Day 1 – New Zealand

We arrived in Auckland between 5 and 6 in the morning. Since it was early and Escape camper van rentals didn’t open until 8, we decided to hang around the airport until 7. Then we took the Airbus into the city center.

It’s hard to imagine losing an entire day traveling. We left one location on July 1st and arrived at another on July 3rd. People have tried to explain how you actually lose a day but I don’t think you fully understand it until you are a part of it.

We left San Francisco around 9 P.M. on the 1st so it was just getting dark. I thought we would follow the rotation of the Earth and it would be light out while flying but I was wrong. The plane never actually catches up with the Sun. In fact the rotation happens much faster than the plane travels. As the plane travels in the shadow of darkness, the rotation of the Earth is causing the Sun to move around the Earth. Eventually, the Sun comes up behind you. We stayed in perpetual darkness while flying. When we landed it was morning and the Sun caught up to us a few hours later. It was now the morning of July 3rd. What happened to the 2nd? It was lost forever.

We arrived in Auckland center around 8. I checked a map on the bus and realized that Escape van rentals was up the road a few blocks. We found that the gate was locked and there was a sign on the side of the building. It said if the building was unoccupied to call a number. We did and apparently they didn’t open until 8:30. After waiting for a few minutes someone arrived. We placed our bags in the office and the man told us it would be “a little while” before the owner was there to finalize the paperwork. After we inquired what “a little while” was we went for breakfast up the street and came back about 45 minutes later.

The owner gave us the “insurance-extra-charge” spiel and we declined. We would take a gamble and it would be a big scary gamble since we would have to train ourselves to drive on the left hand side of the road.

We inspected the vehicle and Andrew, the owner, explained everything about the vehicle. Soon we were on our way but not without taking the emergency brake off. Oops.

It was difficult to get used to driving, first of all, because I was on the right side of the vehicle. I turned the windshield wipers on at least five times instead of the blinker. The goal was to drive straight and follow the car in front of me. It was easy to get to the highway: two lefts and straight. Then I had to get used to being in the correct part of the lane because I was positioned on the right side of the vehicle. I now had to look to my left to see in my rearview mirror and realized I had a large blind spot on the left side of the vehicle. It was definitely difficult to get used to. I developed a phrase to help me making proper turns: little left, big right. When turning left it is a small radius turn and when turning right it is a large radius turn.

We stopped for gas and that was an event in itself. We could not figure out how to use the gas pump. Some nice Kiwi asked us if we needed help and gave us some. The gas was $2.12 a liter, which basically meant $8 a gallon. $95 later our tank was full and we were back on the highway.

Our destination was only about a half hour from Auckland; a half hour of driving up hill, downhill, through neighborhoods, overlooking beaches, and a combination of windy and straight roads, all while thinking that oncoming traffic is on my right and the vehicles behind me were just to close. After a half hour of driving my head was spinning. It was way too much stimulation for whatever day it was. We parked our camper van at a camping site right in front of the beach. We couldn’t have asked for a better spot, except for the ground being wet. It was quite slippery.

We hung out for a bit, Holly took a shower and afterwards mentioned how frighteningly cold the water was. I decided then that I would not be taking a shower. We decided to venture out in search of a supermarket. Apparently, I hadn’t had enough driving yet.

We thought we would be adventurous and get some chicken to cook up. We battled wind and rain while cooking on our propane burner. We wound up having fully cooked teriyaki chicken yet lukewarm and covered in dirt because Escape rentals never cleaned the pan. Mmmm. With rain sporadic for the rest of the evening we hung around inside of our van playing cards and making up games. We went to bed at a nice round hour of 8.