OH-OH WHAT A DAY THAT WAS

 

Makes sense to me.

Here are some excerpts of the lyrics that suited my endeavours yesterday:

 

Oh well, I'm dressed up so nice
And I'm doin' my best
And I'm startin' over
I'm startin' over in another place ...

Oh-oh what a day that was

Oh-oh what a day that was
Oh, oh a day that was
Oh-oh that's the way it goes ...

Moving in every direction
And if you feel like you're in a whirlpool
You feel like going home.

I took a full carload of stuff down to Wellington and arrived Saturday morning. On Monday morning I left Wellington and stopped overnight at Ohakune. In hindsight I should have kept going north.

At 7am on Tuesday I left Ohakune and headed off north via Taumarunui and Te Kuiti ... well, that was the plan. The weather was atrocious with driving rain making visibility marginal and the roads treacherous. I don't get New Zealand drivers. At the early hours the dawn light was very dim and made worse by the rain. This didn't stop many fools driving too fast for the conditions and WITHOUT THEIR BLOODY LIGHTS ON!

The road to Taumaranui was littered with small boulders from rock falls but the road from Taumarunui to Te Kuiti was much worse with flooding, slips and more rock falls. It was getting dodgy. Just before Te Kuiti the road was blocked by cars with flashing lights and I thought that there had been an accident. They were road maintenance people who told me that a major slip  a little further along had blocked the main road and that I would have to turn back. It had just happened so as yet there were no diversion signs set out. 

I turned around and drove back to Taumaranui as I knew that just past there was a secondary route to Turangi. I didn't experiment with any of the minor side roads  which was just as well as I later learned that on some of these flooding isolated communities and evacuations were necessary.

I made it to the secondary road which got me to Turangi, having to drive carefully as conditions were getting worse. As it turned out I turned around and retraced my steps just in time as not long afterwards another slip blocked the road nearer to Taumarunui. I might have been stranded in the middle.

The long drive from Turangi to Whangarei, with the added abortive drive to Te Kuiti and back took 10 and a half hours with just a half hour stoop at a supermarket, petrol station and cafe. I could have, in better conditions, driven all the way from Wellington to Whangarei in that time. I think it's the longest continuous drive I've made and I was exhausted last night. The car performed well - good old Toyota and I'll treat it to a check-up before the next drive.

 I will be making another trip in a week or so and, if the weather is good might do the trips in one go without an overnight stop.