Type 2 fun

4th March 2026

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2–3 minutes

Kia ora,

Do you know about the fun scale? It’s a way of categorising experiences based on how easy to hard the experience was.

Type 1 fun is a joyous adventure that you don’t want to end.
Type 2 fun is difficult, challenging, or arduous in the moment, and you might want to quit, but when you look back, you appreciate what you did.
Type 3 fun is awful at the time and awful when you look back on it. You Do Not want to repeat that experience. Ever.

Type 2 fun and type 3 fun are what a lot of armchair adventurers enjoy reading about. Trips they’d never go on themselves, but they still want to read about others going on them!

I’ve fortunately not found myself in a type 3 situation (maybe that means I’m not living life hard enough? Or maybe I just know my limits). But I’ve been in plenty of type 2 situations.

Hauling myself up to French Ridge Hut definitely meets the type 2 criteria. Hated it on the way up (I stopped to eat a Peanut Slab and have a cry). Hated it on the way down (thought I’d slip and bounce all the way into the Matukituki Valley).

But I made it! I survived. And I’m bloody proud of myself for doing that overnighter on my own.

Deborah smiles at the camera. She is hearing a tan bucket hat and light green shirt. The valley falls away in the background. — Above the bushline, but before I cried. On the track to French Ridge Hut in the Aspiring National Park.

If you’re writing about your adventures, how would you categorise them? Type 1, a joyous romp filled with good coffee and great views? Type 2, a painful, hard, but character building adventure? Or type 3, an omg I really, actually, could have died ordeal?

Here’s to more type 1 and 2 trips!

Happy writing,

Deborah

PS. I loved this Friday essay from the Conversation: I thought a 5‑day solo hike would reclaim a lost self. My menopausal body had other plans, by Rachael Mead.

PPS. Were you in New Zealand last night and lucky enough to catch the lunar eclipse? I set my alarm for 12.30am and hoped the cloud would stay away. And it did! Without my glasses on, the moon looked a bit blurry, but it was a beautiful coppery red.