Nicer Than It Sounds
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Pukeroa,
New Zealand
Sunday, February 17, 2008
The last remaining 'ravers' were litter picking and getting into their Mums' cars as we awoke.
We had decided to drive towards Wellington, not knowing exactly how long that would take, so not planning necessarily to get there immediately. Besides, we wanted to stick with the coast for a while, as it was nice, and we had no great hurry to get to Wellington.
We stopped around Paraparaumu and checked with the Tourist Info people to see if there were any free campsites in the area, as there was nothing close by in the DOC book. There were no free sites, but the Visitor Centre was in the car park of the enormous Coastlands Shopping Centre, so whilst there, we used their facilities. Shaving in the shopping centre toilets, Jacob was a little puzzled to find how many sidelong looks he received from the other patrons. Kirsty anticipated the sidelong looks and retreated to a cubicle to shave her legs. In all fairness though, you can see your own legs while shaving them: Jacob didn't have much choice but to stand at the mirror. Nevertheless, in a facility where you are expected to be allowed to empty your bowels without being complained about, getting tuts of disapproval for trimming your beard seems a bit much.
There isn't a great deal in Paraparaumu apart from the Coastlands Centre and some nice beaches, so, having driven down to the coast for a bit of a nose around, we figured we'd push on. We'd have stuck around for the night if it looked like we'd have been able to park without being busy-bodied. In a lot of cases, we probably could have parked and slept just about anywhere pretty easily, but it's nicer to be able to move around freely and not have to be clandestine about it all.
The Fire Brigade/Gas Board road-block on the main road back from the beach negotiated (we now have a far more intimate knowledge of Paraparaumu's residential districts than you might otherwise expect), we headed on down the coast to find somewhere nice to be. Finding Pukerua to be a much prettier stretch of coastline than the name might suggest, we briefly overshot, collected the makings of a meal from the shops in Paremata, and drove back to a car park layby thing off the main highway, right by the sea.
In Pukerua, outside a Maori Cultural Centre Community Hall Thing where we stopped to use the public loo, a woman sat engaged in pyrography (burning letters and pictures into bits of wood), but not with a pyrography iron. She was painstakingly using a magnifying glass, with, it must be said, quite impressive results. Still, if she was intending to sell any of her stuff, the increased productivity and consequent profit she'd have enjoyed with the proper gear would probably have paid for said gear in minutes. Each to their own though and, as Kirsty pointed out, it's nice to know you can do something so well with such basic tools.
In our split-level contemporary living space with panoramic coastal views (van parked by the sea), Kirsty continued her long-term project of altering the trousers she'd bought Jacob for Christmas, and Jacob sat in the cab, typing stuff up. Fed on herb-crusted pork chops, lyonnaise potatoes and wine (as mentioned previously, single-burner stove van life doesn't mean we're content to subsist off packet soups and cups of tea - although we did have a brew and tried to feed the teabag to the crowd of gulls surrounding the van, with relative success), we whiled away the evening with a deck of cards before crawling into bed. We seem to describe the process as 'crawling' quite frequently don't we? Try living in a van.
