The deep dark secrets of Waiheke Island

Confession: I despise guided tours.

I wish I liked them. I’d love to think of myself as someone who cares about ancient ruins or art history and wants to soak up all possible information. As a professor, it’s virtually a fireable offense to admit that someone lecturing about history or culture bores shit out of you.

Unfortunately on vacation, as in life, my brain is too occupied with more pressing thoughts like: what I am going to consume next and is it a cheese board and an Aperol Spritz?

Or: what’s going on with my fellow tourists and are they boning?

Facts go in one ear and out the other.

That’s why, when I travel, prefer to skip the guided tours and stick to the priorities: binge reading, day drinking, and eavesdropping.

But desperate times call for desperate measures, and traveling internationally with two small children is nothing if not the definition of “desperate times.”

So, with only a single free afternoon to spare in Auckland, New Zealand, I did the unthinkable and signed us up for a hop-on-hop-off bus tour of Waiheke Island, a stunning bit of land that is all rolling hills, wineries, and rainbows.

Most people walk or bike from one winery to the next. However, my children suffer from a debilitating illness called “pathologically acute laziness” and walking more than 1/10th of a mile results in at least one of them screaming that their legs are “breaking apart into a million pieces.”

So it was the bus tour for us.

Despite previous experiences, I was hoping for the best from the bus, since we couldn’t actually visit any wineries. I mean, we could have tried, but based on previous experiences, it would be cheaper and faster just to go in, throw down a hundo, dump wine on ourselves, break a few glasses, and leave.

We had no choice but to be content with the bus tour.

Little did I know that’s where things would get interesting.

For the first half of the island tour, Kai, our guide, gave the standard spiel about facts, history, yadda yadda yadda.

Did you know that Waiheke Island is the sunniest place in New Zealand, with over 2,000 hours of sunshine a year? Me either- I had to google that, because my children were acting like loose bowling balls rolling around the bus and it was taking all of my mental effort not to hurl myself off of it every time the doors opened.

We got off at the last bus stop and, after a relaxing lunch characterized by alternating banishing the kids outside or letting them play iPhone games under the table, we hopped back on.

The ride back was wildly different.

I don't know what happened to Kai in those two hours but it was clear he no longer gave a single fuck.

Instead of spouting facts, he started spouting gossip. It was a one-man tell-all of the island’s deep and dirty secrets.

I was astonished. I kept looking around the tour bus to see if any of the passengers were clocking the flood of tea pouring out of the driver’s seat, but it seemed like they were all too inebriated from wine (adults) or candy (my kids) to care.

I was left to marvel on my own at the most juicy tidbits, which included:

• the scandal of the year: a local judge approved a controversial real estate development—and then was busted for being in cahoots with the developer! They were wine club cronies. Apparently, if you want to get in on the crime scene in Waiheke, you need to know your pinots.

• a tale of a mysterious fellow named Greg (no last name) who supplied the island's firewood but then vanished.

• shit talk about specific Airbnbs—which Kai physically pointed out as we drove past (!!!). Somehow Kai knew a lot of details about these places, including rent per week and whether or not you could touch both walls if you stood in the middle and held your arms out.

• shit talk about the other tour bus driver, Jada…but the shit talk had that sort of flirty quality to it where you can tell the person means the opposite of what they’re saying.

• a story about the time all the island's police responded to a swordfight but it was actually just the local loony walloping some kids with a walking stick

For once, Ash had gotten my full attention. I had so many questions, like:

• What happened to Greg? Could this be the start of Season 4 of White Lotus? Failure to adequately supply firewood seems like the perfect motive for murder.

• What was going on between Kai and Jada? Are they would-be lovers or real enemies? Is bus boning happening?

• Is smacking kids with a walking stick considered OK in New Zealand? If so, how could I get my hands on one? (I’M JOKING, jeez.)

But honestly, none of these compared to the juiciest deet Kai dropped: info on the local Facebook community group. It’s called the Waiheke Whinge and the whole thing is dedicated to making fun of bad behavior on the island. Here are the Facebook page rules:

Who needs the Ten Commandments when you have rules like these?

“You must only send unto others the dank-ass memes you would want to receive.”

Needless to say, I have printed out these rules and posted them next to the doorway to our home to serve as a guide to all those who enter.

I've also decided I'm going to quit my job and start up my own tour bus company dealing entirely in hot goss.

I’ve got the perfect business model already:

The basic tour will include deets on Facebook page arguments, church lady wars, and cross-town rivalries.

The deluxe tour will include love affairs, legal scandals, and murder mysteries—including live reenactments. Complete with swords.

All facts optional, obviously.

Also, the tour will take place in the Raleigh suburbs.

Sure, the physical beauty can’t compare to New Zealand, but who needs stunning vistas when you’ve got neighbors passively aggressively fighting over whose lawn violated the HOA bylaws?

Hope to see you on GoGoGossip Tours!

Thanks for reading! If you related to the kids-in-restaurant stuff, you might enjoy this recent piece by one of my favorite funny people, Sara: Operation Chaos: a tactical briefing for eating out with your toddler.