The Van

We wanted to pay a special tribute tonight, to the van. Not because we are sleeping in it tonight, but because we love the van. We are actually on a glacier so its much too cold outside to sleep since we only have sheets for bedding. But back to the van: its our special friend. Here is a little story about last night in the van. So, after spending a night in a hostel the night before last, we decided that we would drive until we couldn't drive anymore in an attempt to gain some mileage for the next day (driving day). We made it north of Queenstown to a town called Wanaka. We were told that Wanaka was a great place but we couldn't find any reason in any guide book as to why it would be a place to stop in (other than Lake Wanaka) but once we arrived we knew why. Its a special little town with nightlife, cute stores and cafes and on the shore of this immense lake with mountains as the backdrop. Its amazing.

Back to the van. So we arrived in this great place exhausted! We had hiked for 7 hours that day (post to come) inlcuding the last hour carrying some random person's 15KG pack!! Anyway, needless to say we were tired however, Wanaka was hopping. We parked in the parking lot in front of the lake (across the street from the strip of bars) and called it a night. We were so sad that we couldn't go out but we had just driven 3 hours after 7 hours of hiking uphill and we are old. So, we decide to sleep in the van in the parking lot. The only signage said that we couldn't park on the grass and camp. Well, that's how we interpreted the sign. We stayed off the grass and went to bed.

A short time later, it was freezing and there was a party happening outside our window including a girl with a guitar on the picnic table singing. She was so loud- I thought Jewell was outside our window singing to us. It was ridiculous. So I shut the sunroof. Thank GOD. Because, several hours later, after tossing and turning to generate some body heat, the sprinkler system went off. We were fairly close to the heads and it felt like someone was power washing the van. Jenn was quoted saying she "was worried the paint was getting chipped". She sat up, startled and obviously concerned for the van. Then, she turns to find a big burly man knocking on the window of a van near us. (side note- people slepp in vans everywhere as long as there is no sign to say you can't, then its legal and very common) The next thing we know, there is a big loud knock on our window. He yells "security" and Jenn proceeds to jump into the front seat to turn on the car to power down the window to see what he wants. Apparently no camping on the grass means that you can't even park in that lot overnight. He told us we had to move and that the Queenstown police were hot on his tail and were going to fine us if they caught us there. It was 5:45am. Another side note is that we have been driving through this country for the past 6 days, covered alomost 1500 km and have yet to see a cop anywhere. And Queenstown was 2 hrs away from here. Regardless, we headed out of the area to find another spot to crash for a couple hours.

Jenn hit a bunny. There are rabbits everywhere out in this part that we really didn't notice until it got dark out and then they were all over the sides of the road. After the bunny incident, we pulled off on a side area to sleep for the next 3 hours. It gets roasting hot when the sun comes out so we have figured out that our optimal sleeping happens between 6am-9am. We are also good about 10pm-midnight. Ok, this story is almost over... So we awake to the beautiful sunshine, no cops, no burly men. We are ready to start driving up to our destination when we realize that the lights were left on. MARISSA left the lights on after the morning incident and the van was dead. Luckily, Jenn was able to flag down the post office lady who phoned Mike's Garage who came to jump the van. So don't worry, the VAN is ok and so are we.