The Art of Travel : 31 March - 2 April

"Valuable elements may be easier to experience in art and in anticipation than in reality.

The anticipatory and artistic imaginations omit and compress, they cut away the periods of boredom and direct our attention to critical moments and, without either lying or embellishing, thus lend to life a vividness and a coherence that it may lack in the distracting woolliness of the present."

Alain de Botton, The Art of Travel

I have quoted from Alain de Botton before, back at the very beginning of our trip, when the realisation first hit me, that travelling, as told by most travellers on arriving home, is a memory carefully, though probably quite unconsciously, edited for the highlights. Back then, I thought perhaps we were just doing it wrong, that when it took hours to book somewhere to stay on the next leg, when we spent a whole day on a bus and didn't have much to say about it, or simply got tired and did more or less nothing all day - we should have been packing our time, wall to wall with adventure, or at least getting drunk in some bar, meeting pirates or fugitives and contriving somehow to make our whole lives into an adventure story. 

'Live life,' proclaims my tag line for this blog, 'so it makes a good story'.

But, as I eventually realised, with the help of the good, and thankfully, deeply honest, Mr de Botton, actually travel, like life in general, has its downtimes. And I see countless other people, younger or older than us, sitting in hostal lounges in the middle of the day, staring languidly into space or playing with their phones. Nobody adventures wall to wall. But most people don't bore their readers with the less exciting details.

I, however, made a pact with myself that this blog would be warts, worries and all - and so am bound to tell you that the next few days are mostly characterised by two slightly irritable people, rattling about in a van for hours. This is the 'road trip' part of our journey, and a 'road trip' as we are now oddly disappointed to realise, seems to involve spending a lot of time on the road. 

"I think we must be doing this wrong." says M.

And despite my apparent new wisdom about travelling, I am wondering that too. Admittedly I didn't get far through 'On The Road' - I think I was trying to read it whilst ill, and it made me feel drunk and sick - but I don't remember stretches of it, in which the main characters sit side by side, looking out at sheep and grass and hillsides, and complaining that their bottoms are numb and they have back ache and continually looking up on their phones how many more kilometres it is until they get to park up for the night. 

"Perhaps we are too old" I say, harping back to another refrain we were supposed to have grown out of.

Actually we know, deep down - we recognise this and we have been there. The down side of travel, at least in our experience, has three common symptoms: fearfulness which threatens to dim your enjoyment, feeling that you are doing it wrong in the more boring in between times, and worrying that the enforced 24 hour proximity will dent your marriage. The first we are not experiencing right now - and have learned to deal with. We are fearful every time we switch continents. We recognise it, feel it, worry about it, but ultimately know both it and our sanity are going to be fine. The second had all but died out until now - through constant affirmation from other travellers and a general increase in confidence - and this relapse is actually a little useful to us. In some aspects we actually are doing it wrong. We decide we need to stop thinking of New Zealand as a series of destinations and begin to class the road travel itself as the experience. We need to curb the number of hours we try to travel in a day (after this stretch, which has to be a long drive because we must catch the ferry in two days so the distance we have to cover is larger - and we are going the scenic route.) And finally, we need a soundtrack. 

We stop at a tourist information cafe with convenient WiFi and we download our wedding album. We prepared, for the dancing in the evening, a selection of our favourite songs ranging from 1950's to 2000's. We got a bit carried away and prepared many more hours of music than we would have had time to play. It's upbeat and every track us our favourite. What could go wrong?

We blare it out of our tinny speakers in our trusty little rattling van - and the distances shrink a little. I avoid backache by jiggling about to the beats, and M is distracted from the length of the drives.

As for the final one - this was a real worry at first. Are we just learning to snap at each other, I thought despairingly back in South East Asia. We never did that before. What if this trip doesn't bring us closer? What if it splits us up? I discovered that everybody struggles with this. We discovered, through talking it through together, new things, new twists of logic, fears and weak points that take their path through each other's mind causing apparently unreasonable behaviour. If we don't fully understand we at least became able to predict the triggers of each others worst cycles. And we even, with much smugness, become able to curb them. I am proud and greatly relieved by this. Travel makes or breaks your relationship.  I wasn't sure which way it was going, but by this stage I am pretty sure it's in the 'made' camp. New Zealand, with its tiny van and no one around for company but sheep and sand flies, is an extreme test of this smugness. Do we valiantly fight it, remain snuggly soppy and utterly unphased?

No. We niggle, grumble, sulk and rattle in our little metal tin, constantly making up to each other the last nag or muttering, and then doing it again. We are a model of two people who need, not space - there are plenty of solitary walks to be had in the countryside of New Zealand - but company.

We have, at this stage, only just left Roxi's, which has been such an intense highlight, the next few days of driving are thrown into sharp relief by it. The need for company doesn't hit us quite yet, but I am covering in this entry, a general build up over the next week or so.

We understand and recognise each others grumblings for what they are - a symptom of a confined space and so there is none of the angst associated with this experience back at the start of our trip. We know we'll be fine. 

And what is more - we have an end date. On 15th April, like little cherubs from heaven, two of our closest and much missed friends are flying out to join us for a few weeks in New Zealand. They will have their own camper van, and both M and I know that their presence will instantly release this pressure. So we relax. Travel has not been about avoiding the irritable moments, or the bored ones. It has been about recognising them.

Which is a nice, poetic note to end on. But it would be a shame to get so into the down periods, that I omit the highlights.

Essentially, we spend these few days driving down the country on the scenic coastal route, catching the ferry to the South Island, and driving to our first real stop there, Totoranui. 

Highlights include using our new coffee cups from Roxi, eating our way through the generously provided biscuits, crackers and sweets she also provided, and generally gorging. We do not just need a soundtrack to enjoy a long drive - we need a food track. 

And then of course, there is the Kiwi  farm. We stop at this on a very useful recommendation from a friend of M's. There, finally, we get to see the elusive kiwi, though sadly, not strictly in the wild. 'Farm' is perhaps the wrong way to describe it, it is more of a sanctuary. There are two kiwis, in special glass sections with 'forest' settings. Made dark but lit with the kind of infrared lighting we used in our kiwi walk, the birds live in separate sections because otherwise they will fight. We happen to be there in time to watch the feeding of one particular kiwi. This lady is, to put it rather bluntly, a little sexually frustrated. There has not been a male kiwi for her for some time - and her response is to behave, well, a little hormonally. Her response to the entrance of her well known and loved human caretaker, is the rush at her with all of the force of her large, brown, furry body, and kick her as hard as possible in the shins. She continues to scuttle around her in this way for some time, before falling on the food ravenously. She eats quietly while her human squats down, waiting, then, satisfied, she rushes again at her provider, but this time in order to hop onto her lap and bury her furry head under her arm. Used to this, the lady who feeds her speaks soothingly and massages her furry/feathery (it is somewhere between) body. After some time the kiwi decides she's done enough courtship for one session, and starts bumping and grinding, in the hope that she might, just this time, get lucky. Unfortunately this human is not a male kiwi, and has not become more so since the last attempt this morning, so the poor bird remains unsatiated, gives up, and snuggles back in. Eventually, when her caretaker gets up to leave, she becomes as angry with her for leaving as she was for her arrival - and resumes the kicking, all the way until her caretaker finally manages, perhaps with some relief, to scuttle out of the door. 

I think we can all identify with that kiwi.

Another, and very fond, highlight of those few days of driving is staying at Battle Hill Farm. After a faintly terrifying drive along cliff paths we find this farm, which allows vans to camp for just 6 dollars a person. We drive in, and sheep, looking startled, scuttle out of the way in alarm. There are sheep everywhere, the only sound is the occasional 'baa', the only light is from the stars and all night (as I discover during my usual mid night toilet trips) they graze around us, continually surprised, it would appear, at our presence. It's beautiful. It is these places, isolated and surrounded by nature, which are what makes travelling in a van so very special. It is not the facilities at the posher campsites, the TV rooms and laundry, the well lit paths and free hairdryers. It is the tiny, natural, wildernesses without showers and with only a makeshift toilet. I remember every one of these second places. The others merge and blend, blurrily in my mind. Battle Hill Farm is one of my favourites.

In the morning we take a walk up Battle Hill itself and, standing there, wind blowing cold and surprisingly strong in my face, I feel as though any cobwebs I may have collected, any crotchetiness or pouting, are being, quite literally, blown away.

