Tag: travel

  • Free Ride to Plog a Supervolcano

    I bummed a ride this morning from Palmerston North (in the North Island of New Zealand) to the little city of Taupo, which sits on the rim of a giant volcano crater. While it’s currently dormant, scientists keep a close eye on it because of its supervolcano status.

    Lake Taupo is one of the largest and most active supervolcanos on the planet, not by surface area but by explosive power.

    The city of Taupo was nauseatingly busy today due to a car race happening this weekend, so I escaped to plog a little park overlooking the town of Kinloch.

    The flowers were left to remember the local resident recognised on the plaque near the seat: Yvonne Maureen Pitt.

  • Plogging Mt Cleese

    The comedian John Cleese took some deathly piss out of Palmerston North many years ago, so another comedian Fred Dagg named a huge pile of local litter after John. It’s now a recycling station, topped with green waste compost.

    Maybe I could be buried there after I “take my terminal breath”?!

    When I grow up, I want to be compost.

    Here’s the Instagram reel about plogging Mt Cleese.

  • Is Plogging a Biohazard?

    Mystery solved: My bag wasn’t lost. New Zealand biosecurity officers were stumped by my padlock and couldn’t check out something dubious inside.

    It wasn’t my new plogging tongs (deliberately brought to avoid biosecurity concerns); it was my wife’s hand cream, because it looked like a jar of honey 🤣.

    I’m now ready to start plogging Aotearoa at dawn tomorrow.

    These metal plogging tongs replace my usual bamboo tongs, to avoid biosecurity problems!

  • Plog Vlog Ended Up with a Blog

    Capturing the plogvlog.com URL came with a convenient blogging platform and the question “What to do with this opportunity?”.

    Feijoas growing at where I’m staying – No luggage but no lack of free food!

    Plog Vlog is about plogging beautiful places, with the places being the protagonists of the vlogs. Plog Vlog isn’t a travel vlog, so it doesn’t tell the story of getting to the plogging locations. This blog could tell those stories.

    I’m writing this in Palmerston North, New Zealand, after trip involving a cancelled flight and lost luggage. I’d planned to film plogging around Mt Cleese this morning, but my plogging tongs and camera mounts are in that lost bag. So, instead, I’m sitting at a table typing this in my one set of clothes tasting my unbrushed teeth. I’ve got my cameras and not much else; cameras aren’t much use for maintaining personal hygiene.