{"id":401,"date":"2012-10-10T22:10:16","date_gmt":"2012-10-11T05:10:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.audreyy.com\/?p=401"},"modified":"2012-10-10T22:10:16","modified_gmt":"2012-10-11T05:10:16","slug":"new-zealand-bruce-bay-aka-meet-the-sandflies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.audreyy.com\/?p=401","title":{"rendered":"New Zealand – Bruce Bay (aka Meet the Sandflies)"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"
Some beach, between Bruce Bay and Haast.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

On April 17th, our 3rd day in New Zealand, we were beset by the scourge of that otherwise wondrous isle – the detestable Sandfly.<\/p>\n

We were on our way from Fox Glacier to Queenstown, the “Adventure Capital of the World.” I wasn’t very excited for Queenstown, imagining an activity-oriented version of Vegas, but in the meanwhile, the drive down route 6 (South Island’s western coast) proved an experience of its own.<\/p>\n

The little bloodsuckers completely ambushed us.<\/p>\n

With wide eyes, we took in the mountains, ocean, and forests (all the while nervously twitching about the left edge of the road). At some point, a rather attractive bit of ocean called to us for a stretch break. It had stacks and stacks of white stones, foamy waves, and fresh air.<\/p>\n

\"\"
9gag was there the day before us!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

There were “I was here” rocks.
\nThere were chicken-soup message rocks.
\nThere were artsy rocks.
\nThere were memorial rocks.
\nThere were plain rocks.<\/p>\n

We had no markers, and no rocks, so we impotently appreciated the work of others.<\/p>\n

After some minutes, some gnats (so we thought) began to collect. This made us want to get back in the car and leave, which we did.<\/p>\n

We took a commemorative photo. You can see the grimaces, from the hovering “gnats.” Little did we know what was about to come.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

As we hopped into the car, tiny specks hitting our faces and bouncing inside<\/em> the windshield showed that we were not alone. Rather, we now had 30 very active, very biting<\/em>\u00c2\u00a0flies in a small enclosed space. As this unpleasant reality made itself triply known over the space of 5 seconds, the “conversation” went something like<\/p>\n

DEET\u00c2\u00a0WHERE’S THE
\nOPEN THE WINDOWS
\nKILL THEM
\nDEET
\nWINDOWS
\nGAAAH<\/p>\n

Elaine sprayed deet, someone opened windows, Sarah accelerated (maybe on the correct side of the road) and eventually 80kph wind blustered our attackers out. Some cleverly tucked themselves away to attack my sandaled feet approximately an hour later, but for the time being, we were safe. As we drove, my throat felt raw – whether from my recent plane ride, or from the DEET fumes, I wasn’t sure.\u00c2\u00a0I tried to breathe shallowly.<\/p>\n

By the time we pulled into the Adventure Queenstown hostel some hours later, I had 13 (yes, I counted) bug bites around my feet and ankles.<\/p>\n

And that was how I met the Sandfly.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On April 17th, our 3rd day in New Zealand, we were beset by the scourge of that otherwise wondrous isle – the detestable Sandfly. We were on our way from Fox Glacier to Queenstown, the “Adventure Capital of the World.” I wasn’t very excited for Queenstown, imagining an activity-oriented version of Vegas, but in the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-401","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-travel"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p9WqcV-6t","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.audreyy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/401","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.audreyy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.audreyy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.audreyy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.audreyy.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=401"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.audreyy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/401\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":407,"href":"https:\/\/www.audreyy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/401\/revisions\/407"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.audreyy.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=401"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.audreyy.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=401"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.audreyy.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=401"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}