We make friends on the ferry with a group of people, the female contingent of which seem continually amused by the men.

"They are old" says one lady, with which they both subside into gales of laughter as if it is the funniest thing they have ever heard, "he is nearly 80! We are much younger."

I go to fetch us a coffee and encounter them buying a bottle of wine and four glasses. Most of the wine is polished off by the ladies. They are much fun, and interesting to talk to, and it is lovely to sit there, gazing out at staggering scenery as we enter the sounds, taking in advice on where to go, and general chatter with our new friends. 

And finally, driving our little friend carefully off the ferry, we stop for the night in a little lay by on the side of a quiet road, surrounded this time, by cows. And as for the obligatory toilet trips, these are vastly entertaining, (though the cows disappear at some point in the night - bound, presumably, for some special cow rendez vous), because the little toilet hut smells so bad I perfect a new way of breathing for use inside it, and rather enjoy pinging hastily out of it again, and breathing in noisy, and much exaggerated, gulps of manure scented fresh air.

Quite a few highlights for a selection of rather driving dominated days really. And if you add in the scenery. And the sight of the perfectly conical Mount Taranaki looming up out of the clouds, and the foaming, crashing, glittering waves on the shining grey rocks as we walked across the bay in the shadow of it, you have to realise that we are really quite full time adventurers. And that Alain de Botton was quite right. For this last part, this part will be the story we tell. After all, who wants to hear about backache?

Voyage of the Surf Treader: 27 - 30 March

"Caspian, dear," said Lucy. "You knew we'd have to go back to our own world sooner or later."

"Yes," said Caspian with a sob, "but this is sooner."

The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, C S Lewis

When Roxi, (whose real name is so much nicer - I don't know why I am so fond of giving totally inadequate pseudonyms to people) left England to go back to her home in New Zealand, I genuinely found myself gazing, mournfully at her empty desk long after she had ceased to be my colleague. We kept in touch but the odd early morning/late night Skype chats were wonderful but wholly inferior to that easy pleasure that comes with daily contact with a person you care about. 

My feelings, therefore, as we prepare to drive to Roxi's house, are fluttery and excitable, even half nervous. Roxi and I had been planning this trip since the moment she left, well before M and I had taken the plunge and started to consider taking a world wide adventure with any serious intent. She left me with a little wooden picture of Tauranga, her home in New Zealand, depicting the beach, and, with it, a fondly repeated mental picture of her and I drinking a glass of wine on the beach while the boys surfed. It was our way of putting off the pain of goodbyes. We are not saying goodbye, we said to each other, we are saying, 'see you soon.' 

It has been four years.

I find myself stopping in the car park of the supermarket, where we have bought wine, putting mascara on in the wing mirror of the van, having not worn any make up other than a smear of lipstick since Langkawi. Am I trying to seduce Cal (pseudonym), Roxi's husband? Am I  trying to undo the effect of those four years on my face? I don't know. I never know, but am equally liable to do this again as we fly home and we prepare to greet our families again. Perhaps it's not about the cosmetics, but the sense of occasion.

All of which poise and elegance is lost, immediately we carefully navigate our way into the driveway. She appears in the doorway, I have one of those brief rushes of emotion, leap out of the car while M is still parking and grab her. 

When we pull apart, giggling like breathless teenagers and I pull myself together enough to greet Cal and introduce poor M, both of us are seized with a sort of flighty weirdness and can't concentrate on talking. Cal leads us on a tour of the house which gives Roxi and I time to try to calm down and behave rather more normally. Cal's palpable pride in the house which they have both lovingly created, and especially the garden, with its plump chilli's and huge deep green cucumbers, is contagious. It is a house made beautiful by the love poured into it, markedly unmaterialistic in its contents, but nurtured and cared for as though it is an annex to their marriage. And in a way it is.

As for Cal, I had met him only once before, when he gave me a lift home after a session of 'working on Roxi's CV', which had turned rather swiftly into a bottle of wine and a chat. I hadn't spent any real time with him, and Roxi's time in England, at least when I knew her, had been stressful and the two had been trying to deal with one of those periods in life where it seems you are being pelted with general misfortune. 

Now, as they show us round and we open some wine with crackers and the pesto which has now become a 'taste memory' of being with Roxi and Cal, I see them, surrounded by their life and the tokens of their travels, and ornaments, notebooks and other much loved souvenirs of Roxi's mother's life (which serve to add further to that sense of a house built with love), I see Cal's supportiveness, his journeying with Roxi through her grief, and that fluttering settles as I absorb their normality, their daily life. And although this is a sad time for both of them, I can see that Roxi is happy, and that Cal is great.

We sit on the deck in the evening, talking and sipping wine until the time amazes us in how quickly it disappears, and the moon is high in the sky, and considering sinking. Cal is warm and funny, earnest about his moral and ethical codes and easily loveable. Roxi is everything I remember and more, gentle and giving, putting others before herself to an extent that is almost unfathomable, full of interest and enthusiasm and emotional honesty without that self absorption that so often accompanies it - and also, always, infinitely loveable. I have not asked M what he thinks, having never met either of them and as I look at him in the candle light, reflected in red through his wine glass, I am looking forward to asking him later, so I can enjoy hearing the answer, which I know will be positive. I feel as though I somehow invented Roxi and Carl and am hugely proud of how brilliantly I did it.

We talk of everything and nothing. In a gesture that once again leaves me amazed at the generosity and hospitality of others, Roxi and Cal present us with a huge bag full of supplies that we might not normally have bought with our meagre budget (which we are constantly blowing). There are sweets and chocolate, cheese and crackers and wine and (my personal favourite) two coffee cups with lids and colourful depictions of life in New Zealand. These, we will even get to keep and take home with us. M's personal favourite are the 'toffee pop' biscuits. (These will be gone quite quickly and are very unlikely to survive long enough to take home with us, though the memory of them will.) It's incredibly generous.

We spend the next day normalising and talking. Roxi and I manage to lose our giddiness enough to talk sensibly about her mum. There is much to be done, all of which is tiring and stressful but Roxi's attitude towards her grief, an acceptance of it, a lack of hesitance to express it, coupled with a practicality and rational understanding which I have not seen ever before in anyone else and very much doubt I would achieve myself, overwhelms me in admiration for her. Tell her this - and she shrugs it off. People so rarely realise when they do something special.

We go out that evening to one of the many jealousy inducing interesting places in Tauranga, for a drink and some food. We discuss morality and the  importance of doing the right thing and identifying what that thing is. We must have looked at New Zealand that day, must have seen landscapes and learned things, but once again, for me, the landscape, my experience and memories of it, are overtaken by the people. But then, perhaps they are the landscape.

"Adventures are never fun while you're having them."

The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, C S Lewis

We plan to go surfing. A word on this. There has been much thought fuzzing about in my head about the surfing. Roxi and I have always planned that the boys would be doing it, mostly I think to give us more of the wine. I had said I would like to try it to, because I have always thought it might be fun. Besides it looks easy. Everyone who does it always seems to have that easy, laid back air to them, as though they worry about nothing and surfing is just a thing they do, like other people watch TV. They arent the kind of people who get het up about anything, I don't imagine blood sweat and tears when I watch them, effortless riding about on the water under the sun. So it must be easy, right? Little do I know.

But the fact is I am, characteristically, a little scared. 

Before we met Cal and spent any time with him, I had been a little concerned that by volunteering M to surf with Cal while we chatted was a little like those times when you are a child, and you are supposed to be best friends with some horrible child you have nothing in common with because your mums are friends. You get told to, 'run off and play with so and so' in a clear message that you are supposed to go away, and so you stand about shuffling your feet awkwardly. Both hoping for the time to pass quickly. (Just as a note of fairness to my poor mum, I don't remember her doing this particularly, but somehow, every child is familiar with it. It's just a known element of what you tend to consider to be parental torture.)  

Clearly, in the case of M and Cal, this is not going to be a problem. Cal is, easy, enthusiastic company, and M has clearly warmed to him straight of. He's perfectly comfortable. It's hard not to be with Cal.

But I am still a little scared. What if I betray my fear and have some sort of a random panic attack akin to when we first when snorkelling? What if I am the only person in the world who can't surf? Will it change Cal and Roxi's view of me?

