Hitchhiking in NZ
If you ever feel the urge for hitchhiking, New Zealand is hands down the easiest place to do it. It’s perfectly set up for it having only like 1 road going around both the islands. You just have to stand on the correct side of that 1 road and jobs a good’n, you’ll get picked up.
And you will mostly only meet cool people, because whoever stops to give you a lift has already decided to help a fellow human being and is offering a free ride.
I have a few brief hitchhiking stories to tell before telling the main one. Here they are:
Over the Winter season I had just managed to get a job working for Cardrona Ski Resort as a food prepper in the kitchens. I lived in Wanaka which was 20-30mins from the bottom of the mountain pass to reach the resort, then from there it would take another 30minutes to reach the top.
To get to work each day the company ran a bus schedule picking up from a few points in town and taking us up the mountain to work.
Now the thing was, the bus I had to get left from town at 6:15am. I struggle to get up in the morning, and getting up at 5:15am to cycle into town in the freezing cold to get the bus, required a huge amount of will power. Especially from working like mad at Cardrona in peak season!!
It was super hectic in the main kitchen, and we’d finish work at 5pm to get the bus back into town, which mostly you had to wait for, getting into town at 6:30-7pm, having a few drinks with friends, then cycling home…
BIG DAYS.
I was shattered most of the time.
You can probably see where this is going…
There would (understandably) therefore be some days when… it just wasn’t possible for me to make that early morning bus into work.
In which case I would try my hand (or should I say thumb) at hitchhiking.
I remember one time I missed the bus, I got picked up by the coach of the Olympic Chinese girls skiing team! This guy was actually eastern European and had competed at the top of his game. He told me of his trials and tribulations of competing and then how he got into coaching afterwards, most recently recruited by the Chinese. An unusual start to the day for sure.
Another time I got a lift up the mountain with a group of Aussie guys who picked me up in their huge hired van, when there was only 5 of them inside. The rest of the space in the van was used for crates of beer!
They were on a lads skiing holiday. I say skiing holiday but the main thing to them was alcohol, so it was more of an alcoholiday. It was literally 8am in the morning and they were handing out the beer bottles and knocking them back like they were water.
The crazy thing was, the driver Aussie who was taking me and the lads up to Cardrona, was knocking them back just like the rest of them! Speeding up the mountain road, beer bottle in hand, he swerved round the corners whilst slurping half a bottle of beer down at a time.
It was pretty funny really. There was me sat in the van with these Aussie lads, I’m going to work and dressed in my Cardrona work clothes, and they are getting pissed and rowdy, giving each other banter about girls and nights out so far on the holiday and getting pumped for a super drunk day on the slopes.
But I didn’t feel totally like the odd one out. They offered me a beer and, well… who am I to turn down a free beer? So I joined them!
Such a fun start to the day!!
Instead of getting the usual sleepy bus with my co-workers, I was thrown into the midst of a proper Aussie party bus and having a drink with them on the way to work 😉
Another day was completely different yet again. I was with a family of 4, Mum and Dad sat in the front seats and a girl of about 6 and a boy of about 9 sat in the back.
This family were exceedingly posh. The boy was playing a riddles game and asking his parents very difficult, intellectual questions, especially for a boy of his age. “Mummy: if 2 parrots were at the entrance to 2 roads, one road let to hell and the other to heaven, one parrot was a liar the other always told the truth and you could only ask one parrot one question to find out which path to take, what would you ask?”
And the ‘Mummy’ or ‘Papa’ would reply in their very plumy accent “Darling” this and ‘poppit’ that, and “I expect I would have to ask one parrot about the other parrot…” I noticed the boy wouldn’t ask me what I thought. I got the feeling he suspected I wasn’t his equal on intellect. The annoying thing was, he was probably right.
“How people can be so different” I thought after these vastly contrasting experiences of hitchhiking up the mountain on my way to work. “How diverse human beings we are.”
There are 2 standout hitchhiking stories I’ve had, combined with lucky lift sharing, that followed my late hitchhike’s into work at Cardrona… Here’s one for ya:
Standout Hitchhiking Story No.1
I’d decided to hitchhike to Dunedin.
Originally I had planned to go with a friend but it turned out she had made other plans, and to be honest, I didn’t want to spend money on the bus.
As it was, I was going to be paying out a large lump sum of money to the NZ government, mostly in medical bills, so that I could gain another one year’s tourist visa and continue working and travelling NZ.
