In Search of Elves

My last night was really great. I went to a bar with a group of people to celebrate someone's birthday and there was some great live music. It was really fun.

Said goodbye to my Frenchman on the Saturday (he insisted on posing lying on his car for a photo). He wanted to come with me but doesn't have enough money. I then had a longggg three hour drive down to Pakiri Beach, which is an hour and a half from Auckland. It's a beautiful spot, it's just been incredibly grey and rainy, so it's hard to enjoy it. I seem to be in a little cabin with walls made of cardboard and a ceiling made of polystyrene. I have been feeling appalling the last couple of days.... my fibromyalgia has really caught up with me. I have felt exhausted and have slept and slept. I have felt sick, dizzy and generally really sore. I feel much better today. It was a half hour drive to come and use the internet, but it was worth it because I think this is going to be the last time I get to do so before mid January when I leave my Marlborough Sounds hostel.

Am currently in a library. The librarian is rather conservative but she just spoke to a mature lady customer 'no that's a soft porn novel dear, the hard core sexy stuff you want is on that shelf at the back.' I kid you not.

Going to have some lunch by the river here in Warkworth, it's prettier here than I remember. Tomorrow I get to meet the guy I was going to meet originally in Auckland (we rescheduled). He is a bit of a hero of mine, a famous psychologist and author and he wrote a couple of books that is relevant to my book research, so it should be fantastic. Not looking forward to seeing grey Auckland though. I have to return to the sports shop where I got my tent to see if they will buy it back from me. They should do but I don't know quite where I'm going to dump it if they don't. Poor George, I've used him now I'm dumping him.

So, if I don't get online again, have a fantabulous Christmas and New Year. If your relatives are getting on your nerves, write me a letter. It will definitely be appreciated because I'm staying somewhere very isolated. The mail is only delivered twice a week by boat. My parents have my address. Lots of love to everyone. Make sure you check back in in January for more scandalous stories.

My last full day here at Haruru. I have had a great time. Feeling a little unwell today, I've been in bed all day, but I am going out for someone's birthday tonight. I have about a 3 hour drive tomorrow which will be hard, but then I'm resting for 4 days on a beach. Hopefully the weather will have cleared because it is still raining, just not as hard. Listening to terrible music in the bar here, on a rubbish computer.

It is well and truly pouring with rain. It has been since yesterday morning. All the other campers (all in campervans) have chickened out and left but being such a hardy camper, I have stayed. I have ducks swimming round my tent!
Nah, it's not quite that bad. Not yet. But there were some huge floods in February and being right on the river, it has been a little scary. I'm just getting very wet feet everytime I step outside.
I was on the beach on Tuesday, it's such a contrast. There are a few signs of Christmas, but thankfully not that many. It's much more understated here......so far. On the 13th I fly down to the South Island and I can't wait. I'm enjoying spending a last few days with Quentin, who has decided he wants to be a car airbag in his next life, because 'they don't do anything but sleep and only have to work once'. Lazy man. We ate at a Thai restaurant last night and the other day he leant me a film to watch on his laptop.
Not much else to report. From the 13th, for a month, I don't think I'm going to have internet access. But hopefully up to then I will. It looks like it's going to be raining until at least monday. :-(

sunnier days.........

I am very very very very very pleased to be able to say I swam with five dolphins today!!! After 5 grey days, we had some sun. I had a free trip having not seen any on Friday which was even better. It took about 2 hours to locate them, but in the end they were in a lovely shallow blue bay, which meant easy swimming. They were sleeping, so we just watched them for a bit and once they woke up we jumped in and swam. I went in without a wetsuit so I could manage and it was actually pretty warm (about 20 degrees). It was hard to see anything, but I did get a couple of swims alongside them. Mostly they weren't that interested in playing and swam around gently. It was still very cool though. All around was the sound of singing, muffled by snorkels, as people tried to get them to interact. One gave a lovely belly roll and stretched out after his sleep.

Dolphins were one of the reason I came here, so I'm thrilled to have been able to do this. I met some nice people, including two girls on a gap year. We stopped at Urupakapaka island for hot chocolate and showers and tonight I'm going out with Quentin. It was a GOOOD day.

Enjoy my photos from the last few days!

this photo is from my trip to Waitangi, where the treaty between the Maoris and the English was signed. I had a great time. There was a cultural performance and a tour around the grounds which included whizzing very fast down a gravel slope in my wheelchair going 'weeeeeee'. I stopped at one point to take a photo and a very kind man came up behind me and took off with me, saying enthusiastically 'I'll push you'. I had to shout at him to stop and explain that I wanted to be still in order to take my picture which had been so nicely lined up!! He was so embarrassed.

The maori performance was great, I really enjoyed it - the songs were so beautiful. I have a bit of video of them, but I don't think I have enough space to upload any more media. I bought a really cool book on Maori astronomy there.

Yesterday I went out for a dolphin swim.....well that was the plan, there were no dolphins. I get to go again for free next week though. I have 7 more days here, so lots of time to do it. It's a bit grey at the moment and I'm in a hell of a lot of pain, so most of that time will be spent on the beach I think. I'm struggling rather a lot, it's fair to say, both with the pain and with having to lie down every day when I want to be out doing things, but there isn't much choice other than to be patient and wait it out. I want to get up in a helicopter this week - everyone else gets to walk up the hills and see the view, so this will be my way of doing it. Quentin thinks I should cover my bones in concrete to make me better. I just fear he has some weird fantasty about covering girls in concrete. ;-)

It's so hard- I honestly forget there is anything wrong with me sometimes. The other day I was looking at a brochure for going horse riding and I spent a good 5 minutes trying to choose between the trip that went up the volcano and the one that ends in the sea, before remembering it would bloody hurt to sit on a horse for more than one minute.

Off to buy some presents. There really isn't that much to buy out here. I was trying to find some food that was authentically kiwi to send home - and there's just nothing. It's all brands or imported stuff. There is the chocolate that they name 'kiwi poo' but I don't think that counts.