Of course not, I know this. If they were that small minded they wouldn't be Cal and Roxi. I take my usual strategy and try to be honest about it, and make it a joke. It always works for me. Laughing at yourself with others will warm them to you, they usually identify in some way and will forgive you the shortcoming you have laid bare to them. Even more importantly, fears are there to be laughed at, as are shortcomings. Take them seriously and they cripple you. Laughing at them robs them of their power, and very often, because people will meet you half way, provide advice or teach you, and because you have labeled your misgivings as having only comedy value, you actually get over whatever it is before you've started.

I try on one of Roxi's wet suits the night before. It causes much hilarity. Not the final image, in all its rather unforgiving glory, but the process of trying to get the damn thing on. I spend about half an hour trying to get it half way up my shins. (Well they're very sticky and tight.) Rather like most sports bras, getting into it is a work out in itself.   Of course M is fine.l and shimmies into his as though it were a favourite pair of jeans. I look at him enviously from my position on the floor. It's genuinely quite a lot of fun, and part of my weakness is caused by being rendered a little helpless with laughter. As are most other people in the room.

I am not convinced, though, that my inability to put the suit on is a good omen for my emerging surf skills. Later a friend from England will see the picture we take of me in my wet suit, holding a surf board, and responds with a peal of laughter. Which, when you consider that posed picture is the only hope I have of suggesting some kind of aptitude, rather ruins the facade.

We begin by climbing the beautiful Mount Mounganui, sheep covered and sugar lumped shaped, after a stunning breakfast at yet another interesting little place in Tauranga, then meet Cal at the beach side for the surf.

We get changed into swimsuits and wet suits in the back of Cal's van, which is a slightly unnerving experience given the tinted windows. Which we are assured no one can see in, but it feels a little odd, sat there in flagrante, contorted into some sort of circus pose in an attempt to don't a wet suit, and with a perfectly clear view outside.

I manage to get the suit on with relative ease this time and feel a little more confident. There's still a chance I might be good at this.

Cal, it turns out, is a born teacher. He genuinely loves to share his passion for surfing, and, surprise surprise, surfers aren't the laid back, born surfing, people I had imagined. They are disciplined athletes, learning in all kinds of weathers, practising in all conditions,  returning with aching muscles at the end of the day and getting up early to do it all again before reality, that party pooper, calls them in to work. We begin by practising on the sand. Cal draws a surf board shape and we work on getting our posture right for lying on the board, and then using our arms to do a sort of 'burpee' action and leap upright.

I am still finding my arms are a little weak on the sand. This, I realise, with that thrill which is somewhere between excitement and dread, might be harder than I thought.

"Ah, you've come over the water. Powerful wet stuff, ain't it?"

C S Lewis, Voyage of the Dawn Treader

And salty. For some unknown reason I am incapable of facing an incoming wave or an inevitable roll off the board, with my mouth in any position other than open. Quite what this instinct is, I am unsure. A sense of being taken by surprise maybe? Or a sort of scream? 

"When you see the wave coming," says Cal with some concern, "immediately close your mouth and hold your breath till you come up."

I nod gravely. A wave comes. I surface, coughing.

Cal is immensely patient. He stands by my side, coaxing and coaching until I can guide the board out to the right depth, over the waves. A simple skill, but it takes me some time to master it. Looking back on it now I realise that Cal did teach me something, because whatever else I couldn't do at the end, I did manage to master the getting out there. More practice - quite a lot more practice - and I might have slowly been able to surf.

"OK, there's the wave, you need to jump on...now!"

says Cal. There is a short delay. I jump. It's a little too late.

"Sorry" I say, "I think I have slow reactions."

"No problem," says Cal, laughing but ultimately actually angelically patient, "I'll just tell you a few minutes before I actually want you to get on."

This tactic actually works quite well, and I manage to throw myself onto my surf board, get myself into more or less the right position, wobble a bit, because it's surprisingly hard to balance even lying flat on the surfboard, and ride the wave into the shore.

This part, is my favourite. It's quite a thrill lying on a board, feeling the power of the wave beneath you. I feel, I think, a small part of what 'real' surfers must feel when they catch a wave. Only it's a sort of safe version. I repeat this lying on the board and letting the wave carry me into the beach until Cal tells me gently, that I might want to try to stand up on the next one.

I give it a go. There is something in me that always chickens out at the last minute, so I can get into my knees so that I am, briefly, kneeling on the board, and then I topple off.

"Watch out'" says Cal, "remember what I told you, always keep the board on the right side of you so it doesn't come back and hit you in the..."

Bash. The board connects with my jaw. 

The trouble is, it is difficult to think straight in the surf. A wave comes and there's no time for ponderous positioning of yourself. You have to be doing it automatically, instinctively. 

I wade, I ride, I kneel, I roll, I splutter. Then I do it all again. Does it not sound fun? It is, though. It actually really is.

By the time I admit defeat and come out, I have swallowed several gallons of sea water, my arms don't work any more and I am covered in bruises which I am very proud of. I am enormously happy. And also, though I don't know it yet, very sunburnt. I have a bright red face for the rest of the evening. (I did! I DID put sun tan lotion on! It just didn't work...)

M, to my immense pride, has already managed to stand up on the board. He is a natural. He even looks the part.

"You look good as a surfer" I tell him, kissing his salty face as he strides about in the surf, board under his arm, for all the world as though he owned the sea and everything in it. His eyelashes are wet and his eyes the very bright shade of blue they go when he is happy. He is flushed and curly haired and exhilarated. Oh yes, he's a natural. And he's hooked. When Roxi and I go to get changed, he and Cal stay in. Cal is flushed too, with pride at the progress of his pupil, and that rush you get when somebody shares your passion. They are both in their element.

We eat at my favourite of all the amazing Tauranga places, the 'Pizza Library'. Themed on books, which immediately captures me, ofe pizzas are imaginative, especially the vegetarian ones, and the place is full of quirk and fun, waitresses and bar tenders wearing Alice in Wonderland style hats, funny or wise quotes written on the walls, and all the chairs made out of old train seats. There is a piano, which people are playing and singing by, and outside there are statues of Elvis. It's brilliant. People glance, curiously, at my red face.

Then we sit in the hot springs beneath Mount Manganui, and talk about everything under the sun. Cal, with characteristic warmth and friendliness, notices the scars from my operation, and asks me about them. I am gratified because people often look but rarely ask, making me feel uncomfortable but without a chance to explain. Other people seem slightly disgusted by the explanation, so that I feel as though I ought to be a little ashamed. Cal does neither of those things, and as I tell him, and Roxi, who knows about the operation, chimes in, admiring of my apparent braveness (I wasn't at all brave), I start to feel as though the scars are a thing to be proud of. 

Later, hot pools will prove to be something of a nemesis, giving me horrible dehydration headaches as I am unable to take enough water on.

In Tauranga, fast becoming my idea of paradise, this somehow isn't a problem.

We sit for a while, Roxi beautiful in her bikini and looking like some sort of female ideal in the dimming light, blonde hair gleaming. I realise again how beautiful she is, both inside and out and I am pleased that this reunion, so long planned, has finally come about.

We just about manage to climb out of the hot pools before we fall asleep. There are plans to surf some more tomorrow.

"And when I can swim no longer, if I have not reached Aslan’s country, or shot over the edge of the world into some vast cataract, I shall sink with my nose to the sunrise"

C S Lewis, Voyage of the Dawn Treader

It's a bit rougher in the waves today. They seem big and scary, the sort of wave i was taught to stay away from when I was small. The waves are big and they knick me off my feet even before I have climbed onto my board. They make me feel small. 

"When you see a wave," instructs Cal, "you have several choices depending on it's size. You van ride over it with your board, or dive underneath it so it doesn't knock you off balance."

These are all the sorts of waves you are supposed to dive under.

 "Dive now!" Shouts Cal.

I intend to. I really do, but when I look up at the wave, so much taller than I am, some instinct kicks in and I just turn around and try to run.

You can't, as I am sure you will be intelligent enough to realise, out run a wave. I swallow a lot of sea water and perform some spectacular forward rolls in the surf, surf board beating the back of my head indignantly, as if berating me for this ridiculous behaviour.

Eventually, having nevertheless much enjoyed myself, I admit a certain defeat. I have tried surfing and enjoyed the experience. But I'm not, even with Cal's impressive skills as a teacher, going to win any awards for it.

