iPad – check. iPhone – check. Camera – check. Hearing aids – check. Headphones – check. Smart watch – check. Electric toothbrush – check. Beard trimmer – check. Chargers and adapters for all the above – check. Combine harvester – check. Why oh why do I pack more gadgets and leads each year? Why do I spend another £9.99 plus postage and packing on stuff from Amazon? More things to fuss about, to lose, that say I’m no nomad, just another eco-tourist. More things to juggle for socket space in a sandfly-ridden shack at the edge of a New Zealand forest by the sea with unreliable signal and questionable drinking water.

I go to lose myself – and to find myself. And usually I do. But even preparing for it, I know I’m not actually a Creature of Nature. I won’t be chopping wood for my fire as the temperature plummets in the mountains, the unfamiliar Antipodean stars won’t twinkle romantically as my smoky char comes heroically to the boil, I won’t hear the mournful cries of distant mammals and crickets competing for my attention (or dread). I won’t hear the creeping footsteps of another intrepid traveller stealthily getting closer. I won’t call out with feigned nonchalance ‘Whoever you are, just come on in here and share my camp and stay the night’. On the other hand, neither will I wake up to find I’ve been murdered by the Mad Disaffected Ranger of the Kahurangi.

None of this – just a slow evening on the verandah of a shared house in the middle of a tourist panorama, where the offer of a drink gets ratcheted up on the bill of the Authentic Farm Stay. Oh cynical me! OK, so I’ve not left mentally yet. OK – I need a break. I’m still reading the papers, depressed by evil and inept ‘leaders’. I’m still looking at the gossip column for January football transfers. I’m still doing a lively social twirl before I go. I have been away for a couple of days’ walking on the wild winter Suffolk coast with my again-not-to-be Travelling Companion. I’m still sitting damp in London. Oh poor little Laz, I hear you say. So once again…. if you fancy…. for a third time… come with!

I am travelling light. No guitar this time. Just a small – easily identifiable – suitcase and a backpack that announce I’m really a student on a gap year. (Do you like my new pre-frayed denim jacket, by the way?). The first time I did this, in my teens, my suburban mum (she who always shaped my hair with wave set lotion to look like Cliff Richard) bought me 35 pairs of disposable paper knickers, some plastic food wrappers and a sand-coloured corduroy shirt with colonial epaulettes. Full of misplaced confidence (plus ca change!), I tried so hard to make out with a super sophisticated girl from Brooklyn. She got all my very best lines. I was almost there. Or so I thought – until she saw my open rucksack. Marge Shnall ran a mile, bellowing into the desert sky, tripping over yellow rocks and stones as she ran, the full moon in her eyes. I’ve never recovered. And maybe neither has she. Oh Margie, where are you now? Probably still running in circles round the Sinai desert…

So, here goes. Cathay Pacific via Hong Kong (yeah, me, the last revolutionary). Straight to Auckland. Then off to… well you’ll have to read it. I have of course written every blog entry already, just to save myself time you understand. I’m going to fill in the names of people, places and of stupid mishaps and send them whizzing into the ether with photos I’ll find of another lake with another snow-capped mountain. As if you believe any of it anyway. Because really all the time, you know I’m just sitting at home in London, in my floral print shirt and shorts, with a margarita, the central heating up full, and wearing the New Zealand 3D virtual reality headset I got off Amazon for £39.99 on Black Friday.

Looking forward to your company on the other side!