Holidaying Underthinking it styles Part 1.

Hello Underthinkers, its been a long time I hope you have been well. I have finished my first draft of my thesis so I will have plenty more time to regale you with my stories now. Well rant about stuff, but I thought I would begin the new year a little differently.

You see I am not always an overthinker, there is one area of my life where I am an underthinker and that is travelling, I find the best experiences are had when no planning is done, and you let the wind decide where you go.

My ideal travel vehicle.

So this new years I waited till the last minute to see what offers were on the table before I decided what to do. The offers were diverse and numerous, there was the stay in Dunedin, or get in a car and head to various holiday spots, Poolburn with Botts, Twizel with Yam, Aviemore with Geezer, Wanaka with Blakey-pooh, Nelson with Johnny, Queenstown with Mike, or just cruising with my man Bear Grylls

His trips always end with drinking urine so I decided against it

Since I am such a vibrant person that brings joy to all those I know, I decided to try and hit as many of those spots as humanly possible. The plan was formulated I would convoy to Poolburn with Yam to see Botts, from there we would continue the convoy towards to Omarama where Yam could continue onto Twizel and I could diverge to Aviemore, to spend actual new years eve.
The next day we rendezvous in Omarama and continue to Queenstown for a couple of days of rest and recreation.
I admit this is starting to sound well-planned, a little too well planned even...

The "Aaron's 2010-2011 New Year" Team

But I find that even travelling based on the wind requires a partial template, so that if the wind is not blowing you still have something to do. And besides staying in tents and houses require no pre-booking so you aren't locked into anything.

So the packing commenced, a summer holiday in New Zealand requires certain items.

Google really has taken over the world.

There are a couple of requirements of the holiday cricket bat.
1/. Ideally it is a generic brand, maybe a give away from a company, many years my holiday bat was a Wattyl paint bat.
If it is a big name bat such as Gunn-Moore or Gray-Nicholls, then it must be at least 10 years old, preferably your childhood bat, that has been left in the rain, and has big chunks taken out of the edges, and a liberally coating of black tape to hold it together.

2/. It must be no bigger than a size 5, to counter the one idiot on holiday that wants to be the hero, and attempts Sixes every ball, the key to holiday cricket is limited movement.

The ball has less requirements anything you can find really, a tennis ball will suffice, although the electrical tape on one side to induce swing, is a good addition.

The next item required is the Chilly Bin (Thats a cooler for you Americans, or an Esky for the Australians, or a Grrr Grrr grrr for all the literate bears reading this)

Picture unrelated

As long as your chilly bin can fit the required number of beverages and food, then it is a good size. Although in the ideal world you want the bin to be large enough to be used as the stumps in your cricket game, or as a seat.

If you are travelling around in the summer there will be plenty of Barbeques to throw food on, so travel with some good BBQ food always. For this I personally endorse sizzlers

The Devils food

 Now I hear the traditionalists balking, many a people publicly decry the sizzler as not a real sausage, and I will concede they are not allowed to be sold with the other meat products. But I have yet to met someone that once having tasted a sizzler maintains their resistance.

There main benefit is they require very little cooking to be made safe. Now we purchasing Sizzlers there are three main kinds Cheese, Double Cheese, and Triple Cheese. I am not sure if Cheese is actually an SI unit or not, so I am not sure what is the actual quantity of cheese in Cheese. But rest assured Double Cheese is the bare minimum you want, and Triple cheese is perfect quantity of cheese.

The last requirement is of course the tent to provide you with shelter.

Well space for your harem is important, this is of impractical size.

The holiday tent, should contain at least one pole that is been held together by duct tape, and happy thoughts ....

Flight and Keeping tents up were Tinks specialities...

The peg bag accompanying the tent must contain at least 6 different types of peg. If all you pegs match then you are doing it wrong, or you are a member of the royal family.
At least one type of peg, must be completely and utterly useless, either too weak to enter the hard ground, or too fat to fit through the loops on the tent. It is really just there to frustrate the tent putter upper.

WHY WON'T YOU FIT!! STUPID F****NG PEG!!!

Okay the car was packed and the plan was flimsy but existent so it was time to leave with no expectations of what would happen or what I would see. Stay tuned to find out what happened. Be rest assured it is a tale of magic, intrigue, adventure, sadness, happiness,  and plenty of underthinking....