Roxi and I get out, leaving M and Cal, joyfully riding waves and having the sort of fun together that would make that hypothetical mother I talked about earlier, very happy. Both M and Cal, as Roxi and I report happily to each other, have separately eulogised about how great they think the other is. 

When, later in our visiting, Roxi and I take a walk around the foot of the Mount while the boys have a third go at surfing together, me basking in this luxury of seeing Roxi so easily and so naturally, as though we didn't live at opposite ends of the globe, and hadn't done so for years, we find M surfing triumphantly into the beach, fully upright and mist impressive on his board. He is a good pupil and he has a good teacher. Looking at the joy on his face, I wonder if we will ever live somewhere where he could truly take up surfing. The UK is not generally well known for its surf, though I hear Cornwall is quite good. He'll need some top class wet suits though. English seas are not known for their relaxing temperatures.

"Most of us, I suppose, have a secret country but for most of us it is only an imaginary country. Edmund and Lucy were luckier than other people in that respect."

There are just so many cool things here. In New Zealand in general, but Tauranga in particular. I have vivid memories of the pizza library, the pub called Astro Lobe, complete with astro turf and picnic benches and the ubiquitous craft beer,  naked people in the distance, climbing out on the rocks over a foamy bright sea as Roxi and I still a round the base of the Mount, sheep grazing in the sides of it. Cal racing excitedly through his garden, pressing chili's and cucumbers into our hands, the night sky above us as we lye back in the hot pools, eating pancakes in the sunshine after the surf. 

On Tuesday morning we leave reluctantly and get on the road again.

Our goodbyes are not prolonged. Roxi and I say "see you later", because, as we justify it, we really will. We just don't know how much later. In fact we are planning to meet Roxi again when we climb Mount Tongariro later, so we hang onto that plan and ignore the other 'see you later', the one that might be years in the waiting.

"Do not look sad. We shall meet soon again." "Please, Aslan", said Lucy,"what do you call soon?"

"I call all times soon" said Aslan; and instantly he was vanished away."

The Outsiders (23rd to 25th March)

"What's the safest thing to be when one is met by a gang of social outcasts in an alley? ...another social outcast."
'The Outsiders', S E Hinton

I have talked before about the strange attraction of being in a 'club', and of feeling that you have, along with a select group of people, a special knowledge, language, or custom that other people just can't share. I have talked about whether it counts as a terrible blow to humanity or simply one of those things. Either way, what I think it boils down to is that everyone, at some point or another belongs to a club in some sense of the word, and rather enjoys it. In fact I think it happens every day to every person.  So terrible blight or community spirit, it is an irremovable part of being human.

The Outsiders is a book about a journey made by a young lad, 'Ponyboy' on the 'wrong' side of town, who becomes a fugitive following rather too thoroughly 'winning' in a fight for his life against an opposing gang member. But it is a book which is far more about similarities than differences, and its protagonist, contrary to his compatriots, favours peace over 'rumbles', but understands, ultimately, that life is just not as simple as it should be.

"They used to be buddies," says Ponyboy, "they used to be friends, and now they hate each other because one has to work for a living and the other comes from the West Side."

The fact is that sometimes, simply by not taking up your place in one gang, you have created another. In Ponyboy's gritty world of back streets and flick knives, this is all too clear, all too visceral, though it isn't wholly negative, the distinction is clearly made between looking out for your fellow members and 'making like brothers', and becoming a 'snarling, distrustful, bickering pack...like the wolves in the timber.'

But I read The Outsiders in school, aged thirteen and about as far from being a fugitive gang member on the mean streets of 1960's America as it is possible to get. And I still understood. I understand now.

Two days ago, just before we left the Kauri forests for the mosquitoes and starlight of Tapotupotu, we went on a guided night walk in the forest looking for Kiwis. The Kiwis, which are large flightless birds, which snuffle around in the ground at night looking for food, and attempting to avoid capture by possums, wild cats, stoats and weasels, remained entirely invisible, though we could hear them calling. We were not in their gang. We used special torches which wouldn't startle the Kiwis or dazzle them, and were quietly outraged each time we came across people making their own way through the forest using 100 watt beams. They were not in our gang. They probably looked at us with their own sense of superiority, having walked out on their own for free, and not spent 35 dollars for the privilege. We were not in their gang. And the group of people we surprised in the darkness sharing a rather sizeable spliff were in another gang altogether. (It's amazing the amount of human activity that goes on in the forest after dark).

Sometimes being 'outside' can be a way of being 'inside'.

Having left Tapotupotu reluctantly on Monday, we continued around the glittering Northlands coastline to Russell. Russell feels as though it is about two inches square, has a resident population of less than a thousand, was the capital for all of nine months and seems to my admittedly rather feverish imagination, to be the embodiment of a 'club'. I imagine gossip abounding among the locals, people twitching net curtains and peering over their immaculate lawns at their neighbour's 'goings on'. I imagine new people being accepted only slowly, and with much speculation, with information about them being highly prized. I imagine community care of the rather more natural kind, neighbours bringing round a pie or popping in to see how Doris was doing. It's a very 'white picket fence' idea, only I imagined the nicer side as well as the sinister ideas we tend to have grown about nice little townships like this. Even so, it is picturesque and well kept, and the glittering seas and the large white houses and the (probably) rather glittering bank balances reflect it back at me like a sort of middle class utopia.

We climb the hill to look at the view, sea, cliffs, trees, boats and white houses laid out for us like objects in a shop, arranged to the best possible effect, and also to admire the famous flagstaff.

The flagstaff, erected rather characteristically to fly the 'Queens Flag' by the earlier British settlers, was seen, during a period of some unrest following initially friendlier relations between the intruders and the indigenous Maoris, as a symbol of oppression by certain of the tribes. Trading had been a key factor in the two populations working together but the imposition of various taxes and new laws had begun to undo that, creating a sense that the Ngãpuhi Maoris were being pushed out.

There began an almost comical battle of wits. The flagstaff was cut down for the first time by a member of the tribe.

It was replaced and guards established on a 24 hour basis. Somehow, nobody is quite sure how, Ngãpuhi members, led by the chief, Hone Heck, managed to cut it down again.

This time it got serious. The flagstaff was replaced by one sheathed in iron.

Amazingly, Hone Heck, once again, and seemingly effortlessly, felled it. Iron and all.

It is hard, reading about it, to have much sympathy for the British, in the face of such clever adversaries, and it surprised me to find that it was erected once again.

This time the conflict, during which guards were killed and a full scale war was started, was much more bloody, and, after much loss of life on both sides, peace was forged and the flagstaff was not reestablished.

What we view now is a new flagstaff, made when a more lasting peace had been garnered, by volunteers composed entirely of Maori tribe members who had been instrumental in cutting down the first four. They refused any help. It exists now as a token of peace.

It's difficult to discover who, exactly, is the outsider in the early tines when the British arrived. They, quite clearly, were the intruders, but they were initially welcomed by the Maori people who were intelligent and resourceful, and saw the possible trade advantages. Relations between Maori and Christian missionaries were also very strong, and the church largely remained allies to the indigenous people in the later conflicts. The explanation for this is that the Maori people were, themselves, deeply spiritual and understood the search for God and the concept of God. Both Christians and Maori had that in common, they were in the gang that believed in a God. And, as I have found so often as we travel, exactly how you describe God and interpret his or her instructions, doesn't really matter as much as the idea that God exists. We have warred pointlessly over the exact size and shape of God for centuries. The Maoris and Christians back then knew better.

There would, I imagine, have been a rather patronising attitude among the new settlers to the Maori tribes. They would have been classed as what British explorers back then rather liked to call 'savages' though there was nothing much to justify this, particularly given the later display of intelligence and skill in the flagstaff escapades. But might the Maori's not have surveyed the tightly buttoned, uncomfortably dressed intruders as rather comical, displaying so little in the way of local knowledge? Later in this trip we visited a film installation in Auckland in which the Maori born artist had re-imagined the scenes at that first landing, and the British, hot and sweating in their uniforms appeared rather more ridiculous than the, by comparison, half naked indigenous people, conducting dances and tattoo ceremonies on the beach.

