Traveling in a Camper Van through New Zealand

Traveling in a Camper Van through New Zealand

Written Tuesday Nov 27, 2018 – Edited & Posted July 31, 2019

Kia Ora – Kwe' friends, I admit, I am use to the life of traveling, packing up, setting up, putting away tents, luggage, reorganizing and moving from one location to the next. Yet always I have to remind myself, this never gets easier. Laughs. I am just much wiser and experienced now. Still get anxious and all ADHD acting though, the life of a solo female traveler. Laughs.

Alright, the adventures I’ve had so far. Laughs. I have to say, I met these two girls by coincidence on my flight from Bali, Indonesia; one from the United States, Rebecca and the other from England, Charlotte. So random too, thankfully I am such a social butterfly, I talk to anyone and everyone literally just need to exchange a smile and I go in for the conversation. LAUGHS. The girls thou, both are phenomenal in their unique ways, both queens and eager to travel and celebrate one another has been and is rejuvenating to be around, giving me this youthful energy and reminding me what it was like to be twenty again.

Jumping around, arriving to New Zealand, it was nice to actually hear the girls had planned to buy a camper van to live in for seven months and drive around together was inspiring. I could not help myself but ask to stay in touch with them and then invite them to meet everyone I met on my journeys. Our journeys quickly came together and I am beyond grateful for the extended invitation to join them in attending the Tattoo & Art Festival in New Plymouth, New Zealand. During this adventure we all ended up getting tattoos in which I tattooed my hands. RIGHT, my hands!

Pauppi the Camper Van

Here is a description I put out on social media: Samoan Traditional Tatau - (hand tapping) - done with prayers, tattoos on hands are called ‘lima’ and are with greatest honour!

• “The symbols are Samoan motifs that come from the environment and are geometrical. This ‘malu’ on my hands are feminine (female) to represent my families, fathers side my right hand, diamonds are protection, symbols on back of hands are my journey and destiny, birds for balance, fish for relationship, left hand is maternity and fertility, and the shining star is strong female representing me!”

•

Hand Tattoo

This adventure brought many blessings and more crazy adventures to come in the near future, little did I know. Laughs. Everyone I met in New Zealand were to be a part of my extended family – whānau. So many amazing people, Maori whānau from Wellington, Auckland and Rotorua. (okay all honesty, from everywhere but my geography of listing the locations is difficult still. Laughs). And top of the trip was meeting my sisters and brothers from Hawaii and the Netherlands. My sisters from Hawaii, I will make it a commitment to myself to adventure to their territory and visit and speak with them and learn and share culture, traditions and laughs. Megan you can hold me to my word.

Strange how the universe works in our favour. The girls and I were traveling back from the tattoo festival. Laughs. Pause for a minute and reflect, I have so many funny stories of this little road trip, that I am laughing. Stories for camp fires for sure!

Anyways, it was perfect timing that we met our brothers and sisters from the festival the following morning at a café in the middle of no wheres in along the side of the mountains traveling from New Plymouth to Waitoma. In these moments we linked up with them. From my hostel we all went to check out the black labrythe caves to see the glow warms. Laughs. Three hours of hiking with wet suits on (COLD Wet Suits on), we were outside then inside of caves, jumping off small waterfalls with our small tubes, turning off our head lights to see the glow warms as we floated by was like gazing at the stars in the skies, amazing! Them wet suits though. Laughs. I am grateful that the hostel owner advised me to wear warm cloths underneath. Was well worth it. The spectacular views to say the least, the amount of mysterious creators that lie within and under mother earths surface in those caves, so beautiful and creepy at the same time.

Fabulous Glow Warm Crew

Glow Warms

Nevertheless, all the stress of traveling have many memories to look back on and laugh. Even when they were not funny in the moments. Laughs. I am grateful to have as much gratitude for the time I had traveling these past couple days with the ladies in their camper van and in my tiny tent. The tight spaces and the amount of luggage I’ve accumulated, I still feel like I am over packed, but I mean this is my life. Laughs, always prepared!

My fitness is a conversation for another time, hauling these luggage bags around. Laughs. Reminded me of when my sis Lisa took me to her Crossfit/fitness class with the ladies and I nearly died from being out of shape and in rough conditions for not training in months. Laughs. Literally, I was dying. Laughs.

Regardless we are heading to Auckland, and the beautiful ladies will have time to continue situating their home on wheels, getting the van ready for it's oil change PAUPPI – so many stories with this van, PAUPPI the van. Laughs.

Just a quick last minute highlight for my own memories, like that time we drove over manor and the van smelling like shit for a couple days. Laughs. And almost running out of gas going to New Plymouth and praying we make it and thinking about the crazy options we'd come up with if we did run out of gas. Laughs. Having freshly tattooed hands and getting rained on and having a soaked tent that I needed to pack up at 5am, so I slept in the front of the van for two nights. Laughs. Such good memories and so much more memories to reminisce about another time.

Forever grateful as ever! Hope you all enjoyed a cup a tea while reading this blog. I sure had a good time re-reading this one. Laughs. So for now, keep maintaining an Attitude of Gratitude.

Nmultes

Ashley R.