This was in fact why I was planning on going all the way over to Dunedin from where I was living, which was in Wanaka, at least a 3 hour drive away.
From the information I’d found online, these medical tests were (stupidly) a different price everywhere you went. Auckland, in the North Island, was known to be the cheapest.
However, I was living in Wanaka near Queenstown which is south of the South Island and though it might have actually worked out a bit cheaper for me to fly to Auckland and back rather than get it done down in Wanaka, I thought that option kinda ridiculous and I didn’t like Auckland so much anyway.
After some more research I’d looked at the website for the prices in Dunedin and it showed me that compared to Wanaka, it would be just less than $200 cheaper! Seeing that, I quickly called them up and booked myself in for the next available appointment, Tuesday at 1pm…
So there I was, walking down the main entrance/exit road on the outskirts of Wanaka, trying to find a good spot for a potential car to pull over, pick me up and take me in the direction of Dunedin.
I’d managed to get myself into this hitchhiking position, having rolled out of bed and eaten a bowl of cereal by just after 8am.
As I was stood there watching not many cars go by for half an hour, I looked at the time and thought to myself:
“I shoulda got here earlier…
If it takes at least 3 hours going straight there, if I get a few different lifts and have to wait inbetween and it’s coming up to 9am, if I get a lift now it’s only gunna give me an hour’s grace to get to the medical centre for 1o’clock…”
Sort of regretting not realising this sooner and getting up earlier, I continued eagerly waiting by the main road, as the time ticked by, still also holding out hope for some lovely, generous person to come and save me.
I watch as one more car comes out of Wanaka along the exit road, but this time, they started to indicate to pull over on the left next to me!!
The car comes to a stop and I rush over to them and bend to look through the car window. It’s a middle aged woman with a mousy face and she asks where I’m heading.
“Dunedin” came my hopeful reply.
“Oh no I’m not going that way today… I could take you a bit further… but yeah nah, I reckon here is probably a better place to hitch from.”
“Ahh OK, no worries… thanks for stopping anyway”
“Bugger” I thought to myself, “thought I was in then”
The wait continued and the time was fast approaching 9:30. I said to myself:
“If no one comes by like 9:30-9:40, I’ll just head back home.
9:35 and it was almost time to pack it in, when an old Ford Mustang pulls over next to me and rolls down the window.
An older gentleman maybe mid fifties was behind the wheel and he asks me where I’m headin.
“Dunedin” came my not so hopeful reply.
“Me too…” he said.
“Ah awesome!! Thank you so much” I said as I quickly swung open the passenger door and took the seat with my backpack on my lap as we pull out onto the road to Dunedin.
His name was Fred and he was making the journey to Dunedin to meet up with a friend.
I explained why I was going to Dunedin and he said he wasn’t going right into the centre so he could drop me somewhere outside and I said that would be great.
He begins to tell me about the part of the country in which we were travelling through, appearing to be very knowledgeable about it’s history. Pointing out a bridge, lakes and rock features which now, all the detailed information he passed on has escaped me, but at the time I found this to be very interesting.
And Fred only got more and more interesting as he disclosed to me his whole life story!
He said ” To live in Wanaka you have to be flexible and work 2 or 3 different jobs through the various seasons in the year.
Growing up he trained as a pilot and got his pilot’s license. He said he could fly anywhere he liked, exploring all around New Zealand.
He got into the Whiskey business and said if I knew the distillery opposite Cardrona Ski Field. As it happened, I worked at Cardrona so I actually went past this distillery almost everyday and was considering stopping by for a tour.
He went on to say that he and his friends purchased a couple of special barrels of whiskey, this Whiskey wasn’t ready to drink yet, it was an investment which cost them a combined total price of a cool, couple million dollars!!
So this guy was doing alright for himself!
We made our way on through a back country road and what seemed like the middle of nowhere. He assured me this way was more direct and he’d often come this way instead of the main road.
Checking my watch every now and then it had been 2 and a half hours since we began our journey as the clock showed me it was 12:10pm.
I thought “OK we must be only half an hour away now, maximum, so he can drop me somewhere and I should have enough time to find my way to the hospital for 1pm.”
Half an hour later we still hadn’t reached the edge of the city and I was beginning to get nervous, but there wasn’t much I could do about it. I brought up google maps on my phone and searched for the centre so I had it all ready for when I had to bail and would probably need to make a run for it.
