The Amazing Adventures of The WebStress and Pulsar the Hire Car
Part I - Trek to the summit of Mount Maungatautari (almost)

Since I made the brave step of hiring a car (which I discovered isn't the horrific experience that it is in the UK - they don't ask for a down payment of your soul in exchange for a Fiesta and a few scratches are par for the course) and setting out on New Zealand's largely deserted roads, I have seen some amazing sights.

I have never really travelled much on my own. In fact, the only real solo adventuring I have done to any extent has mostly been on the M5, M42 and M1 and the only real experiences to note are the service station toilets and anger inducing cost ineffective Ginsters sandwiches from the adjacent shop (none of which I can eat, although I usually buy a cheese sandwich and remove the offending dairy produce if I'm in need of a carb kick).

But this holiday I've been all over. I've driven to the east and west coasts, I've encountered beautiful lakes, volcanic environments (which had such an offensive stench that even I, who has experienced the most horrific of bodily functions and still managed to eat a marmite sandwich on my lunch break without further thought, couldn't face eating anything other than a biscuit for the rest of the day) and bubbling mud pools.

And I have taken an enormous amount of photographs (making up for in quantity from what I lack in artistic quality) that I have made my boyfriend sit and look through every night on my return (this is some sea; this is me with some sea; this is me with a large apple in my mouth, isn't it a really big apple?; this is my shadow when I was pretending to be superwoman at the top of Mount Maunganui; this is a landscape; this is another one of the landscape, but on manual focus; this is the same landscape but with me in; this is a sheep pissing (yes all these were photographs I actually took)). And, while his attention may have waned a little with each photograph that I made him look at, he dutifully stood by my side as I waffled on about 'a funny story' that was associated or told him a WebStress fact (definition: highly inaccurate, lacking in any real direction and fairly wooly at best).

I've done all this on my own. I've set off every day with a picnic, I've walked, I've attempted (and spectacularly failed) to absorb every leaflet, every informative board, every historical plaque that I've encountered. I've driven miles, I've seen sights that made me gasp (that somehow didn't come across in any of the 20 or so photos I took of such locations and they all seem to have the sense of being a little overcast).

And I've walked and walked and walked.

While I am fantastically terrible at most sports and outdoor activities that I have ever attempted, and the rest I'm mildly awful at, walking is actually something that I can do. And not only that, I'm actually quite good at it and will not give up after 10 minutes and suggest a cup of tea as an alternative activity.

Today, after exhausting the city's local activities, I decided to venture further afield (but still make it back for lunch and Melrose Place) while not spending too much cash.

So a walk it was. I studied local maps and set my target as climbing to the summit of Mount Maungatautari (no I have no idea how that is pronounced, but I did for about 2 minutes after someone told me).

While that may sound rather dramatic for a morning's exercise, Maoris seem to have named anything above a small bump a Mount of some description. According to the guidebook it was 797 metres and had a track to its summit. Doable, with a decent pair of walking boots and a few snacks.

I arrived at the desolate car park, populated with just one other vehicle: that of the park ranger. I asked him about the route which he said was steep and approved of my decision to wear walking boots. I geared up and was about to set off before he asked if I was okay with going alone as it was best to go walking with someone, and that while the area was as safe as it could be, I should be careful. I told him that someone knew where I was which seemed to suffice.

And so I set off.

The initial track was through farmland populated with sheep and cows. The sheep fled like waves parting for a modern day Moses (without the beard and religious connotations), however the cows were less skittish. Instead they closed in on me, mooing unsettlingly and I was extremely thankful that an electric fence divided me from them. Maybe they'd heard tales of Cornish Cow tipping.

After ducking under the odd electric fence and avoiding (where possible) large amounts of faeces, I came across a group of conservation workers at the top of the fields who the park ranger had warned me to 'make sure they didn't give me any hassle'. I walked by cautiously, making as limited idle chit chat as feasibly possible without being incredibly rude, and continued up the track.

The track was wide enough for a 4x4 and pretty steep. As I was stumbling over the gravel, the words of the park ranger were echoing in my head. There were two things I imagined he had warned me about being careful of. One was falling over and breaking my ankle (extremely possible considering that I appear to have been blessed with the balancing capabilities of an inelegant elephant (years of watching my dance performances as a child must have been torturous for my mum). The second was to be careful of other things, or people.

I was happy with the first. I had provisions and a telephone with credit. I could occupy myself waiting for help playing eye spy. I had a map, albeit a vague road map of the area, but still it was something to read. I could limp or crawl my way back if necessary. I was used to continually falling over, I have the ability to fall over invisible objects and have acquired so many bumps, scratches and bruises over the years that my skin rarely acknowledges the odd graze here and there. Flesh wounds could be solved with a plaster, a bit of blood would dry after a while.

The second I was less comfortable with. I quickly became aware that there was no one else around. My nearest neighbours as far as I could tell were the group of scary Kiwi men who were growing ever distant behind me. And I had a long way to go.

But I pressed onwards. I have an extremely fertile imagination when it comes to 'bad things that might possibly happen' and I wasn't going to let them consume my enjoyment of some good old cardiovascular exercise with a view at the top (camera at the ready, boyfriend on standby to be bored later).

I went up and up (as you tend to do when trying to reach the summit of a mountain) and tried to concentrate on the vegetation around me, although after a while and several hundred trees later, my interest was beginning to grow a little impatient. The top must be nearing. Or a photo opportunity of a view at the very least.

