Fawlty Towers

Following Rotorua we started to realise we were burning through our money quite quickly despite the fact we had been living off packet food and staying on cheap, sometimes free, DOC campsites. We'd been boiling water on the camping stove to wash with and using long drop toilets for God's sake. We needed to start making some money.

We'd heard that a lot of travellers made money as they go along by fruit-picking in different places depending on the season. We thought this would suit us staying in the van and would facilitate us moving from place to place over the year and so we looked online for location options and discovered that Hawkes Bay on the East Coast has year-round fruit picking work and workers were always needed. 

We planned to drive there, stay on a free site by the sea and see what was what. 

We arrived, and the next day registered with a kind of fruit picking temping agency and were told to keep our phone on and with us at all times. As soon as work was available the agency would send out a group text to everyone registered and they would give the work to whoever responded, on a first come first served basis. She couldn't (or rather refused) to answer any of our questions about when work was likely to start or how long an assignment was likely to last but we decided to give it a few days anyway, stick to the area and see if anything came up. 

...Nothing came up...

The towns around were so small and dedicated only to their agricultural trade, there was no other work to be found and so we decided to move to a city, we would head to Wellington and see what was available there. 

The drive was long and so en-route we searched for another free site to save us some cash. We were lucky enough to find one a little off the beaten track, inland and close to the Ruahine Ranges. 

When reading about the site we discovered that there was no access for campervans but we figured Peggie was small enough to squeeze in, and if needs be we could throw up the tent and feign ignorance about the van if we were spotted. 

Turns out, we needn't have worried. We reached the camp site to find a small fenced off field with one ginormous overlander truck, parked smack bang in the middle, complete with a chimney billowing smoke - this guy was taking the piss out of the no campervan rule! 

Relieved we pulled in and within seconds, we were surrounded by three jack russell dogs, yapping from all directions. To our surprise a face appeared from nowhere, right in our window "Hey! I'm Fawlty" it said. 

Fawlty was a tall, thin man with sallow cheeks, only a few teeth and strands of greasy dark grey hair, barely covering his mottled head, slicked back into a pony tail. His clothes were worn through with holes exposing his knees and elbows. He thrust his grubby, Fagin gloved, hand through our window for a shake. 

Turns out the overlander was Fawlty's and so was the table right next to it, the table I just noticed was covered in animal skulls...

"Ignore the dogs" He yabbered "I like to let them out when people arrive in case they don't like them". I didn't understand his logic here, in case the people didn't like dogs or the dogs didn't like the people? In either case, it still didn't make sense to me. I didn't question him though, I was distracted by the animal skulls at the time. 

"I live here in conjunction with the DOC." He carried on. "they were going to shut this site down but i'm keeping note of everyone that comes here and so far i've convinced them to keep it open" He looked very pleased with himself. 

"Erm, well done?" (Still distracted by animal skulls...)

"So, you guys are?" We told him and he made a note of us in his shabby notebook. "Couple from England, alright guys, enjoy your stay". 

"Thanks Fawlty"

The camp was quite remote and aside from another vault long-drop toilet there were no facilities, but being British and all we wanted a cup of tea and so I set off on a hunt for water. 

Despite attempting to creep pink panther style round Fawlty's skull collection, he once again appeared from nowhere with his gap-tooth grin. "Alright there lav?!"

"Yes thanks Fawlty, just looking for some water" Holding up my pan at him as proof. (I hadn't even noticed your skulls! Nothing to see here!)

"Ah there's no water supply up here, gotta walk to the stream back there, but no worries I can spare yas a couple of litres - come in!"

It probably wasn't my wisest move to enter Fawlty's Tower but I did, and while he filled my pan I had a little nosy. But just with my eyes, from where I stood, because you literally could not move in there. The place was filled with rubbish, and by that I mean actual litter that you're supposed to put in a bin. Beer cans, crisp packets, tins, all over the place. His unmade bed was raised at the end of his trailer and underneath were more piles of garbage and stacks and stacks of books and magazines.

He'd cleared a skinny trail amidst the mounds from his bed to the sink and to what, presumably, was his bathroom. I was grateful I couldn't see in there. His wood burning stove was aflame, probably fuelled by his accumulated crap. 

He had pots and pans littering his only kitchen work bench and more still filling his tiny sink. Half a joint lay still smoking in a full ash tray and the dogs lay amongst the rubbish looking a little stoned - they were nowhere near as active as they had been earlier that's for sure. 

"Nice place" I coughed. 

He smiled happily "I like it. Lived this way since I was three years old."

"Oh yeah?"

"Yeah, my parents liked to travel a lot. I gave it up for fifteen years for a woman and her God but it all got too much for me. We had eight kids, all girls, but they're all too busy now chasing that God to bother with me. Only the youngest sneaks out to see me sometimes"

"Are they Christian?" Chad wasn't with me, I could ask questions. 

He laughed "Aw nah, nothing like that. Their God is money. Always chasing money. They want to live in a nice house, with a nice car and all that. Me, I prefer to live simply. Got all the comforts I need here"

I warmed up to Fawlty then, we could all learn a lot from him. But not about cleanliness. Stick to your own ideas about that. 

"Yeah, we've got nothing at the moment apart from the stuff in our van over there". 

"Good for you kid!" He proferred the joint toward me. "Smoke?"

"Nah thanks Fawlty. Don't smoke" He lit up anyway, leaving my full pan of water just out of reach, surrounded by his dirty pots. 

"I shouldn't smoke really" he started. "I'm lucky to be alive. Had nine hours of intensive surgery to keep me here so every day I feel fortunate to wake up. I don't need fancy things, I'm just grateful for my life and each day I'm still here"

"Nine hours of surgery? What was wrong?" More intrusive questions. 

"Ah you know, all sorts lav, mainly my testicles"

"Oh..." Did I hear him right I wondered? I was pretty sure I had. Can't be many body parts that sound like testicles. How should I respond? Argh! I was suddenly out of questions.

I couldn't think of anything and Fawlty didn't appear to be elaborating any further either. I stood awkwardly, staring meaningfully at the pan of water, trying desperately not to think of Fawlty's testicles. 

What could only have been a matter of seconds, seemed like hours (well not really, but it seemed like a long time and you know what I mean) but eventually I was rescued by other campers arriving on site. Fawlty jumped up in excitement and practically leapt past me out the door "here ya go" he shouted as he passed "here's me mate, he's English to!" I grabbed my pan and watched as Fawlty's "mate" jumped out of the driver's seat, dived into the back of his van, locked the door and drew the curtains in record time, before Fawlty was even half way across the field. 

"Where were you?" Chas asked when I eventually returned. 

"Oh you know, just chatting to Fawlty about his balls" 

I'm annoyed with myself for not taking a picture of Fawlty's skull collection. So I googled "animal skulls on a table" instead. This is similar to what I saw that day - except there were more skulls.