One of the things I really enjoy is driving. Despite the gammy knee and the bad back I genuinely like forcing myself to sit behind the wheel of a car for hours at a time and daydream between bouts of concentration on traffic.
For this reason, I’ve always loved travelling here in New Zealand, the roads themselves are always interesting. This is of course because they have not to be overrated things like curves and stuff to look at. By way of contrast, the two biggest drives I’ve ever been on were from Melbourne to the Alice (four days one way), and LA to christknowswhere Mississippi (five days one way), and mostly involved desert roads that were straight for hundreds of kilometres. So you can imagine my comparative boredom on the longest single trip, which was Dallas, Texas to Phoenix, Arizona. Twenty-two hours with only pitstops and a trip to the Alien museum in Roswell, New Mexico. Was a little tired after that one, but had to get the car back to LAX.
Both these two big road-trips were amazing, but the parochial kiwi in me has to argue that they’re nothing like that trip straight up the centre through the slowly transforming landscape of the North Island. If you’ve never really ever driven Te Ika o Maui, or the Mainland for that matter, I’m going to have to ask what in the hell have you done with all your time? The North Island is simply some of the best scenery anywhere.
Now, I realise that scenery is one of those relative things. No matter where you are the landscape you’re looking at is always fantastic, it’s just one of those things about landscape. But after fifteen years of hitching and driving all over the place in every season, the majesty of Ruapehu summoning clouds to court its snowy peak, and the barren tussock of the Desert Road remains one of my favourite sights.
As a quick aside, in 96 a few of us took a chance for a free trip to Wellington from Auckland on a student protest. It was ridiculous, we went during Easter when there were no pollies to harass. Note to whomever organised that cock-up, you are a munter. I digress. A few of us were in a minivan and about to get to the aforementioned Desert Road, and we had a particular Queenslander I’ll call M. Tiberius with us. Being Aussie he was keen to see this mythic Desert.
His comment? “Desit! That ain’t a desit! You could put 50,000 head of sheep on that!”.
Regardless of the misnomer, I can always favourably compare that sight to walking the cliffs of the Grand Canyon, and feeling like I’m in a virtual IMAX theatre, or walking the base of Uluru, with tens of thousands of years of myth written into its walls (only suckers climb to the top for a view of sand), or waking in a tent to minus 15 degrees and a red dawn over the blood red mesas of the Monument Valley, or drinking iced tea under Spanish-moss drenched magnolias outside civil war mansions in the Deep South.
Yeah, I just love driving to places. Flying is all good, but obviously Quantas can’t stop in five or six different pubs along the same highway in South Australia and the Northern Territory for you to find that some crafty salesman has provided every one of them with exactly the same ‘Singing Fish’ wall trophy (or that every one of them wants to show it off. You push a button and the fish sings. The first two were funny, the rest, bizarre). American Airlines can’t provide you with exactly the same ‘shortstack with bacon and percolator coffee’ in every roadside diner from LA to Dallas (in Louisiana I had gumbo instead). And Air NZ can’t provide you with an entire pub full of people in Tokumaru Bay singing ‘Alice, Alice, who the…’.
You might have gathered from this that I finally left Wellington after only snooping up limited information for you. Best Goss? A cousin tells me that ‘Maori Party’ is a synonym for ‘Student Politicians’. Now there’s a surprise. Hopefully a term in Parliament will season any successful candidates.
After spending something like eleven hours on the X-Box Thursday, the whole time with my mode switched to ‘Holiday’, and not ‘Job-Seeker’ or ‘Researcher’, I piled into an Avis car relocation ($20 plus gas!) and drove up to Auckland on Friday. Two things struck me on the trip. Well, actually three things, but I’ve already gushed about the scenery.
No. Actually there’s four things. Did I mention you can’t buy Bacon and Egg pies in Victoria? If anyone asks ‘who ate all the pies?’ Che. I’m loading up on those things, having eaten about half dozen since arriving from Melbourne. And all this before I have to keep turning down gristle and cabbage stalk passed off as “steak mince”. The Great Australian Four and Twenty Pie? It might really be blackbird in there.
Anyhow, the first drama on the trip was the roadworks. Every fifty kilometres, fat blokes with shiny vests and lollipops. Sure, it’s good that they’re fixing every pothole between Wellington and Hamilton before the budget expires, but… Plus, its worse when I actually get to Auckland. Eight hours driving very slowly and then sitting in traffic on the Motorway? You can damn well keep that shit.
I reckon it’s about time you all woke up to the reality of public transport. You know, that way of getting to work where you get to sit next to the fat lady with BO? Or you end up talking to the hairy crazy guy who’s convinced he has the best conspiracy theory every? For instance that “Iraq is to harden up the Marines for invading Tehran”. But PT isn’t all that bad people.
Again, I LOVE driving. But that sitting in traffic bullshit is pointless.
OK, that second thing is the Police. In fifteen years I have never, ever seen so many patrol cars. Never. Haven’t these people got something better to do? Like maybe stop crime? Or rescue damsels in distress?
But before I get too carried away, let me tell you a little story about a mate in Melbourne who calls himself Wogfulla. Wogfulla is the most law-abiding citizen I’ve ever known. He gets pissed off at me for not indicating when sitting at a left turn only sign for example. Even when he’s in another car and watching me from two lanes away. Wogfulla, I’m in a left turn only lane, if the car behind me is wondering where I’m going then I’m wondering where they learned to drive.
So one time a few of us are in Portsea, a down the coast from Melbourne, and my car leaves earlier than his to head back to the city. We’re waiting around for Wogfulla at his place and when he hasn’t turned up after a fair while his girlfriend is getting a little worried. When he does finally get to the house he can’t stop smiling. Naturally, we ask him what the go is.
It seems that on his way home he was pulled over by two officers in a patrol car. An officer approaches Wogfulla’s car, and asks him politely if he knew the speed he was travelling. Wogfulla dutifully replies, “oh, 95 or 97 kmph?”. The officer then asks him to confirm his speed, and then states that he was indeed travelling at 97kmph, and asks for Wogfulla’s drivers licence.
Seeing that the officer seems to be writing him a ticket, Wogfulla asks what the problem is. Well, says the officer, the speed limit here is, of course, 70kmph. Wogfulla, a little confused, says, ummm, no, it’s actually a hundred. The officer denies this, but when Wogfulla insists, wanders back to his patrol car. After conferring briefly with the other officer, the first officer walks back to Wogfulla and asks, are you sure?
At this point, Wogfulla is asked to take the officer up the highway, onto an overbridge, back down the highway, and then back onto the highway again a few kilometres back. Driving along, Wogfulla points to a sign saying “100”. Then, a second sign saying “100”, and then, drops the officer back at his patrol car.
The officer says, umm, under the present circumstances, we will let you off this time. But, please don’t speed in future(!). Oh, and we’d appreciate it if you didn’t mention this to anyone.
Wogfulla told everyone he knew.