As I’m doing that though Fred says:
“You know what, I can drop you by the centre, it’s not far… otherwise you might miss your appointment.”
“Man, that’s really kind of you… thank you, I really appreciate that.”
So as we finally came in to the outskirts of the city, the time was ticking on to 12:50 but we still had a few minutes drive to the centre and at this point I was really on the edge of my seat!
Had I come all this way to miss my appointment and have to rearrange it all for another day? From my experience going to the doctors in England, you had to be signed in the waiting room at the time set for you and no later, otherwise the next person in line could take your slot.
This wasn’t worth thinking about so I focused on where we were and where I had to get to.
We’re almost there and yet we come to a premature stop from where I needed to be. Traffic!! Shit!!
Now Fred is looking for a suitable place to drop me as we edge slowly nearer to my destination.
Creeping onwards he see’s a place to pull in and says
“OK I’ll drop you here Giles. Goodluck with your travels.”
I thank him again for kindly dropping me here (without me giving any money too) and I exit the Mustang, swinging my backpack onto my back and I wave goodbye to Fred as my attention then had to clearly focus on finding this place as fast as possible.
The time was 4 minutes to 1 and counting!
From checking the map, it looked like the clinic was along this road near where I was but I couldn’t see any signs for it. Rushing over to the other side of the street I jogged along looking this way and that for where to go.
Then I saw it. A sign up ahead. I followed the sign into a building but this did not look like the place for a clinic… more like a shopping mall.
There was a staircase going up several floors, a few random shops and a lift. I check the time and I have one minute left…
Desperately rushing around looking for any useful signs, finally I see that the clinic is on level 2 and I run over to the lift which takes up there.
As my watch hand struck the hour, the doors open into the clinic reception area. I go straight over to the reception desk and ask if I’m in the right place for a medical check for visa extension.
The dark skinned Mauri lady looks up at me with that casual, laid back attitude so common in New Zealand and says:
“Yep, that’s the one… what’s your name?”
“It’s Giles Short”
“Dum di dum di dummm…” she hums as she looks me up on the system.
I’m still not totally sure I’ve made it yet and am poised, still catching my breath after my mad dash, and very keenly awaiting her reply…
“Yeahh Giles Short for 1o’clock, take a seat over there ey’…
I'd made it!!!!!
Then the relief came flooding over me. I couldn’t believe it had worked out so well!!
I felt so grateful to Fred for what was the best journey that I could have hoped for.
I mean, I had been driven over 3 hours across to the other side of the island, for FREE, plus he told me all his incredible life stories and history of the country, which I really enjoyed AND he managed to get me to the clinic BANG on time for my medical test!!
Now that was a good start to the day 😉
Now all I had to do was pass my medical…
The Maori woman receptionist comes over and hands me a small plastic container.
“We’ll need a urine sample. You can use the bathroom through there…” and she points me in the direction of it.
I was bursting for a pee so I had no trouble getting a sample for them. Actually, I had the opposite trouble of peeing too much.
The container was only small so it filled so quickly, I filled it over the brim and got pee all over the place…
So after cleaning myself and the container off from all the pee, I returned the sample in at the desk.
No sooner had I done that the nurse came into the waiting area, called my name and I duly followed her through the lurid, green coloured corridors and into one of the rooms.
Behind the door a white middle aged man with a big nose and equally big glasses offered me a seat.
He rather brusquely takes me through the forms asking about my medical history, any previous or existing health conditions, do you suffer from this, do you suffer from that, blah blah blah, and of course I answered him: nope, nope, nope, I’m fit as a fiddle.
I did have a slight kidney condition a few years before, but I felt like he didn’t need to know about that 😉
He takes my pulse and blood pressure, see’s they are normal, and writes some notes down on one of the forms.
He hands the forms to me and tells me to give them in at reception on my way out, then says thank you as if finished with me.
“OK so what happens next in the process of getting a visa?” I ask.
He explained that I will need a blood test, which one was booked for me that afternoon over at another centre, and lastly a chest x-ray… over at another different place, the hospital.
I should hear within a few weeks my results, which they would then forward to the government as evidence that I’m healthy enough for a second year. (And that I didn’t have some serious medical condition which would drain them financially or meant that I couldn’t leave New Zealand… That was the essence of it.)
