Intermission - You can get refreshing drinks, or snacks from the kiosk, or the answer to a question someone didn't ask.

30/08/12 Sat on my arse, on the sofa, tapping away at this and sipping a coffee.

The advantage of not having to jam everything in to a few weeks is that, some days there's nothing nicer than sitting back, writing, reading, plinking on the Uke, collecting my thoughts, and not actually 'having' to do anything. Apart from marvel at the tweeting of a bird in one of the trees outside, that sounds just like an R2 Astromech Droid! Amusingly cool!

For sure, there are many more adventures to be had, and countless roads to travel ahead of me, and you can guarantee I'll be back on the road very soon.

Some may wonder why I’m not on the move every day, jumping from boat, to car, to plane; from bus to train, to grab a fleeting snapshot of somewhere beautiful before speeding on to the next.

It’s because I don’t have to, in all that I am grateful for being here, the most wonderful, calming, unexpectedly needed gift I have been given, is time.

For the first time in… Hell, longer than I can remember, time is something malleable to me, something I can feel and hold. Not something I have to chase, to reach out for and never quite grasp, because of the hurdles and imagined barriers that everyday life, and I myself, would throw in my path.

Time is now mine.

Time to not need to rush around like a headless chicken, time to hang out with friends and catch up on the many years apart. Time to let them show me what turns them on about where they live, and the gems hidden off the tourist path.

Time to just live my own life, at my own pace. To move as fast or as slow as I desire, and time to savour every taste of this beautiful beguiling country.

I don't need, or want, to treat New Zealand as a drive through.
I'm going to take my place at a table outside under a big sky, relax, and work my way through every dish on the menu at my own pace.

For the last couple of days, apart from feeling grotty from an unwelcome head cold, I've just been sitting back and feeling wonderfully, satisfyingly full, after the journey so far.

I’ve been given the time to digest it all. The joy in letting the reality that I've finally travelled the nearly 12,000 miles across this fragile little sphere we call home, to see old friends, and embrace a new world, sink in. The warmth of the people i've met and been introduced to. Looking through the photos of where I’ve been, and replaying the movies in my head of the wonders i've seen. Writing up this blog from my scribbled notes in a beautiful leather journal friends gave me. Reminiscing and laughing with Marc about our somewhat ridiculous old times, about the now, and about the soon to be.

Don’t worry about me, or the speed I take this journey, for I don’t.

All I know is that I'll be hungry again very soon, there's no doubt about it, there are even little rumblings in me as I write now. Although that could be too much coffee this morning, or the occasional 'wobble' from an earth tremor. I'm still getting used to the odd gentle shimmy of those.

I just know, that every time the hunger comes, I shall eat and drink this land until I'm full again.