In fact the Maori/British relationship seems to have been, at least at times, more harmonious than other settlement experiences, with both sides taking at least some interest in the practices of the other. This juxtaposition between this and the historical bloodshed and, given modern Maori art reflecting the racist attitudes they still experience, or have experienced, still sits strangely with me. On the one hand many if the place names are Maori and Maori terms seem to be knitted more deeply into the English used in New Zealand than we had seen, for example, in Australia. On the other, we encountered several people who demonstrated a sense of dismissal if Maori tradition, and others who told us that they felt things had 'gone too far', that the Maori people had equality now, but wanted more power, an outlook which is reflected in Britain quite often if you are silly or brave enough to engage a mixed group on the topic of women's rights. We do struggle with identifying what equality is, and whether in fact we have achieved it. And there is often, though I am not sure whether it is the case in respect of the Maori people, a sense among those who have historically been subjugated, that they have done right to compensation in the form, quite often, of extra power. Stopping at equality, even if we can be sure we have achieved it, which we normally can't, is really quite difficult to pull off. And somewhere along the line resentment grows among the previous subjugators, until you have, once again, a set of two gangs and the right climate for a fight.

Moving on from Russell, and its relatively posh and correspondingly pricey campsite, we move towards the Coromandell peninsula to stay in the car park of the local boat club. It boasts a public toilet and a sea view, and is absolutely free. We park up and walk around the corner to sample some New Zealand fish and chips. Well chips anyway. And I am hoping for, if not a good old Yorkshire pea fritter, maybe a gherkin or a pickled egg.

The town we are parked in is more or less one street with four or five shops, two of which are fish and chip vendors. Being poverty stricken, still reeling from the shock of western prices after South East Asia, we opt for the least pricey option and go to the take out, still enjoying the prospect of eating cozily in our van with a bottle if red wine which we have previously procured with this in mind.

New Zealanders have, to date, been incredibly friendly, open and chatty, full of smiles and with the special ability to move from the rather dull strictures that characterise 'small talk' into an interesting conversation with a stranger, however strange that stranger might be.

The lady at the chip shop is the exception. She glares at us from behind a face which is wrinkled and grooved in all the places one might expect from a lifetime of frowning. We hesitate because we are not sure what a 'vegetable roll' is. It might be a spring roll, or it might be a veggie burger, neither of us are sure. There are no pickled eggs or gherkins. This isn't really a problem, what we want are the chips, so we approach with our widest smiles and ask for two portions of chips and whether she could tell us what a vegetable roll is.

She fixes us with an unsmiling gaze and replies, flatly,

"It's a roll. With vegetables in."

She doesn't like us. We are not in her club.

We hang around awkwardly until our food arrives, which she bangs on the counter. We have salt in the van but are not sure if the Chios have already been vinegared. Tentatively, and against our instincts to grab the chips, turn and flee, we ask.

She doesn't reply. But she reaches behind the counter, pulls out a small plastic pot of a liquid we assume is vinegar and bangs it down on the counter so hard it makes me jump.

We take the vinegar. And run.

Somehow, we reflect rather gigglingly over our wine, we have done something very wrong. We are not sure what it was. Being vegetarian, perhaps? Being tourists? Being 'not from round here?' Either way, the experience has caused us more hilarity than upset, and we eat happily. There is only one thing mussing. And it's not vinegar. It's the grease that the vinegar is meant to cut through.

Chips in New Zealand seem yo pride themselves on being non greasy and healthy. And they are. And they taste good. But our English palates, used to fat, greasy chips which grace the paper they are in and most of your face with a shiney gleam, sort of ordered the chips because we wanted the fat in them. We are in the fatty chips club, I'm afraid.

We make a mental note to get fish and chips from a proper greasy chippy as soon as we get home. Well pea fritters, anyway. And vinegar.

We sleep, listening to the waves, snug in our van, and, as will become a theme in New Zealand, I am rewarded when I grit my teeth and dash, coldly, to the toilet in the night, by a beautiful uninterrupted night sky.

In the morning we drive around the Coromandel Peninsula, using the handy coastal road. It is absolutely stunning. I look out over more glittering water, somehow managing a certain shade of blue, half way between torquise and indigo, which I have seen nowhere else in the world but here. The rocks seem to have been hewn deliberately into the most attractive of shapes and the grey in them shines, punctuated by clumps of wild grasses and nesting birds. Our campsite tonight is more salubrious in that it has showers and laundry facilities, which we need by now, and we are, as soon as we drive in and turn up at reception, instantly In The Club. Because this campsite is also a brewery. And, though my post surgical insides don't allow me to drink very much of it, beer is something that we, and M especially, actually know something about. We chatter happily to the enormously friendly receptionist (a little later I go back to reception to ask for change for the washing machines, and we swap life histories), and then we prepare for the experience we came to this particular part of the peninsula for - Hot Water Beach.

Hot Water Beach is a beach under which there are naturally hot mountain springs, so that you can, in theory, dig a hole, find the water which comes up to fill it is a healthy shade of very hot, add a little sea water to make it feasible to sit in, and relax in your 'spa'.

I am quite excited about this, especially as it is a chilly day. We don our swimwear, rent a spade from our receptionist friend, and drive the shirt distance to the beach just in time for what the website promised us is 'low tide'.

When we arrive the beach is heaving with people. We start to dig.

"Is it feeling hot to you?" says M, doubtfully, after about ten minutes.

"Not really," I admit.

We look around. All around us are small clusters of people alternately digging and frowning, and asking each other if it seems to have got hot yet.

We are about to give up when we notice a rather smug looking cluster of people, in quite a large, shallow hole, luxuriating, apparently, in steaming hot water. Encouraged, we carry on, casting envious looks in their direction and getting down to some serious digging, such as you might do if you were trying to dig through the centre of the earth to save on your airfare home.

The process is further complicated by the sea, which, (I suspect) is rather enjoying itself. It turns out that 'low tide' on this beach, is not actually all that 'low' and our efforts are frustrated by a huge wave, on a fairly frequent basis, rushing noisily and exuberantly up the beach and dousing everyone in freezing cold water. The waves are quite string, they can knock you off your feet and send your flip flops, towel, spade etc. floating off towards the cliffs so that you have to break off to go dashing after them, apologising as you run to all the people whose holes you might have fallen into on your journey.

Although of course, nobody's holes are especially intact at that point. Because if you throw a lot of water at speed onto a sand wall, it rather quickly dissolves and helpfully fills in your burgeoning attempts so that you have to start again. I try sitting in the hole as a barrier. I get buried.

After a while, both us and pretty much everyone else with the exception of the smug spa dwellers, has given up digging and realised that the hot water is only on a small section of beach, coincidentally being the bit with the spa on. Moreover most people have been gazing longingly at the 'smug spa' for long enough to notice that it is not in fact as relaxing as it might seem to be, as you have, if you care lucky enough to be part of the spa clan, to constantly reinforce the walls of your spa following each wave attack, and your warm and peaceful contemplation is rudely interrupted every few minutes by being doused with freezing water, and all the whole you have to keep up the necessary appearance of absolute bliss.

You see? When you are not in the club, you have to go to great lengths to justify why you never wanted to be in it anyway. Especially if not being in it wasn't actually your choice.

"I lie to myself all the time," says Ponyboy, "but I never believe me."

We go back and thaw out over beers in the brewery. We talk happily to the bar tender. He likes that we like the beers. He likes them too. We are in the beer club.

When I look back on these few days, and indeed on every day, the same pattern reveals itself. We, like everybody, have experienced being in the inside and outside of various groups. Most of the time it doesn't matter, but there are people who spend a lifetime on the outside of the things that matter, to them, or to the world in general, with serious side effects. People are social misfits because the options they have for the groups they can gain entrance to, don't suit them.

"They grew up on the outside of society," says S E Hinton, of her struggling characters, "they weren't looking for a fight. They were looking to belong."

Fear and Loathing in New Zealand: Coasting

"There was a fantastic...sense that whatever we were doing was right, that we were winning."

Hunter S Thompson, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas

"The bit I am really looking forward to," said M back in December, when we were planning the New Zealand route, and it was beginning to turn from a brilliant idea to a potential logistical nightmare, "is when we get right to the tip if the Northlands part of the north island, and we have been going a few days and are in the swing of things and can relax and really be starting to enjoy ourselves."

