...I HOPE!

 

Thursday was spent searching for the perfect car to tool around New Zealand in. We had gotten our hopes up for a 93 Suzuki carry van but the Dutch owners, the Van Goghs (relations? maybe?), managed to sell it off right before we were supposed to look at it. They parted cell phone calls with a hint- "go to 33 Battersea Street in Christchurch and maybe you will find a good deal on a van." Sounded a bit enigmatic to me, but we went anyways and ended up at the Backpacker's Car Market where there sat dejected looking cars accompanied by even more dejected looking owners trying to sell them off. Many of them have sat in there for more than 2 days hoping that the prospective buyers gingerly entering the warehouse would take a fancy to their car.

 

We inspected three different vans. The cheapest at 2800 NZ (these are all asking prices, mind you, nowhere near selling prices) was a beat up old van manned by two Israelis. The next at 3500 was a 1987 Toyota with a purple bed, a parquet floor and a German surfer couple. They nearly got us, but I fell in love with the most expensive, a 3900 dollar 1986 Toyota Hiace on sale by a British couple about my age. This baby is a monster- large enough for the queen sized air mattress on a platform in the back, a full row of seats, and the entire drivers bench seat, not to mention and enormous rack on top that looks like it once carried luggage and passengers in India. Dolly (that's her name given by owners twice removed) is white and resembles an overgrown shoebox on wheels. We had to compete with a Frenchman bicycling around the world in 4 years for the purchase (if he's so set on bicycling, what the hell does he need the car for?). In the end, it was our offer of 3300 and a home cooked meal at our motel that sealed the deal. They ended up coming over and having a 5 hour dinner with us and we managed to pay off the amount in full by noon of the following day since it isn't often that people try to take 3300 dollars out of a student bank account and my account certainly wasnt happy.

 

I hope Dolly doesn't die on us and I hope that we can sell her off in Auckland.

 

Bon voyage.