Our goal yesterday was a nice remote lake called Rotoroa (not the geyser-town \u201cRotorua\u201d if you followed our last posts, we are now in the South Island! Don\u2019t worry, we also get very confused with the names here\u2026). Starting from Tapawera, the day was on small gravel roads with a hot and heavy weather across some inland valley \u2013 with the usual daily ascents\/descents\/climbs \u2013 lunch a bit later than usual in a town on the map that did not exist in the reality (unless an abandoned bridge counts as a village).<\/p>\n

Things were starting to get suspicious during our picnic with a few insects starting to play with the leg-hairs\u2026 insects usually don\u2019t bother us when it\u2019s really hot weather. But okay, feet on the bench and problem solved to enjoy the marmite-sandwich (yes, I kind of got to enjoy \u201cMarmite\u201d \u2026 still not the \u201cVegemite\u201d though!). 20 more kilometers with temperatures rising and muggy atmosphere, the bike literally stuck to the road with melted asphalt (our tires probably left some \u201cC&C and their three wheels were here\u201d marks in the tar all along that stretch of road), our water breaks were becoming more frequent, the road always climbing and the kilometers going slower and slower\u2026<\/p>\n

We finally reach Rotoroa at 4pm \u2026 3 \u2026 2 \u2026 1 \u2026 0! About 3 seconds after the town sign a huge storm with downpours of rain of hail fall on us \u2013 luckily this is the entrance of the \u201cNelson Lakes NP\u201d and trees hundreds of years old haven\u2019t been logged here. They will offer us a perfect protection for the next 20min.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Things now get very suspicious\u2026 the tree cover protects us from the rain, but it appears that insects here also don\u2019t like rain\u2026 so we get to enjoy the trees with an ever-increasing number of six legged creatures. A spread of some recommended insect repellent all over us and we feel that it shouldn\u2019t be a big deal.<\/p>\n

Time to pitch up the tent and the camp, it looks like everyone is either inside the cars, RVs or deep in the tents. Things are still tolerable (we\u2019ve already had mosquitoes and other annoying flying beasts previously). It takes a bit of time to disassemble everything and build the camp\u2026 time that sandflies take to launch a call throughout the forest: \u201cwe may have some prey tonight!\u201d (think of the calls of trees from the Lord of the Rings\u2026). Some people with engine vehicles are leaving the campground \u2013 very unusual in the late afternoon, where the next campground is over an hour drive away. The number of sandflies always increases \u2013 I\u2019m starting to go nuts outside. Sandflies don\u2019t just fly around you or lick your sweat (we have a lot of that juice\u2026), they bite \u2013 don\u2019t even hide their attack like mosquitoes, somehow go through the clothes and any type of skin, cut a piece of body, make you bleed, and leave you a toxin that will itch for three days. It seems that they love me \u2013 with already tens of bites from the previous days.
\nBack to the campground, where there\u2019s only a local dude \u2013 the alcoholic-smoker version of John Rambo walking around with shorts and truck-driver-style-T-shirt \u2013 he is welcoming any new arrivals by \u201cwelcome to hell, hahahaha!\u201d. Somehow, he\u2019s invented some type of anti-insect-shield around him because he doesn\u2019t appear to be affected at all… We are now finishing the camp with thousands (seriously!) of sandflies launching continuous attacks. Rambo is nearby, looking at us and proud to have some type of dinosaur-teeth-resistant-skin.<\/p>\n

We had read that sandflies don\u2019t like water, so next idea is: swim in the lake. That works pretty well, and we are considering the idea to sleep underwater with a straw. We don\u2019t have a straw, so another time maybe. The campground is now under constant sandflies-fire. We have a target to enter the tent in less than 2,5s (for two people): almost reached. We managed in that time to let only about 50 sandflies in the tent. We are fairly happy, because there are about 10 times as many, outside on the net. The fight in the 2 m\u00b3 starts, murder after murder, we get some bites, but by squashing the flies against the netting, the quantity slowly lowers\u2026 until we think we are done\u2026 and tens more appear from behind a bag. The struggle continues, we check every single seal of the tent because we have doubts that there could be a hole somewhere that would give the flying creatures an advantage. Tent finally cleaned!<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

But it\u2019s time to eat\u2026 shit, we only have noodles and that seems impossible to eat without boiling water outside the tent\u2026 we put on all possible clothes (waterproof snow gloves included). Only the eyes are not protected. Guess what, the fight is now focusing on the face and eyes. Dinner ready, we jump back in the tent, still the 50 sandflies to kill (plus the ten extras from somewhere behind the bags): the tent ground becomes covered with cadavers. No dish-cleaning tonight, no teeth brushing, it\u2019s too extreme to get out! We still have John Rambo in his chair and minimal clothes watching a Sylvester Stallone movie outside! I freak-out and try to do a brainstorming on how to not go to the bathroom at dusk\u2026 \u201cNo, I do not need to pee, I am the master of my body, I can control that bladder\u2026\u201d. Damn it, I must go! Sprint across the volatiles, sprint back, the 25 murders in the tent (I improved the jumping into the tent from 2,5s to 1,1s). And the entire night with a crazy noise of flying insects all around the area. One sandfly is quiet, 50 zillion are making a noise that makes anyone insane. The night is perfect though, nobody dares to drive or go out to do any noise.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

7am, time to wake up \u2026 same nightmare outside the tent, there are hundred insects already in position to come in \u2013 we do as much as possible from the inside of the tent and manage an incredible packing and departure in 15 minutes (versus 1,5h usually). As we ride by Lake Rotoroa, I tell Cassie \u201ctake as many pictures as you can, because I will never ever come back here\u201d, we have a big climb to start the day, but we forget to take water in the rush \u2013 doesn\u2019t matter, I prefer thirst over that.<\/p>\n

The first kilometer out of Rotoroa is at high pace to try to distance the beasts, and we are happy to have survived the last 12h of sandflies siege!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Our goal yesterday was a nice remote lake called Rotoroa (not the geyser-town \u201cRotorua\u201d if you followed our last posts, we are now in the South Island! Don\u2019t worry, we also get very confused with the names here\u2026). Starting from Tapawera, the day was on small gravel roads with a hot and heavy weather across some inland valley \u2013 with …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":920,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0},"categories":[59,183,186,3,1],"tags":[],"post_mailing_queue_ids":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/talkie-walkie.us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/921"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/talkie-walkie.us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/talkie-walkie.us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/talkie-walkie.us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/talkie-walkie.us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=921"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/talkie-walkie.us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/921\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":927,"href":"http:\/\/talkie-walkie.us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/921\/revisions\/927"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/talkie-walkie.us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/920"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/talkie-walkie.us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=921"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/talkie-walkie.us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=921"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/talkie-walkie.us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=921"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}