(written on the 13th from notes)
I left the Kerosene Creek parking lot I think about 8:45.
And stopped on the road to Hot ‘N Cold to check on a possum that was lying in the middle of the road.
Its eyes were open, and I didn’t see any blood, so I wondered if maybe the poor critter was still alive and suffering.
So I did a u-turn and came back, pulling over to the side of the road and then checking its status.
Stiff.
Sad that it died that way but good that it wasn’t still lying there suffering. 🙏
I moved the body off the road, turned the van back around, and headed down the road for my morning soak in the hot water. 😊
It seemed like the water was even cooler today than yesterday. I think the temperature has gone down every time I’ve gone to it since the first time?
Today, I didn’t even have any need to go into the colder river. In fact, I was trying to find a hotspot, because I didn’t feel like the river was hot enough.
I can’t stay in the hot water for too long, because I overheat quickly, but I do like the hot until it’s time to switch to colder because I’ve overheated. 🙃
Just after I arrived, a French couple from the Alps side of France showed up, and though they weren’t dressed for the springs, I invited them in, and they joined me. 😊 We hung out and chatted for a good little while.
After we bid each other farewell, I stayed in the water only a little bit longer than they did. As I was walking back to my van, I ran into an older gentleman who was picking up trash along the road.
🤍😊🤍
That warmed the heart. 😊
I thanked him for doing that, and he told me that the local commercial thermal park donated trash bags and periodically came to pick up the trash that people had put in the bags there.
Thank you, Waiotapu Thermal Wonderland. 🙏
Andrew and I struck up a conversation with, and I also chatted a bit with his wife Margaret. Turns out Andrew is the metal-detector adventurer one of the hot spring soakers from last night mentioned. 😊
They showed me a jar full of the gazillions of rings that they have found in the hot springs there. And because of the kinds of people they are, they don’t search for the rings in order to make money. The first thing they do after they find one is post it on Facebook asking people to identify where they lost it.
Sometimes he finds other things as well, bracelets, cell phones, etc. He even found a cell phone that had been lost I think he said for something like 2 weeks but was still working!
My cell phone was supposed to be waterproof 😆 (well, to be fair, not waterproof, but ip68 rated, so it should be able to withstand accidental drops in shallow water without any issue whatsoever)
Aaaaanyway… Chatting with Andrew about all of his metal detecting got me interested and excited and got him pumped up as well. He hadn’t planned on metal detecting the area just yet, as he was waiting for after the storm rolled through, but being energized by our conversation, he decided to give it a go while I was there.
Amazingly, he found a ring within 60 seconds. Looked like maybe silver with small diamonds and one big diamond in the middle, but if I had to guess, I would say the diamond was probably either lab grown or a CZ, as it just felt like it was disproportionately large? to the other smaller ones on the band itself.
I’m certainly no jeweler, though, and don’t really have a flying freaking clue of what I’m talking about. 🙃
He also came across several washers. Apparently, there’s someone who doesn’t like the fact that he metal detects the area, and has decided to be a jerk about it, regularly dumping metal washers to waste his time.
I really just don’t understand some people. I don’t understand malice.
I understand the desire for justice. I understand the desire to punish perpetrators of harm…
Maybe the person throwing the washers in the river thinks he’s dispensing justice or punishing bad behavior?
I would rather that be the case than someone who is simply just… evil? (Can I consider someone who takes pleasure in being mean to another evil? I’ll probably have to think about that a bit).
Anyway, it was fun to watch him wander around trying to come up with another catch for the day. Coincidentally, the man I met last night who told me about Andrew showed up again this morning, and the three of us chatted for a little bit.
There was also a family that showed up, curious about the hot rivers who also became curious about the metal detecting, so I showed them the ring that Andrew had found as he continued wandering around looking for more rings.
Fun stuff. 😊
After bidding everyone a final farewell, but before leaving, Alex messaged me with concerns about his van, so I spent a little while disassembling my van enough to be able to send him pictures for how to replace the #4 ignition coil, as well as inspect his upper motor mount.
After helping him, and wanting a toilet, I decided to head back toward Kerosene Creek but got sidetracked on the way, passing a sign that simply read “Mud Pots.”
I’d passed the sign at least one other time without stopping, so I decided to indulge my curiosity this time. And I’m glad I did. 😊
To my surprise, the mud pots turned out to be the size of a large pond or small lake, sort of an upside down and backwards L shape (when walking toward the little boardwalk from the parking lot).
I got to chatting with an older couple from Alaska who’d recently moved to the central Oregon coast in an effort to live in a politically extremely blue state. We talked a bit about Alaska, a bit about Yellowstone and traveling around the United States, and a bit about traveling New Zealand.
Lovely couple. 😊
I ended up sitting in my car for a good little while, I think trying to figure out the weather (I forgot to mention that one of the things that I learned from Andrew today was that there was a cyclone heading for New Zealand!!! I love violent weather!!! 🥳 I think I stayed in the parking lot there for as long as I did because I was trying to figure out the timing and location of landfall, so I could be there. 😁).
