Leaving Jack Behind

So we needed a van.

The decision has been made: We’re not going to rent. Even the scenario of (1) buying a van, (2) van completely breaking down and then (3) buying another van would still be cheaper than renting one. So we started looking at the ‘for sale’ ads in our hostel, which were quite abundant.

Before too long we found Jonathan, a French traveler who was selling his ’89 Nissan Vanette VX. Unlike Stanki’s van, it had a double bed – with a VERY good mattress at that – and a power steering system, an extremely important trait in such a heavy vehicle, especially if you’re about to travel the whole country with it.

We arranged for a test drive up to Mount Eden the following day. The test drive went extremely smooth up and down the steep road, the van didn’t seem to have such a hard time and was relatively easy to drive. Lucky me that my dad always had sorts of vans and other big cars, so I had plenty of practice for this trip. True, he didn’t teach me how to drive on the wrong side of the road, but still. Thanks dad!

Jonathan was selling lots of maps and all sorts of useful equipment with the van, like kitchen utensils, a cool box, some tools and – most importantly – a fishing rod, which we’re still trying to get rid of every time we meet a local who might be interested in fishing. No luck so far. All in all, the deal seemed quite fair, and Jonathan appeared to be a friendly and trustworthy person. He showed us some downsides, a half-broken handle, a bump in the back corner, the rear view mirror wasn’t perfectly screwed in (already fixed by now), but nothing was too alarming. He even tried to help us fix the dead left speaker for about half an hour, but when we realized it’s both the speaker AND the wiring that’s malfunctioned – we gave it up. It was too bad for us, music lovers as we are, but it sure wasn’t a deal breaker. We shook hands, and the deal was sealed.

During our talking it appeared that Jonathan, blessed be he, had an extra two+ months of third party insurance, which he would not be using. A quick call to the insurance company arranged that our names would be put on the policy as well, et voila! Free insurance for the Jack-leavers! We took it one extra step and signed up for a 6-month AA membership (99$, not available for a shorter period of time ), which made sure that if we ever got stuck around nowhere – they will come in a shining armor and tow us away. We even got with our membership a full set of excellent maps of all the NZ regions and big towns, that would otherwise cost quite some money. We were satisfied.

The next day we went to the post office together and changed ownership (9.50$), only then learning that the ownership papers would take a week to be delivered to Pentlands by post, so we’d have to be in Auckland for that. No problem: The obvious plan was formed – we drive through the Northland region up and down, and since the way out of Northland must pass through Auckland again – we’ll pick up our ownership papers then.

Only thing left was to name our new traveling home slash best buddy before we hit the road. It didn’t take us long to realize that this is probably the oldest vehicle we would ever drive, almost as old as we are <cough cough>, and so it was settled. Welcome to the family, Gramps!