His prediction was not wrong. In fact our stay at the Tapotupotu Department of Conservation ('doc') campground exactly exemplifies that feeling. Doc campgrounds cone in slightly varying flavours but are generally very basic but in extremely beautiful locations, and cost very little. The Tapotupotu site costs $6 (about £3) per person per night, boasts a beautiful view over the bay, parked on the grass with awe inspiring towering cliffs either side, complete with wild and luscious grasses and crashing waves. It boasts the sound of magpies (a much more melodious call in New Zealand than in England), a pitch darkness perfect for the illumination of the stunning night sky, and not much else. There is no electricity and the toilets are 'long drop', which means they are essentially holes in the ground with a seat attached. There is a bin and a cold outdoor shower. 

And - even if it doesn't sound it - it is heaven. The fact is, things like cooking by the light of our tiny portable gas hob, taking a heart stoppingly cold shower after exercising on the beach, and even tripping by the light of a wind up torch to the toilets to get your bottom thoroughly chilled by the cold breeze from the long drop channel in the middle of the night, are more likely, and have always been more likely to delight us than to worry us. It feels, more than anything else in the, thus far rather civilised camping experience in this part of the trip, like a real adventure.  Moreover, we have, as predicted, lost the edge of our actual worries, which centred on finding campsites, driving a van without crashing it, and affording to eat. 

The adventure is heightened by the 'trippy' nature of it all. In this case, quotes from Hunter Thompson's drug fuelled memoirs don't feel especially out of place. The whole evening does unfold rather like a sort of hazy morning after memory of a substance-inspired night before. 

I exercise on the beach while M takes pictures of me, whilst seated in a camping chair reminiscent of a sort of cigar toting director of an indie movie (or possibly a porn film), except swapping the cigar for a beer. 

I take a cold shower in my bikini outdoors, dealing with the constant shock of the cold water on my skin by essentially jogging on the spot whilst shampooing, to try to get my body temperature high enough not to be constantly gasping for air. Thinking about it, that must have been quite a sight. 

In the meantime M starts to cook out of the back of the van on the gas stove, except it falls dark very suddenly so that he has to peer into the pan to see whether anything is cooked yet, resulting, inevitably, in the oil spitting on his face. I provide medical aid (consisting of bathing his face in cold water from the shower, unearthing the first aid kit and applying cream and plenty of the all important sympathy) whilst also trying to check the pan myself, all by the light of a wind up torch, which only works properly, whilst you are actually winding it. As a result the entire process is accompanied by the strange sort of mechanical wheezing sound the torch makes whilst being wound. 

M's face, you will be pleased to know, is unmarked the following day, however we face another hurdle when, finally, we climb inside the van, shivering, to eat the meal we have so eventfully prepared and find the roof of the van is literally covered in mosquitoes. I commence a brutal mosquito killing mission throughout the meal so that our conversation is punctuated by me suddenly banging my hand against the roof at frequent intervals, until the roof us smeared with the bodies of insects and the blood of the unfortunate human who had constituted their last meal. It's like an insects' graveyard.

All of which I appreciate sounds like a nightmare, but really it wasn't.

It was absolutely glorious.

Fear and Loathing in New Zealand: Acceleration

"Maybe it meant something. Maybe not, in the long run, but no explanation, no mix of words or music or memories can touch that sense of knowing that you were there and alive in that corner of time and the world."

Hunter S Thompson, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas

The Northland of New Zealand is windy and forested, rich with birdsong, devoid of much in the way of other noise, scattered with wooden slat huts, painted with an appealing sort of frayedness at intervals to form tiny villages with dogs, barking curiously at the side of the road, cautiously twitched net curtains and a sense of welcome which somehow manages to mingle excitement with a sort of friendly distrust. 

It's possibly the best way to start a journey like this, and the majority of the day passes pleasantly on curving silent roads as we get the feel for the little van which will be our home, and for the flora and fauna which decorate New Zealand. 

The views range from dense and darkly lush forests and enormous, ancient Kauri trees, to wide open landscapes dotted with sparsely populated settlements, and beautiful brush ferns which manage to be white, pink and yellow, not just  as a collection of separate colours, but subtly, as though, turning your head a different way, they might change from white to hint at mauve, or from yellow to suggest something nearer to ivory.

We stop at the Kauri museum. We are, today, on a little bit of a mission of memory, dedicated to the Mother of my Kiwi friend Roxi (pseudonym), who passed away shortly before we arrived and who I sadly never got to meet in person, but met, nevertheless, through Roxi's anecdotes, pictures and memories. I will call her Beth. Beth has a line of history stretching back to early settlers in the Northlands and, I believe, once worked in the Kauri Museum. 

We take a picture outside it, in honour of her.

The Kauri myself itself is beautiful, both in the way it is laid out and in the choices it makes about how it represents its history. The main subject matter, other than the Kauri tree itself, is the early pioneers who settled in New Zealand and proceeded to farm the Kauri timber. There were countless Kauri trees at the time, with timber which is uniquely beautiful, durable and marketable, and producing resin ('gum') which is amber like in colour and quality, and which could be found both on the tree itself and, more usefully, hardened into lumps in the ground having fallen there over hundreds of years.

Both Kauri timber and gum kept the early pioneers in business for quite some time, risking, literally, life and limb to obtain them with limited tools. 

Of course what the pioneers did not then realise, is that Kauri wood was even more valuable than they thought, because a Kauri tree, takes literally thousands of years to reach a reasonable size. A hundred year old Kauri is, comparatively, a sapling. By farming them with the enthusiasm they did, they were both increasing the worth of their produce, and doing themselves rapidly out of a job.

Nowadays, less than 14% of the original Kauri forests are retained, with less than that being fully grown trees. The farming of healthy  trees is now restricted. Too little, perhaps, too late - but we make new mistakes in each generation and hindsight is a wonderful, but unobtainable thing. 

The most recent threat to the trees is rather more biologic, though it has possible been spread by the new 'farming' of New Zealand in the firm if tourism. A disease called Kauri Die Back disease is killing the remaining trees and much effort us being made to cease the spread of it.

What really strikes me about the Kauri Museum though, and the reason that I have such a vivid impression of it, even now, writing this nearly two months later, is the sheer heart of it. The models in the museum, which demonstrate the use of tools or timber techniques or which populate the reproductions of the 'boarding houses' for timber buyers and tradesmen, are all modelled on real people. The first hand accounts you can hear by pressing certain buttons, are narrated by people for whom these are real memories. New Zealand is still young enough (at least in terms of western settlement), for people to trace back their lineage to the settlers' year zero. Real inhabitants of Northland are celebrated in the museum. And it isn't limited to the trees. A lady who collected bottles, is honoured through the housing of her bottle collection in the museum, carefully reproduced so that the bottles are displayed in the same, painstaking and rather beautiful order as they were in her house. A young army captain from the area is celebrated for his thoughtfulness and kindness to his troops. By the time we leave, (and we spend much longer than we had intended), we feel we have been introduced to people, and not simply taught a few facts about trees. In fact the trees are so revered, so ancient and so awe inspiring, it seems that they too, have their own identity, and we visit, the next day, Tane Mahute, an awe inspiringly huge and religiously significant (particularly for the Maori) Kauri tree, which, quite fittingly, even has its own name.

We have one last stop on our little tour in Beth's memory, however, and that is a drink in the pub close to the road named after her relatives, who once owned the farm there. The pub is populated with staff and locals, who look up curiously, though without hostility, when we come in. A game of pool, played by staff and punters, is underway, and has an air of such importance we feel a little apologetic insisting on buying drinks. I order a wine in Beth's honour, though think better of striking up a conversation about the farm or the road named after her, looking at the bar tender's longing glances back towards the pool table and returning the still curious stares of the other drinkers with a slightly nervous smile. We raise a glass to Beth. Remembering this, I realise I have tacked on a new memory, because at the time I hadn't seen this photo, but in my mind the image I drank to is of her beaming smile and the mischievous twinkle in her eyes, beneath a shiny white bob, holding up in one hand an enormous crayfish. Her favourite food. The implication is that she intends, immediately, to eat the whole thing with great gusto.

To Beth. And to the warmth of the Kauri museum, with its understanding that not just the powerful people, but all people, are worth remembering.

Fear and Loathing in New Zealand: Revving Up

"Buy the ticket, take the ride"

Hunter S Thompson, Fear and Loathing on Las Vegas*

(* Apologies for the pretentious quotes, it's just it's really, really good fun...)

The New Zealand part of our trip, in particular the loading ourselves into a miniature camper van painted with birds, like true hippies, and proceeding to park up in stunning landscapes with only the birds for company, has always been a point of special excitement for us both when planning and imagining this adventure.