After he’d cleared that up for me some what, he gave me a note of the blood test and where it was, we shook hands and I left the doctor’s room, remembered the way back down the corridors to the reception and handed in the forms.
“You have a good day ey” from the chilled out Maori receptionist, as I went back to the lift, down to the ground floor and out on the street once more, now in search of this other medical centre.
Pulling some snacks from my bag I ate the cereal bars and apple as I walked along checking out my surroundings. I was noticing the general public in the city. Their style of clothes was peculiar to me, often mismatched, random colours and sort of made me think of how my parents dressed me, my brother and sister when we were young. Very 90’s style.
It was, as I’ve heard many people say, like England 20 years ago and I did feel a bit like I’d gone back in time and was viewing another era of life.
I managed to find the next medical centre without a problem and I went inside and gave my name.
“Hi Giles, that’ll be 180 dollars.”
“… … …”
I stood staring at the woman with my mouth hanging open; a pained, questioning look creeping over my face.
“What?” I said.
“180 dollars.”
“ummmm wow ok, I didn’t know about this price I had to pay… … … I don’t understand, I saw on the website it would be this amount, it never mentioned $180 for a blood test…
The receptionist showed some sympathy to me but obviously she couldn’t do anything about the price, so all I could do was pay it. It just seemed a bit fucking extortionate for a simple bloody blood test.
Sat in the waiting room I felt pretty annoyed. I also remembered that the reason I came all the way to Dunedin was because of the price it said on the website… $180 cheaper than in Wanaka!!
Shit… That was why then.
So after the bloody expensive blood test, my penultimate mission for the day was to make my way over to the hospital for a chest x-ray. The final mission for the day would be to hitchhike or get a bus back home to Wanaka, this I had not yet planned.
I had spotted quite a few Japanese restaurants along the way to the blood test centre so now I was hungry and fancied some sushi. I sat and ate a sushi takeaway set while looking up where this hospital was.
Google maps showed me I was 35minutes walk away.
“They don’t make it easy, this visa medical process do they” I pondered as the food hit my stomach and instantly made me feel sleepy.
A tiresome long walk up a bloody steep street later and I’d found the hospital.
(Dunedin by the way has the steepest street in the world! That’s the kind of steepness I was dealing with.)
Maybe that was part of the medical test… I had to walk to three different places around the city and the last hurdle was the monster slope to the hospital.
Pretty shattered by the time I arrived, I was so not ready for a chest x-ray!
But I had it done and dusted fairly shortly, I was in and out after 20minutes. As I was walking back along the corridor I was searching bus timetables on my phone when I noticed this woman walking behind me.
I recognised her from somewhere…
And then it clicked. I had an interview with her for a job at my favourite restaurant in Wanaka, The Big Fig, and she was the boss.
She was mid-late 30’s with dark brown hair tied up at the back, light skinned but sporting a healthy tan and a kind face. Her name I seemed to remember, was Jo.
What suddenly occurred to me was: “She might be travelling back to Wanaka today…”
So as I walked towards the exit past the reception desk, I kept an eye behind me and she had turned and was speaking to the woman behind the desk.
Trying to act casual, I continued the search on my phone, though I couldn’t take in any of the information because my attention was all on putting myself in a useful position to get talking with her.
I took a seat right by the exit and waited patiently, hoping she would come out this way.
She finished her conversation and she was, thankfully, walking out towards my exit. I looked up at her as she went past hoping to catch her eye but she didn’t notice me… Bugger.
I wasn’t giving up. The bus looked far too complicated to organise to my tired eyes, not really sure if I’d missed the last bus already and I did not want to stay and pay for a night in Dunedin.
This gave me motivation to pursue her out the door, and I caught her up in the car park.
“Excuse me.” I said as I approached her…
She looked round at me.
“You’re the owner of ‘The Big Fig’ in Wanaka right?”
“Yes I am” she replied, and it seemed she began to recognise me.
“I met you a few weeks back, do you remember?
As it dawns on her she says “Oh yeah you came about a job.” and she started to walk again through the car park with me chatting by her side.
“That’s right. I really love your place! It’s my favourite place in town to eat.
“Thank you” she says smiling appreciatively.
“Are you going back to Wanaka today?” I ask as tenderly as I can.
“Well I should be, she says, I’m hoping my friend is going to pick me up at 5 when she finishes work.
“Ah right ok, well I’ve just come over here to get my medical tests done to extend my visa so I’m also looking to go back to Wanaka… do you think I might be able to get a lift with you?”
