Back North

Friday morning had us all packed and on the road again, with the plan to visit some spectacular underground cave formations at Waitomo. Pam and Elizabeth were leaving soon after us and we would meet again at Pam’s for the night, before flying to Brisbane on the Saturday.

Although south of Hamilton (about halfway between Auckland and Taupo) there are no dual carriageways, the roads are all fairly good, though subject to widespread roadworks, and even the trucks clip along at the national speed limit of 100 km/hr, only slowing on the steep inclines where there are usually overtaking lanes. Progress is therefore pretty predictable. We got to Waitomo in good time, but were rather disappointed that the prices of the various tours were much more expensive than most of the other excursions we had undertaken. We decided to go for the short cave walk and boat ride through the caverns almost lit but the myriads of glow-worms – very much Walt Disney meets Phantom of the Opera – but satisfying not to have missed it.

Despite the traffic advisories we ploughed back on up the route until sure enough, about 40 km south of Auckland we ran into the classic M25 scenario and were cursing that we had not known the area well enough to make a detour, when I spotted a car identical to Pam’s and with a very familiar registration plate, just pulled in to the side of the motorway. I pulled in front and it was then that we spotted that there was front end, nearside damage. She had been involved earlier in a “fender-bender”, not bad enough to make it undriveable, but unbeknown to her she had ruptured the cooling system and after about 15km more driving had had the big red light come on and had stopped. We were just by an on-ramp and soon a police car pulled up to tell us we couldn’t stop there, but were very quickly understanding that there was no option, and made sure that all was under control (Pam was in touch with the AA and her insurers). It was just a matter of waiting for the tow truck to arrive and amazingly we were able to transfer all the additional bags and provisions into our rattle-trap, as well as the 2 additional passengers, and after what seemed an eternity were on our way again. Whilst waiting we were hailed by a passing car with 2 strange (to me) flags sticking from the rear window. Pam recognised the passenger who wanted to make sure all was well, as a renowned Maori politician and activist. He obviously knew how important we were and wanted to get in our good books!

Hence, the earlier reference to taking Elizabeth home and seeing her lovely apartment. It’s obviously not cheap but as an old people’s residence I don’t ever recall seeing anything so desirable in the UK. Eventually back at Pam’s we took service of the nearby fish and chip shop, and retired to bed after a somewhat eventful day for all.