Despite being completely exhausted, again I woke up earlier than Chase, apparently back to my old routine. 🙃 I spent a little while working on one of my blog posts to at least get one up and done.
The day began even more cloud covered than the previous, but again, we were hopeful that the forecast would hold up, and that the clouds would break up and give at least a partly cloudy, partly sunny day.
Once Chase was awake, he was in the mood to get some breakfast, so we headed into town to Twizel, where I bought some stuff from the local grocery store, and he did as well.
As we began heading north again past Lake Pukaki, this time, the lake was an even more amazing brilliant blue. So again, we stopped to take pictures 🙃. I don’t think my mid-range phone has the ability to take pictures that show the proper colors, so I’ll probably have to just rely on pictures that others have taken that can be found on google.
Needless to say, the colors were just beautiful 😊.
From there, we headed over to Lake Tekapo, the color of which… I mean… How do you describe it? I thought Pukaki was a brilliant blue, but… wow. 😯
Maybe it was just the way the light was hitting at a different time of day, but holy. freaking. crap. The color of the lake was this just incredible, vibrant, electric blue. It just… I just kept looking at it over and over again.
We drove up the dirt road all the way to its public dead end on the south side of the lake. And then we did the same thing on the north side, past the end of the marked road, fording the river in a few places before finally throwing in the towel at a spot that was too deep to cross (though had I been by myself and not exhausted, I probably would have drained the area, and continued on until I could go no further. 🙃
But that’s… what I do. 🙃
Instead, I tried to nap for a little bit because I was just utterly exhausted.
Chase was really great about it, as we were out in the middle of nowhere with no reception speak of. I dozed in the driver’s seat for probably an hour, but only falling asleep for sporadic seconds here and there, i think.
One of these days it would be nice to learn how to sleep anywhere. 🙃
I don’t think that’s a realistic goal, unfortunately.
That’s actually one of the things that I’ve been trying to do on this trip out here–recognize that I am now a middle-aged man, and there were things about myself I’d hoped to change by now that I’m hard on myself about. And… I’m just going to accept that that’s just… reality for me.
If it changes, then great, of not, I’m gonna just accept reality and move on.
Of course, that doesn’t apply to actual defects of character. I’ll still work very hard to overcome those, but other things, such as only being attracted to a very small sliver of the women on this planet… I’m gonna stop fighting myself, stop trying to change what I’ll attracted to. At this point, it just is what it is. I’ve never been able to broaden my preference for what I find attractive. So… I’m gonna stop putting pressure on myself to accomplish that seemingly impossible goal.
🐿️
Anyway, on the drive back east toward Tekapo (the little town), we ran into a German backpacker who had been walking from the tip of the North Island all the way down to where we were in the South island. She had already walked 30 km that day, and she had stuck out her thumb hoping to get a ride. Normally, Chase and I are so slammed with stuff that we don’t stop to pick up hitchhikers, but given how far away we were still from town, and given that we were on a dirt road with just slightly above zero traffic, we decided to squish all of our stuff back enough to make room for one more person.
We drove her to town, with me stopping multiple times to take pictures of the incredibly blue lake. Still, after having driven up and down both sides of it, I was completely mesmerized by the incredible color. The sky was a dull, pale, almost nothing compared to the electric vibrant blue of the lake. It’s funny that after hours of staring at it, it just never got old. It was like a dream. 😊
After dropping off our temporary backpacker at the grocery store parking lot so she could get some real food instead of the dehydrated stuff she’d been living on (an effort to LEPAEPBTIFT), Chase and I headed north, planning to camp near our final destination of the trip, at least for me–a bridge over another vibrantly Blue River that looked deep enough to jump in, and far enough below the bridge to be a good bit of fun. 😁
The campsite was about 20 minutes further north than the bridge jumping spot (hopeful jumping spot), so we headed out to the campsite and quickly bed down for the night, still absolutely exhausted, as, though I’ve been exhausted, unfortunately, I just still can’t sleep well at all. 🤷
End of another day. 🙂
Love and hugs to all. 😊
Lift the World
~ stephen
Lift the World 