Greg (right) and Thomas celebrating on top of Rangitoto with a bottle of Queen Adelaide; my low patch was in no small part down to me missing my friends
When I wrote the following, I was feeling pretty low. This had obviously happened before, such as when I was having to wait around for ages in Melbourne for my car to be ready, or when I had to drop Queensland from my plans in when halfway from Perth to Darwin because I'd miscalculated of the amount of time I had left on my visa. Both of those times I had good reason to be pissed off – delay and disappointment, respectively – but this time I had no good reason at all, I just felt really miserable, and, to be honest, didn't really want to be travelling.
Needless to say my mood lifted eventually – chemical imbalances rarely fail to make a permanent mark on the endlessly interesting world of travel – but from when I left Lake Taupo back on 11th November to when I arrived in Dunedin on 3rd December, I was a miserable bastard, and it happens to all travellers at various stages. So read the following section with a pinch of salt, and apologies in advance, because when I whinge, I whinge. At least that part of me is still English.
Temporary Cynicism
Even cats don't fall on their feet this well, and they're genetically programmed to land right side up. Then why do I still feel a nagging doubt about this whole New Zealand thing? Last time I wrote, I edited my original transcript before transmission to remove all my little niggles about my current travels, putting them down to continuing flu, which isn't a good enough reason to commit negative vibes to permanent storage, but unless my current health status is still under par, there's something not quite firing on all cylinders in New Zealand.
To be honest, I think I'm just suffering from a bout of cynicism. Yes, the countryside's beautiful and yes, the travelling's easy, but I keep finding myself thinking, 'Not another bloody mountain,' and I haven't even reached the real McCoy yet. The people have been quite superb – of that there can be no doubt – but I think I must be suffering from what most travellers call the 'three month blues', except I've taken thirteen months to reach it, and I needed ill health to set it off. By all accounts the three month blues hit you when you're beginning to get used to the travelling life, when you cease to be amazed by everything just because it's new, and begin to change from being a tourist to being a traveller: at that stage you get a little homesick, and just wish everything was back to 'normal'. This doesn't fit what I'm feeling, but I can't find any other reason for my recurring desire to jack it all in and come home. It's not a strong enough feeling to actually make me book a flight to London, and a quick waltz around the nearest sunny bay brings me back to the reality of my situation, but there's no point in obstinately travelling for ages just because I said I would.
I wonder if it could be that I'm simply not as impressed by what I've seen as I thought I would: I can't make my mind up about New Zealand. One theory is that because the human environment here is quite English – the physical environment is too mountainous to be English, but it's more English than the Australian outback, that's for sure – I keep seeing a watered down version of home, a version with a very short modern history, an emerging culture in terms of music and art rather than the very established versions in the UK (though the emerging cultures are very strong here, to be fair), and – to me – a lack of cultural identity. Kiwis would disagree with me very strongly I'm sure, but I keep feeling this is a country of people from other countries, rather than a definite place with a definite identity. Any country where the sports presenters start talking about Arsenal beating Newcastle United without once mentioning the English football league by way of introduction doesn't feel that alien to a Pom: in fact, if I wasn't English, I'd assume that New Zealand had its own football league, just one where games are always played in unseasonable weather...
And yet I know that if, say, I was offered a full-time job here – a totally hypothetical concept, before you fall off your chairs – I'd probably leap at the chance and hang around for a bit, because there's still a feeling that there's potential in them there hills. I think that it might be a simple case of overload: I've seen so many amazing views, done so amazing walks, lounged on so many amazing beaches and explored so many amazing cities, that one more bloody picture-postcard-pretty view is enough to drive me over the edge. The desire to have exhaust fumes blown in my face as another London bus chugs around a near-stationary Piccadilly Circus is quite strong...
But never mind; I am sure this melancholy will pass, if only because it feels more like a chemical imbalance than a genuine attitude problem, and as soon as I manage to shake the feeling of grogginess and aching limbs by doing a bit of healthy exercise – like going for a few days' walk – I'm sure the same person that managed to explore Western Australia will emerge. Besides, I've been living with unexplained bouts of being a miserable bastard for as long as I remember; it's just that they've been considerably less common since I hit the trail. I guess that's a good thing...
