KEY POINTS:
Let's be blunt. This was to be a moving, powerful story about the benefits and fun to be had taking a campervan away for a weekend of skiing. It has become instead a dramatic, edge-of-your-seat thriller about being evacuated off the mountain in a blizzard, moments after swishing off the top of the first lift at Turoa.
But let's not get ahead of ourselves. We shall rewind to a cloudy, if not yet wet, Friday evening, on the eve of the first of the three storms that would make much of the country their whipping boy.
We whizzed down the Southern Motorway in an Explore More Queenie campervan, full of wide-eyed, innocent hope, childlike excitement, and blind refusal to believe the increasingly grim weather forecast.
But by 9pm we were convinced we'd beaten the odds.
We'd made our first night base camp in Rotorua. "Pah!" we sniffed. "What storm?" The sky was clear (provided you squinted and looked only in one direction). Rotorua was, true to form, bloody freezing - but in that hopeful snow-on-the-mountains kind of way. And while cold may bother mere mortals, we campervanners were smugly snugged up in the Queenie's embrace.
Now, for a moment, I must pause and honour my roots.
I am from tent people; those hardy stock who travel light, sparing only scorn for those weak and soft caravan types with their comfy beds and their floral curtains. And yet... and yet... When it's cold enough to make your eyelids squeak, I am forced to admit there's something to be said for rocking up to a camping ground, plugging in and blasting the heater.
The Queenie is the second largest in the Explore More Fleet and perfect for winter trips away as it's big enough that you can stand up inside and have a wee bit of space to manouevre around inside, should you be trapped in, well, the first of three rather grim storms. Boards can also be pulled across the extra head room in the ceiling to make a perfect "rafter" space to store ski gear.
Hitting Ohakune at the crack of dawn the next morning, we whipped straight up the mountain where beautifully sculpted ice-dripping bushes lined the access road. Trudging up to the lift under the weight of skis and poles, we mocked the forecasters. The sky was cloudy but the day was still and remarkably warm.
And then, about halfway up the first lift, a gale whipped out of nowhere - stealing my favourite ski hat and feeding it to the drifts below, the fiend - and less than 30 minutes later we were packed up and back in Ohakune having inched our way off the hill in almost white-out conditions.
Right then. What to do with the rest of our three-day weekend in the now driving horizontal rain and sub-zero temperatures?
Step One. Thaw out. Off we toddled to Ohakune Motor Camp where the Queenie was once again plugged in. While it warmed up, it was off to the showers for me, where, bless them, they have installed heatlamps and heated towel rails in the shower stalls. Bliss.
Step two. Thaw out some more. The rest of the day passed in a succession of cafes, pubs and restaurants, lurching from one open fire to the next.
The following day - after another night bedded down under the pile of bedding that comes with the Queenie, listening to the weather lashing the windows - we were reluctant to stray too far from the mountain, hoping for a miracle and that the weather might clear. But after a brekkie at Ohakune's great Utopia Cafe and a small detour to the lookout over the Raurimu Spiral it was time to face reality.
Skiing was officially off. Consoling ourselves with a soak in hot water back at Taupo's DeBretts Spa Resort, we considered our options - park the Queenie at DeBretts Camping Ground and possibly sit in the hot water for days, or move on.
In the end we made the obvious decision - where else would you head in the worst weather of the year? The beach of course.
Stocking Queenie up with food and wine we headed for Raglan where - after watching a few straggling surfers do battle with the remnants of the stormy swell - we fired up the onboard cooker and feasted.
The final day of our "ski" adventure was spent zig-zagging our way home as the fancy took us. A wander around Raglan, followed by a detour to the spectacular Bridal Veil Falls, and another from Pokeno out to the beautiful wild coast of Port Waikato.
Parked up on the beach at the mouth of the Waikato River, we brewed a cuppa in Queenie and decided that, despite the skiing washout, life being chased by storms wasn't so bad after all. Provided you pack the heater.
- Detours, HoS
