I haven't (yet) dropped off the face of the planet but was merely kidnapped by ma & pa in their campervan for two weeks. What a SCENARIO! They are now in the air, en route to Honk Kong, and i am free to fill yous all in on the FANTASTIC chaotic SCENARIO which has been living in a confined space with ma & pops.....aka. M 'B.O.N' (Bag Of Nerves) and Lumberjack P. Also featuring in this tale of toilet horror, navigational dramas and around-every-corner DANGER - Dashboard J, S.C., Rudie Red and myself Lone P.!!! (Pics will help to decipher this seeming randomness!)

So so so.................it was time to leave Queenstown, time for my liver anyway, especially when the tender-morning-after-the-particularly-heavy-night-before being thrown down rapids on a bodyboard by the Maddog River Boarding crew led to mine and Valentina's near death. Scarily near death. My heart didn't want to leave, but for the sake of my health and sanity....off we trundled in our bp (backpacker) campervan ready for whatever adventure NZ had to throw at us......well, maybe!

It soon became clear that the campervan and the 3 of us in it was going to provide adventure enough - Lumberjack P. doing what he does best and lumberjacking about, losing his patience every morning when making a cup of coffee and getting a bowl of cereal involved having to navigate around 2other people in the space half the size of your average shed. 'Adventure' for M. 'B.O.N' soon came to represent every corner we drove around at any speed exceeding 30kmph. We found that, particularly on the winding, mountainous roads, keeping M. BON in the back helped to tame the nerves. All was well....we were learning as we went the ways of campervan life! Plus the guidance of Dashboard J, S.C. and Rudie Red helped things along i do believe! Stealthing up and down the length of the van whilst in motion, keeping low to the ground and always in reach of some kind of handle, in order to rescue falling tins of beans/packets of coffee/biscuits/bottles of water being thrown in a rather dramatic fashion out of the cupboards whilst dad took corners at what felt like 100 kmph but was probably more like 40 became a daily task...and M. BON in particular had this down to a T; as (you would think watching her) her life depended on the success of her stealthing capabilities. We pushed the adventure boundaries a little too far when we took her up Mount Ruapehu in a chair lift and nearly gave her a heart attack. Poor M. BON......alls well that ends well though, we got her back onto solid ground eventually!

On to toilet dramas...I've no gory details unfortunately as i left the dumping duties to dad every morning....it was without a doubt his favourite campervan maintenance task so i didnt want to take that away from him, and with only 2 weeks i knew he embraced this duty fully every morning. So, anyhow, you'll have to settle for the toilet chemical dramas we had instead; summed up nicely by the conversation-verging-on-argument that M. BON and Lumberjack P. had early on in the adventure....the dialogue went something like this:

M.B. 'the toilet stinks, did you put chemicals in there this morning?'

L.P. 'we haven't got any chemicals left'

M.B. 'i know, i told you to get some...'

L.P. 'well ive been looking for them in all the supermarkets but cant find any'

M.B. 'you need to ask at the campsites...have you been asking'

L.P. 'oh, no'

M.B. 'well then are you going to ask'

L.P. 'yes, i'll get some in the morning'

M.B. 'why haven't you already got some. the toilet stinks!'

L.P. 'i couldn't find any more...i've been looking'

M.B. 'well where did the campervan lady tell us we could get new chemicals?'

L.P. 'at the campsites'

M.B. and Lone. P. 'hmmmmmmmmm..........'

That might have been one of those had-to-be-there moments, but for Loid and Jimbob you'll understand the humour of this typically feeling-like-your-going-around-in-circles conversation with pops!

A few more intense pant-wettingly humorous SCENARIOS that you might appreciate ('you' meaning predominantly Loid and Jimbob!):

1) Lumberjack P's journey over the handlebars of his luge as he careered dangerously around the corners of the luging track, desperate not to be beaten by 'a girl', let along his daughter. Not only did he 'faaall off and ladder his taights' (imagine a West Country accent) but also skid marked the entire left side of his body, gravel rashed both shins, elbows, foearms and knees and most likely lost a fair few brain cells at the same time....though the amount he had before the fall is questionable anyway. In all seriousness i've never been so terrified as i was when i drove around the corner to see one empty luge and dad spread out on the grass bank, not moving. Once i knew he was alive and nothing was broken, the whole experience suddenly became the funniest thing since.....well, i cant even remember what was funnier before this! A whole lot of aloe vera, antiseptic, pain and Monty Python-esque expletives later, dad was fixed right back up. He would have you believing otherwise though of course and apparently has slept badly ever since the SCENARIO as the duvet has rubbed against his gravel grazed shin and kept him awake....!!!!

2) Lumberjack P's rendition of 'Dan the Lavatory Man' to a bus (half) full of people on the way back from a cultural maori evening. And no, you wouldn't be over exaggerating if you imagined him standing at the front of the bus, maybe even singing into a microphone.....because thats EXACTLY what happened!

3) Again, Lumberjack P. focused tale.............this time, his somehow, mind-bogglingly, absurd ability to live an entire day wearing girls pants (not only tight, but without necessary hole in the front) - WORSE than girls pants; his daughters pants (not mine but lols or gems....mystery as yet unsolved/neither of them want to claim the pants as their's now!) - AND THEN go on to wear them another couple of days because he had run out of clean pairs. DElightful as always.

So...all started off a bit ropey with grand revelations of new tatoo's and certain nose studs but after the initial shock and adjustment period of being thrown into a campervan together after 6months apart the whole SCENARIO went swimmingly. M. BON's dead chuffed that she has climbed a glacier and been up a volcano though not so chuffed that she is returning home without tanned legs. I told her you would help her feel better Loid...just flash your bright whites! Dad is just happy to be returning home i think - to a normal sized living space, reasonable travel times and straight roads, and of course Tabs!

Im sending tonnes of love and hugs home with them....to Edgcott and woobop, Weedon, Berko, liverpool, York, Northampton, Hinkley, Notts, Macnhester, etc etc etc.

Love you all looooaaaads and not long now until i am back to see you all. Next stop - Chile!

Your favourite Lone Pom (i'll have to find out what that translated to in Spanish!)

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