed last night, I took a short walk. Above me was a beautiful star-filled sky! But what was startling to me, was that it is a different sky than from in the Northern Hemisphere! There is no Big Dipper. Instead, there is the Southern Cross, and other constellations I have never seen before.

I felt almost eerie to look up to the heavens and see nothing familiar. It was like I was on another planet! How strange! And yet how wonderful! Here in a RV park, in a land that looks not dramatically different from familiar places back home, I was reminded that I was, indeed, far away. And it felt good.

NEXT INSTALLMENT: Driving on the left side getting easier

Chapter 2