The 64-year-old Australian real estate agent and auctioneer is aiming to be the first person to solo circumnavigate New Zealand on a jet ski, and long hours in the saddle can have some painful repercussions.
"You don’t want to get monkey bum — that’s the big red rash up the butt — because that hurts.
"So lots of Vaseline is a good thing."
He arrived in Wellington earlier this month and since then, he has been making his way down the east coast of the South Island.
He was in Dunedin yesterday, and today he will head to his next port of call, Riverton, before continuing up the West Coast back to Wellington.
He will then travel anticlockwise around the North Island.
In total, the 5000km circumnavigation of New Zealand was expected to take about 25 days — 160 hours of which would be spent on the jet ski.
It is not the first time Mr Warner has done a marathon trip like this.
Previously, he became the first person to solo circumnavigate Australia (including Kangaroo Island and Tasmania) from Exmouth to Exmouth in Western Australia, clocking up more than 17,000km over 100 days.
He said the journeys were also about highlighting the importance of men’s health.
"It’s important to have the conversation. It’s important to see your doctor, check your sunspots out, get a finger up your bum for prostate cancer.
"If this trip creates a conversation or assists one person to make a healthy life decision, it will be worth it."
He said the isolation, the crocodiles, the wilderness of the Gulf of Carpentaria, the Kimberley, the wild west coast, ocean swells, and the mix of boiling and freezing temperatures made his Australian journey very challenging.
Comparatively speaking, jet-skiing around New Zealand was proving to be much more enjoyable, Mr Warner said.
"There’s no crocodiles, no tiger snakes and no brown snakes here in New Zealand, so I’m very happy about that.
"I saw my first sharks on this trip, little penguins, lots of albatross, and dolphins tend to come in like a pack of dogs. No whales yet though.
"New Zealand is such a beautiful place, and to go around and see the mountains from the coastline — I’ve seen more of New Zealand from the outside than I will from the inside."