Back at a crowded Kerosene Creek (maybe 15-20 cars?), I waited for a good little while for the bathroom to be available, as many people were using it as a changing room.
Eventually, it was free, and I was able to use it. 🙏
After using the bathroom, I did something that I’ve only done once before in my entire nearly 6 months of being in New Zealand.
I cooked. 🙃
I’ve had a can of soup kicking around since I think my very first week in New Zealand.
Well, as I’m trying to eat down my food before leaving, the soup was one of those cans of food that needed to go, so I fired up my freshly cleaned stove, grabbed some water, mixed the concentrated soup and water in my pot, and heated it all up.
I didn’t realize as I was eating my soup that I was burning my tongue. It was hot, but I didn’t realize it was that hot. 😅
Only later could I feel that mild burnt-tongue sensation.
Not my favorite.
One more reason not to cook. 😆
I also munched on carrots and pickles, still nervous about the continual twinging of the tooth that is still bothering me.
I really hope it’s only super sensitive from the onslaught of soda it received in a short period of time and isn’t evidence of a dying root. 😬
Had a surprise visitor, a very large bumble bee, fly inside my van and leave me a present.
With the cyclone coming in, I decided I wanted to get one last coat of clear silicone on the repaired section of my roof, so I opened the sunroof, crawled inside the van with my caulk gun, and got to work.
There were a couple of spots where bare metal was showing, and other spots where I think bubbles had burst and created hollow spots.
There were also fairly uneven spots in different places, so I added a whole bunch of silicone (I think it’s silicone?) and did my best to cover the exposed spots, smooth out the uneven spots, fill the divots, etc.
After putting the finishing touches on what is an absolutely atrocious-looking repair job at this point (it actually looked pretty good when it was just the bare metal, but with all the sealant going over it, it looks pretty gnarly. Super challenging to try to create a smooth coat of sealant when it’s coming out of a tube in thin beads. 😅), I then gave my brother Richard a video call.
He and I talked for a good long time about all sorts of stuff. At some point during the middle of the call, I saw a tourist from an Asian country who couldn’t find a trash can decide to just dump the trash he had on the ground.
I wasn’t having it.
Wanna get my blood heating up in a hurry? Do that. 😠
I paused my conversation with my brother, looked at the man as he was walking away from having done the deed, and very sternly something like “No. You do not do that to this beautiful country. Pack it out.”
He picked up what I think might have been a diaper? And walked away toward the long drop.
I just knew he was going to drop the diaper down the toilet hole, which might just be worse than dropping it on the ground because now it’s going to clog up the equipment of the people who come to pump out.
Had I not been on the phone with my brother Richard, I never would have let him dump that in the long drop. I knew exactly what he was doing when he started walking that direction. No, I would have straight up chewed the guy out and followed him over to his van, making a little bit of a scene in front of his family and kids to make sure he and they understood that you don’t just dump trash because it’s inconvenient for you to have to pack it out. 😠
Pack it out! 😡
Because I was on the phone with my brother, I just stewed inside as I watched him go into the long drop with the trash and come out without it. 😡
Later, when I went in the long drop myself to check, my suspicions were confirmed, as there was no trash set around the toilet. He had to have dumped it in there.
Oof. 🤬
Selfish people.
I regret not chewing him out. I should have told my brother I was gonna call him back.
It brought back memories of watching that guy from India slap his wife in the face.
Talk about 0 to livid in an instant. You don’t #@$&#$ touch your wife like that.
I can still feel the anger well up inside of me just thinking about that man who slapped his wife. And even more exasperating to have her come out of the car and try to convince me to let them leave before the cops we had called came.
Not a chance.
He left in handcuffs, thank you very much, as well he should have. 🚓
And I have a similar anger well up inside of me thinking about the man selfishly trying to secretively dump his trash for others to have to clean up.
Man, I despise selfishness. 😠
Of course, most of us are selfish at times, and I’m certainly no exception. Selfishness… simply shows up in a different manifestation in my case.
End rant.
I debated whether or not to go back to Hot ‘N Cold for one last so but decided against it. It was time to go storm chasing. 😎
I stopped for gas in Rotorua, then swung by the kiwi camp that I had met the French Canadian girls at last time I was in the area. Unfortunately, as someone had mentioned in the comments on the campermate app, the Kiwi Camp was closed for the duration of the storm (most likely because the place is full of large trees, and that is not the safest place to be when facing high-wind storms 😅).
I tried to stop by a freedom camping spot in Tauranga but accidentally drove by it. Then I tried to go to another one nearby, but Google, instead of letting me know that the road to it was closed, sent me off to a nearby neighborhood and directed me to walk through people’s yards to get to the freedom-camping spot. 😆
Wanting to be relatively close to the water, but not wanting to drive a whole lot further, I found a little freedom-camping spot at Te Puna Station Road Reserve beside the Wairoa River just before it empties into Tauranga Harbor.
The storm is rolling in, and I’m a tad excited–hoping that my camping spot will allow me to experience both sides and the eye of the storm. 🤞
Lift the world.
Bring it on.
~ stephen
Lift the World 