Then the orange markers that I'd been diligently following veered off the road and plunged into the undergrowth. Deep breath: On we go. Not too far now, it shouldn't be too far.

However five minutes of trekking up through the dense woodland, and I was no longer worried about the scary Kiwi men driving their 4x4 up the track to abduct me. They were beginning to look like Father Christmas in comparison to the possibilities that my mind was telling me may exist in the dense undergrowth.

I looked at my situation. I wasn't going to be able to run anywhere if something were to happen. The woodland was near vertical (or so my legs thought) and I was sweating profusely and struggling as it was. I hadn't seen a soul and I'd been walking for a very long time. And the trees were looking like they could hold an awful lot of scary things.

I have been struggling for years to come to terms with walking alone. While I have always been absolutely terrified of the dark, a few years ago in my final year at university I was mugged at knifepoint and from that moment on, my fear of walking alone or being anywhere vaguely secluded or remote expanded to the day. I was mugged at night, but it was only 7pm on my way home from attending the gym for the very first time (damn fool hardy idea). The most unsettling thing about the whole incident was that I'd been followed for some time by the (trying to suppress bitter undertones) bastard skag head who mugged me. It was possible that he was following me on my walk home from uni which resulted in me walking up, in hindsight, an incredibly unsavoury desolate path.

He had been watching, and when I was alone, he started running. I heard footsteps, and I turned to see him advancing on me. I started to run as fast as I could thinking if I could just reach the road, just a few hundred yards in front of me, there would be people, it would be okay.
I didn't make it that far, and with a small but still really not very friendly knife about a centimetre away from my throat (apparently if it had touched my skin then the bastard skag head would have faced additional charges to that of simply mugging, but that centimetre looked really really small at the time) he made me take out my wallet and phone out of my bag and give them to him.

He ran off then: People were chasing him up the alley (who I have an awful lot to thank for, as they took me home and calmed me) and he had what he needed. The police later said that, under these circumstances, I did what was right. If I had have fought in any way then, well, he was a heroin addict and they're not known for their compassion in situations such as this. Money equates to a hit and that's about where it ends. So they said, and I'm inclined to agree.

After, the police took me around the estates where I lived looking for him and I quickly realised that where we were living was basically situated in an extremely unsavoury area. This was confirmed a few months later by a documentary on the increasing heroin problem in Bradford, focusing on the council block directly behind our house with a few choice shots of needles, heated spoons and tin foil.

After that going anywhere on my own was difficult for a long long time. I had amazing support from my friends but now, even now, nearly 5 years later, while I have managed to suppress it as far as I think it may ever go, I can't do anything on my own at night, or in secluded places, without that fear. While I managed with a car wherever I could, it crippled my freedom in London as no bus or tube thought it necessary to stop directly outside of my house and I felt that fear every morning when I left in the dark, and every evening I returned home. I avoided people, I stopped and changed direction often, or waited until they'd passed I felt my heart pound so fast it made me sick when I could hear someone behind me, just walking to the tube stop on a morning. I felt stupid and foolish but only on occasions where fear was totally consuming me did I manage to swallow my pride and ask my boyfriend to meet me. The rest of the time I just felt my heart, felt the sickness in my stomach, felt the hairs rise on my arms and the back of my neck and dealt with it. Or didn't go out.

But I am stubborn, I can walk and I was going to walk to the top. What was the point in walking two thirds of the way? You climb a mountain for a reason. And I was not going to let the fear pulsating in my head take over. I repeated over and over to myself that I was merely out of my comfort zone, that yes, it was possible that situations could occur that would result in a particularly unhappy WebStress, but they were slim (the devil's advocate sitting in on such thoughts kept interjecting with unhelpful comments such as 'yes but what if this is the slim chance?' and I promised to have serious words with him once I'd returned to the car and composed myself). There was no one following, there was no one watching. I was okay.

I carried on and finally, finally I reached the top, which was possibly the severest anti climax of any hardcore uphill walk I have ever experienced. There was a bench. And lots and lots more trees. No view, not even half a view.

I didn't even stop. I was just relieved I'd made it. I carried on following the orange arrows, leading me downwards. I'd done it, I'd reached the top, and now I was going to get down as quickly as possible and go home for a well deserved cup of tea.

But something wasn't quite right. The orange arrows were heading downwards sure, but then a little way in the distance they were heading upwards again.

I hadn't reached the top at all.

I stood stock still for a moment, wondering what to do. And then, with no conscious control from me, my fear consumed my pride, my body turned and my legs took me back the way I'd came as quickly as possible.

My descent was thankfully a damn sight swifter than my ascent. I arrived back at the scary Kiwi men in impressive time. They asked me if I'd made it to the top. I couldn't lie, because I didn't know what was at the top. It may have been the most breathtakingly beautiful view conceivable or, if experience of previous resting points had led me to believe, it might just be a bench and some more trees.

I told them where I'd reached to. They nodded. Then they asked me some peculiar questions about how I'd found out about the mountain and how did I know it was pest free. By this point I'd gone beyond indulging in niceties with scary Kiwis, so I made my excuses and carried on down the hill.

En route I took an astonishing amount of pictures of the view that I could see, the cows (who had clearly been mocking my efforts to attempt the climb in retrospect with their communal mooing) and some sheep (one which was pissing).

I drove home, a little shaken, very relieved, a bit dazed (which resulted in an accidental massive detour) and rewarded myself with bad American comedy (Melrose Place was all over by that point) and a cup of tea.

My next outing tomorrow is horse trekking with a very large group of people over a vast amount of open countryside.