The people you meet

New Zealand seems to have its fair share of eccentrics - probably due in large part to the population per square kilometer factor offering many places to hide out from the world and be left alone.

I met the first eccentric in Christchurch, day 1, in the hostel dorm room. Daz was an American who came to NZ 35 years ago and now worked half a year as a yachtie on the South Island, and the other half as sailor somewhere off the coast of the Spanish Mediterranean, ferrying rich people from port to port. Now, firstly it struck me as a bit odd that a guy in his mid-60s would be staying in a dorm room at a hostel - single room, fine, but dorm bed? Immediately made me wary. But I decided to get over my age-ism and said to him that I was heading to a bar I was keen to visit and that he'd be welcome to join me. He turned around and offered me a beer instead and asked "Being American, do you like music?"

Um...ok, not sure what being American has to do with liking music, but sure. Now at this point I should have just said "thanks, but I'm really wanting to check this bar out so perhaps another time"

But I accepted the beer...And proceeded to be shown 30 minutes worth of home movies of his now adult daughters playing jazz at a festival from 1988.

"Oh, yes, they were very talented"

Throughout this time I learned that in addition to being a yachtie, he was also a jazz musician who toured the clubs of NY and LA in the early 1960s, a commercial pilot, a paramedic and went to university later in life for a degree in molecular biology.

You'd think that this would make him interesting. It didn't.

And yet I couldn't manage to extricate myself from the situation and ended up drinking beer in a public park ("an old yachtie's trick!!") listening to conspiracy theories about how the CIA orchestrated the September 11th attacks.

Finally I got away, ditched Daz in favour of that glass of red at Cartel and listened to a one man band sing The Gambler (among other standard pub fare) for an hour or so...and then proceeded to be kept awake by the most horrendous snoring I have ever heard come out of someone's head. I was stuck on the top bunk, Daz on the bottom, and every 15 minutes I shook the cheap metal bed for all it was worth to try to quieten the noise long enough to be able to drift to sleep. He did all the classics - deep breathing, the honk-shoo you did as a kid to pretend you were asleep, something that sounded like the deranged Hobbit in Lord of the Rings (...my...precious...), and even one I thought only my Dad had a patent on, the quiet puffttt coming from lips barely parted. That I didn't run myself off the road from lack of sleep the next day was a small miracle.

And then there's dear Andy

I ventured to the remote Stewart Island with my friend from uni, Heather, who lives in Wellington. Poor Heather got horribly seasick on the wildest ferry (or other marine vehicle) trip I've ever been on and ended up laying down for 2 hours after arriving, which afforded me the opportunity to get acquainted with our accommodation hosts. We had booked Jo & Andy's B&B to stay in, yet another misguided Lonely Planet recommendation promising delicious breakfast and dorm/single/double accommodation options (turns out the dorm and the twin room were one in the same).

Stewart Island is one of those places that houses people skeptical of anything that comes off the mainland, and Jo & Andy are no exception. A couple in their 60s have a tiny cottage overrun by books covering every square inch of wall space (the ceiling is reserved for the clothes dryer on a pulley).

Andy is a disheveled man with a scraggly red beard, clad in a flannel shirt and woolen socks. He was a Vietnam vet that, like Daz the snoring yachtie, came to New Zealand about 30 years ago from the US. He didn't like to go to the mainland and tried to avoid it at all costs ("no more than 3 or 4 times a year"). The conversation was a bit odd and stunted - he'd cut you off or respond in a way that made you confused as to what to say next. I thought at first he was an old hippie but then he started giving off more of the if-I-wasn't-in-New-Zealand-I'd-be-holed-up-in-Western-Idaho-starting-a-militia vibe.

The other thing the Lonely Planet said about Jo & Andy's was that they had a qualified massage therapist on staff...Turns out that was Andy. We learned this after he talked about hacking off his right thumb in a wood chopping accident "which was a problem, because you know I also give massages". Heather said she later learned his massages "have a certain reputation."

:::shudder:::

We only stayed one night and high-tailed it back to the mainland (Heather flew) and the Catlins - where we encountered

• the Lost Gypsy, an eccentric guy in his early 30s that takes apart electronic and other 'junk' and turns it into these wacky 'automata'. He seemed to have a general dislike of the world outside and a definite dislike for small children (but not in a shotgun-toting kind of way...at least I don't think so).

• the Mushroom Man's wooden lawn art

• Teapotland adjacent to Chrystelle's scary doll collection (we think was actually a man). Photos and donations were welcome, but we decided not to encourage this guy's particular brand of lunacy. The host of the nearby hostel where we stayed asked if his spelling had improved on his signs...it hadn't.

All part of the charming quirky side of New Zealand!

(Just as long as you don't get a massage from any of them, of course.)