Except somewhere along the line we have come to realise, as the start date for van collection approaches, that it involves driving a larger than usual vehicle, (and M can drive, but we choose not to run a car at home, so it's been a while since he last practised), navigating (and I still have to write 'hello' in the air to figure out which way is right), and (for me, worst of all) - winging it. 

I am not a winger. Ask me to wing something and I will react like one of those cartoon characters who runs of a cliff, realises suddenly that they have done so, and immediate plummets. I am a planner. I have planned where we will stay, I have happily removed any uncertainty over where we will be in each country, in the pursuit of our goal of feeling as though we have lived there. I have, on occasion, bravely stated that now I am an old hand at this travelling lark, I could probably give the 'working it out as you go' a whirl, but this brave statement is akin to the one in which I said I would go canyoning to cure my fear of heights. Or the one about going permanently teetotal. I can't actually do it. I mean, seriously, who does that? 

In New Zealand, however, we will need to decide on the day, or maybe a few days in advance, where we will stay for the night. We will not be able to book sites because we won't know how far we have managed to drive. Even if, in my hopeless drive to plan things. I do actually set out where we might stay each night (which I, ahem, do actually do, scrawling it in a notebook which acts as my sanity), the fact is, shock horror, we might change our minds. And if there's anything I hate more than not having a plan, it's divergence from a plan. I am a certifiable control freak. (Except in job interviews and at work, where I am of course 'adaptable' and 'innovative'.)

Moreover, in case you were still clinging to a pastoral ideal in which we park our van in any old passing field and proceed to play the lute beside a haystack, New Zealand has had to crack down on 'free camping' for vans which are not certified as 'self contained' (i.e, have a loo and a corresponding poo containing device), due to the amount of tourists happily excreting all over its beauty spots. This seems understandable but of course it leads to a paralysing fear that we will be unable to find anywhere to park up (despite numerous internet devices and downloadable maps and similarly numerous camp sites) and will have to 'drive all night' (M's personal nightmare) or 'park on the roadside and get told off at two am' (mine). 

Oh and New Zealand's roads are windy. And some have steep drops.

Suffice to say that by the time we land in New Zealand, the concept has moved from hippie dream to impossible reality, and we are in fact rather terrified of our trip to New Zealand. 

"It will be an adventure" we tell ourselves, only its amazing how quickly the word 'adventure' can become synonymous with 'certain death'.

With hindsight, (I am writing this days after our arrival in South America), this line of thinking is ridiculous and the reality turned out to be more hippie dream than dangerous nightmare, but I can't help noticing that there are some strong similarities between how we felt about New Zealand as we started and how we felt about South America, as we landed, days ago, in Chile. (i.e. from 'salsa fuelled land of glorious colour' to 'drug fuelled land of terrifying gangsters'). And incidentally, the salsa imbued version is turning out to be nearer to the reality. Make no mistake, if you happen not to be named Brad and somehow born fearless, and are in fact a namby pamby worrier as per yours truly, travel involves a constant readjustment of current 'top ten lists of terrors' and encouraging pep talks/arguments (especially if your husband is basically so relaxed he's horizontal - at least in comparison). It's just that somehow, and in a way I cannot adequately describe, it's also unbelievably wonderful. 

So we wake up on the day we have to pick up our van, with more butterflies than a rainforest, and a sort of brusque over cheerfulness designed to carry ourselves, and each other, along. 

Mission one - we tell ourselves - is to visit The Warehouse to buy warm clothing for when the weather turns.   A few hours, (and a cheese scone) later, we emerge armed with thermals. We have attempted to buy a thermos because I require tea for my early morning sessions with Neville, but were greeted with incomprehension. 

"That," says the shop assistant, "would be with our winter stock."

"Wow. You're all stocked up then," says our cashier rather sardonically as we pile thermals and a hot water bottle onto the check out counter. Outside it is approximately 28 degrees. 

Mission two - should we chose to accept it, is to buy a phone card. Accomplished.

Mission three - and we are really doing quite well, we tell ourselves triumphantly - is to pick up the van.

Once inside the rental office we pursue a sheet of terms and conditions in tiny print. We note that if we crash the van, we pay. If someone crashes into us, we pay. Until the third party coughs up. We note that if we incur a speeding fine, we pay that plus a fee. We pau a bind which maxes out M's credit card, note that most accidents are caused by other foreign drivers, speeding on the wrong side of the road.

"You will be alright," says the rental man, "you're used to driving this way. It's the other road users you want to watch out for."

These 'other road users', who we discover later are popularly considered to be largely Chinese or Indian, have killed several kiwis through reckless driving and disregard for road laws. They have underestimated the time it takes to get somewhere given gradients or windiness of the roads, sped to catch up on their schedule, and spun off cliff paths or into oncoming vehicles. They have got behind the wheel of a van in New Zealand having only just passed their driving test in their home country. 

"You can't really do anything about them," says our rental man, casually.

I swallow, try to put out of my mind images of our plummeting vehicle following a head on collision with fifteen year old speeding learner drivers in buses, and enquire as to whether we can park on the side of the road if we get desperate.

"I wouldn't," replies the rental man, "the fine is about ten thousand dollars."

If he hasn't done much to reassure us, the sight of our van puts my fears aside. It is a small, compact, blue van painted on one side with clouds and soaring birds and on the other with a Maori canoe bobbing on waves beneath a bright orange sun. It has sections for luggage, a cool box and a little travel gas hob. At night it transforms into a little cosy bed, complete with two duvets. We can move wood slats around to create a rickety little table and there are blue curtains to match our blue sky and our blue sea.

'Escape', it says on the front and back sections. 

I am already in love with it.

But don't forget mission four - to drive it. I sit in the front seat while M nervously manoeuvres our way out of the rental car park and onto the busy Auckland roads. I navigate carefully, manage, on this occasion, not to get us lost, and we successfully convey ourselves out of Auckland and to a supermarket just outside of the city. 

The distance we have actually travelled is negligible, but we are jubilant and self congratulatory. I can navigate, it would appear, with the help of GPS and M is perfectly comfortable driving as soon as he actually gets behind the wheel. 

We buy wine and beer to mark this mini victory, cram our van full of food and drink, discover that no one in New Zealand appears to know what a 'Thermos flask' is, give up on that, buy more alcohol to make up for it, and proceed to tackle mission five - finding a place to stay.

Surprisingly enough, it turns out, at least so far, that everyone who told us it would be easy to find camp sites, didn't actually lie. We roll up at one not far from the supermarket (today is about covering metaphorical, not actual, distance) which I have found through the app we have downloaded for this purpose, enquire nervously as to whether there is space, are shown to an empty slot amid a sea of empty slots in a green and friendly landscape, pop open our drinks and triumphantly toast ourselves.

Then we snuggle up in our van.

So no. We are not Brad. Our van contains more tea than fosters (and more craft beer and wine than tea), our evening contains more snuggling than substances and our victories are more of the order of 'drove a few miles without panicking' than 'abseiled down the nearest canyon'. 

But we are happy. And we think, just possibly, New Zealand is going to be actually pretty damn cool.

Top Ten Memorable Moments in Australia

And now, as is traditional on a day when I will spend most of my time on a plane, (sampling the wines, food and films), here are my top ten memorable moments in Australia. In no particular order:

1) Catching sight of the Sydney Opera House for the first time suddenly realising where I was, how far away from home and how very, very lucky.

2) The opening moments of Madama Butterfly at the Sydney Opera House. I always get a swell of emotion at a theatre as the show opens, but all the more so in this case because I was actually sat in Sydney Opera House. Amazing. Or, as a very good friend so perfectly described it, "squeeeee!"

3) The time we spent with Dan, Elizabeth, Bella and Lucie Harver. All of it. 

4) When a wild parrot flew down to perch, for quite some time, on my head. A wild parrot. Wild. On my head!

5) The 'two bikes and three surf boards' story at the brewery, and, at a separate brewery, the 'we do it by hand, just because' story whilst sipping my Willie Wonker style Bloody Mary flavoured beer.

6) The 'wash basin'  on the Great Ocean Road

7) Eating amazing breakfasts and becoming obsessed with 'smashed avocado' in Melbourne.

8) The night with the crazy beer club in St Kildas

9) Those first few days in Sydney, getting over a rather pleasant 'culture shock' after the rampaging traffic of South East Asia.

