We got to see more beautiful scenery along the way that changes rapidly! We also encountered a little bit of construction; which I have to say is way better managed than it is in the USA. I thought it was cute that they had portable stoplights to control traffic in construction zones rather than using people to hold signs and direct traffic.
We drove for several more hours and stopped in Wanganui for the night. We were lucky enough to find a grocery store that was open 24 hours - it was only 7pm but nearly everything in the city/town was already closed for the night! We were also REALLY tired since it was 1am for me (Pacific Daylight Savings Time) and 2am for Ashley (Mountain DST). We bought food for our dinner and bought supplies for sandwiches to last throughout the week. It may have been because we were tired, but we thought it was funny that we bought "crusty rolls."
Our next task was to procure a place to sleep (after stuffing our faces in the car of course!), and decided that we would conquer the task of pitching our rented tent the first night so we would get over any qualms we had about doing so and try to get our money's worth out of it. We located a campground on one of our hundred or so maps (we had sooooooooo many and picked up more everywhere we went!), drove along the river, past the train tracks and next to a wildlife/wetland preserve to the Bignell Street Motel.
By now it was very dark outside, cold and quite windy, but we were met by the warm face of campground owner/operator Peter One. We asked if he had space we could pitch a tent; we had only seen little stationary campers when we pulled up. He said he did, but sensing how incredibly foreign we were he offered to rent us a camper-van for the same price as just pitching a tent. We caved and rented camper-van number 38. So much for conquering the tent!
We unlocked the door and climbed up into a space that was several decades behind modern times. It was tiny, and didn't keep the cold out, but at least we had a locking door and didn't have the wind blowing on us all night. Ashley and I couldn't stop laughing about where we were sleeping and about bailing out of tent camping.
After hauling our luggage inside we changed into our pajamas, and sporting a maglite and a headlamp we walked across the compound to the community restrooms to clean up and brush our teeth.
Even though I called us a couple of old fogies for climbing in bed at 10pm (remember - that's the same as 4am for me!), we were happy to read some scriptures, an article in the Spanish Liahona (trying to relive the mission days...), and get some sleep!!
Sounds like a pretty cool rest of your first day.
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Great head lamp! So handy. Who says your wussies for not sleeping in a tent - not me!
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