10) Going to the Food Market in Melbourne and buying a feast which included marscapone stuffed figs. Eating it in the park in the sunshine. This, darlings, is The Life.

The Bit Inbetween

Today literally is 'the bit in between' as it is our last day in Melbourne, and we catch a flight in the late afternoon to Sydney to stay at a budget hotel near the airport and fly the next day to New Zealand.

We use our limited time to visit the Museum Of Contemporary Art. The pieces are all by different artists and all need the explanation we are provided with by the guide, bring not obviously interpretable on their own. Which sounds like an indictment. But actually I think we could have made some interpretation of our own - we just might not have got quite so much out of it.

Of course all art is a matter of interpretation and so even with the guides explanation, certain pieces chime with me and begin a thought process of my own, so that now as I describe them to you I am no longer able to distinguish my own spin from the original - which is what good art, especially modern art, is all about.

Whilst not deliberately put together as such (as far as I know), there is, I think a theme to a few of the pieces, and that is, as the title suggest, 'the bit in between'.

Some artists had deliberately played on this theme, being interested in the gap between what is real and what is not, especially where a real object is present, but something not solid is represented.

In one piece, a set of neon strip lights depict a set of horizontal lines of diminishing size, set above each other in parrellel, and above them, a neon circle. The lights are real. The 'stairs' you see are not. The circle is just a circle, and it leads into the same room you stand in now. But it suggests something more.

In another, a camera, filming the room opposite, projects onto the wall behind the piece, the image of museum goers as they move around there. However, as we move through into the room to look closer, the image of us disappears. We occupy, in that moment, the space between what us obviously real, and what is not. We exist, but we are no longer portrayed as such.   I wonder, in that space, whether perhaps we have more scope, whether our conceptualisation of ourselves might become less restricted when our image is not tied down, strictly, to that which can be seen by the camera. In that space we might transform, become something bigger, more beautiful in our mind's eye. And might that, eventually be perceived by others? Might the widening of our own mental agility, our imagination if ourselves, become reality to the extent that we, personally, could prove t that to others, to the contrary of what their eyes might tell them?

It's a bit of a leap, I admit, but I have always believed in the limiting effect of our received understanding of ourselves through limited media caricatures, and indeed through the pigeon holing of  society and even our friends and family. 

"Jennifer is the arty one"

"Lisa is so fiery"

"The thing about Robert is he's just a little bit socially inept."

Are these people these things naturally and everlastingly?Or did they display some characteristics that signalled those things once or twice, and the reported image of themselves did the rest, tying them forever in their own minds and others to becoming that thing.

I have always loved the theory put forward by the poet Wallace Stevens, that reality and the imagination are so tightly interrelated that one cannot exist without the other. My favourite if his poems, The Man With The Blue Guitar, begins:

"A man played on a blue guitar,

A shearsman of sorts.

The day was green.

They said 'you have a blue guitar,

You do not play things as they are.'

The man replied, 'Things as they are,

Are changed upon the blue guitar.'"

We view everything through the filter of how we imagine them to be. If we imagine them differently, they will morph and change under that filter. What we believe we are seeing changes our behaviour, and our behaviour changes what we see. Or vice versa. M once told me a story from Chinese philosophy about a woman whose Mother In Law had come to live with her, and who loathed and hated her Mother In Law, because she criticised and moaned and sniped at her all day long. Eventually she visited a herbal doctor and asked for some poison to kill the Mother In Law with.

"Very well," said the doctor. "I can see your problem us very great. Here are some herbs which will surely kill her, however, they have a cumulative effect. You need to use them in tiny doses every day and, very gradually, they will poison her. But, in order to avoid suspicion, you must be very very kind and good to your Mother In Law, so that when she is finally dead, no one would think you would do such a thing."

As light hearted as I imagine you can be having just resolved to poison someone, the woman returned home and, sure enough hid a little of the poison in each meal. She went out of her way to be kind and friendly to her Mother In Law, the husband was greatly relieved and the household, once so stricken with enmity, became peaceful.

Weeks and months passed, and the woman and her Mother In Law became good friends, so much so that the woman ran back to the doctor in panic,

"Doctor!" She cried, "I need to reverse the poison! My Mother In Law has changed so much! She is good hearted and kind and she is a great friend to me! Please tell me it is not too late!"

And of course the doctor replies,

"My dear Lady, there was never any poison in those herbs. I only wanted you to see your Mother In Law when she was not defending herself in enmity against you."

Everything changes depending on how we perceive it, and how we perceive it changes everything.

16 and 17 March. Ring If You Want To Go. Fast.

On 16th March we go to St Kilda's Bay, where we spend a day rather reminiscent of a Nice Retired Couple Out At The Seaside. We walk along the beach, eschew the free outdoor cold seawater and pay for the indoor heated sea water at the St Hilda Baths, eat an ice cream,  see some penguins and then have dinner in the nice little pub down the road. If this is retirement, bring on the bed socks and the wrinkles.

(Though, having said that, I know plenty of retired people and none of them own bed socks. Or, in some cases, wrinkles.)

The 'nice little pub down the road' however, happens to be advertising a 'meet the brewer' event the next day, and so we book into that and wend our way home, a happy anticipatory smile on M's notably unwrinkled face.

So, on 17th March we turn up at seven o clock sharp, just as our ticket instructed us.

Our first warning is that there is no one there. We stand at the front of the 'queue' waiting for the doors to the downstairs part of the bar to be opened. We are just discussing whether it would be rude to nip upstairs to buy a drink and take it I to the downstairs part with us, when there is a huge commotion and about four hundred people make their way exuberantly down the stairs, all of whom appear to have nicknames and all of whom are carrying matching beer flagons.

That is our second warning.

The doors open miraculously at this point and so we make our way in and commandeer a couple of seats near the front on a sofa. We are not sure whether to buy a drink. Our ticket includes tastings and food, but we don't know whether the tastings will start straight away or whether we should buy a drink now. Or whether our ticket includes this. Or what the food is. Or whether we are supposed to have ordered it. Or told someone we are vegetarian. 

"Right!" Says someone into a mike at the front to uproarious applause and heckling, though we can't understand any of the heckles because they seem to refer to events we have nor been privy to, but which absolutely everyone else here has, "well I think we all know the drill don't we? So we'll be getting started in a bit."

We look around. Everyone is greeting each other enthusiastically, waving their matching flagons and removing their coats to reveal matching club t shirts. I watch a couple of people walk confidently to a shelf behind the bar, retrieve a couple of beer flagons and fill them at the pumps. 

"I think," I say firmly to M, "that we need a drink."

As the evening progresses, it becomes, if not already so, clear that this is a club event. Or at least an event to which the beer club are attending. 

"Hello," says someone into the mike. We learn his name because everybody begins, instantly, to chant it. "Looks like I am your host this evening."

There is some banter we don't understand, and then, 

"Who is new here?"

We are sensible enough to keep quiet. One other man is brave enough to raise his hand. (Though later it transpires he is a friend of one the club members). 

There is a cheer. He is presented with a small bell. 

"Ring it if the talk gets too technical" he is told, "you know, if we start on about mash tuns and stuff..."

As it happens M and I are not in need of the bell as far as technical beer jargon goes, but we need translation instead on in jokes, club language and what a 'tweeny' is when it's at home. 

"I," whispers M to me, "am a bit scared"

"Me too!" I say.

But we are laughing. The beer club are beery, leery and chummy, but friendly, and for the most part, though my mind boggled at the thought of what initiation ceremony might be imposed, we felt like we wanted to join them. Approachable they were not, but note due to their foghorn brand of communication than because they weren't open to the prospect of new friends.

As the evening progressed and as we listened to the two guest brewers talk about their business, and remained entirely on the outside of the various in jokes inbetween, we grew more comfortable and even entered the quiz.

Despite showing our outsider status even more by suggesting in answer to the question "what Australian animal was recently discovered with its head stick inside a beer can?", that it might have been a wombat (" We had some crazy answers to this one - how the hell does a wombat fit it's head inside a beer can - unless it's a very big beer can....") we managed to come in third.

We had a lot of fun that evening, and as for the thing about clubbiness and exclusivity, it seems to me that we are all part of something which, by its nature, others are not. And that perhaps it us as much part of life to be outside of some things, than it is to be inside. And for every club there was once an initiator. And every initiator was, by nature, the first one.

And thus, by necessity, an outsider.