“I can text my friend and see if she’s OK with that…
“Ah thank you” I said gratefully.
So Jo texted her friend and the response came straight back which she read, then laughed aloud and then told me her reply, which was simply… is he hot?
Hahaha! This made me laugh, though slightly awkwardly. “Cheeky!” I thought.
Jo explained that her friend was a bit crazy like that but she was mostly harmless. She also assured me that she would take me back to Wanaka!!
Amazing!!!
Safe to say I was feeling so relieved and happy as I swaggered along chatting with Jo about our day, and following the road back down the mammoth slope and into town.
We stop outside her friends place of work and wait a few minutes until a big black SUV drives out from behind the building and pulls up next to us.
“Ah this is her” Jo recognises, and moves to get in the car.
She gets in the front, greets her friend and I step into the back.
So this is Rachel, Jo said making the introductions, and she’s the one you have to be careful with. Haha, bit of man eater eh Rach.
“ah yeahh, truth be told haha” says Rachel.
“And this is Giles.”
“Hi Rachel, hey thank you so much for giving me a lift”
“No biggie.”
She drives off and I’m pushed back in my seat as she puts her foot down on the accelerator and we zoom forward heading out of town for the journey home.
“I’m gunna get back a lot faster than the outward journey with Fred”, I thought to myself as she cruised along over the speed limit whilst chatting away with her mate Jo.
Rachel had dirty blonde hair, was wearing big sunglasses and had a get up and go, no holding back sort of attitude.
I asked what she gets up to in Wanaka and what she said really surprised and impressed me…
“Yeah I like to do base jumping and use a wingsuit.” she said in her nonchalant Kiwi manner.
:0 “Holy Shit, really?! was my reaction, “that’s fucking cool!”
“Yeah I used to work for Skydive Wanaka, was jumping 3 times a day so you sort of get used to it.”
Ah I just did a sky dive there actually, it was SO FUN!!
“Who did you jump with” she asks.
“Oh, ummmmm, a foreign guy… could have been eastern European”
“Victor?”
“Oh yeah Victor!”
“Yeah, Victor knows his stuff” she said. “Group of us go to some cliffs around here to jump”… and she points over in the distance to some big rock formations.
“Well what’s it like? I asked “Using the wingsuit? Isn’t it super dangerous?”
“You wouldn’t believe the adrenaline rush” she said enthusiastically “Once you’ve tried with the wingsuit, the skydiving just isn’t the same anymore…But yeah it’s obviously a higher risk. But hey, you know, you just gotta do it.”
“Fair enough!” I said.
And she went on and told me a about a few of her close shaves.
I was having a great time with these two women. I sat there being driven, once again, for FREE, all the way back home, enjoying listening to their funny Kiwi banter and hearing about Rachel’s crazy, adrenaline fuelled stories.
I asked Jo what her story was and how she came to be owner of ‘The Big Fig’.
She told me she came over from Australia with her sister after leaving her last job. She had the idea to run a food business in Wanaka. She said she worked hard for 1 year non-stop, often sleeping at the restaurant, before she could get the business up and running how she liked it.
I told her that all that effort certainly paid off, she’d really created something special there. (see bottom of page for Big Fig video)
I also shared with them my story of how I’d had, and was still having, an unbelievably lucky day. And this wasn’t the first time things had fallen into place so sweetly. I told them of other such lucky adventures, I’d had along the way. (see link stories When I Lost My Backpack in Melbourne, What Can Happen When Wondering Around Sydney,
I couldn’t believe how lucky I was to have firstly made it to my appointment on time, thanks to my new friend Fred, completed all the various medical tests I needed for extending my visa, then, instead of having to figure out a bus or a hitchhike ride home AND without having to stay in Dunedin over night, I fatefully and strategically positioned myself to bump into Jo, who was likely the only person in the whole of Dunedin who I knew, and it so happened she was heading all the way back to Wanaka at the same time as me and her friend could give me a lift…
Arriving back into Wanaka, in double quick time too, they dropped me off right outside my shared house.
We exchanged some last banter about me being their toy boy and I thanked them for the lift and said again how this day, this whole sequence of events, had been wonderfully crafted, one thing after another, and ridiculously lucky.
Through putting myself out there, hitchhiking without much of a plan whatsoever, things managed to turn out better than I ever could have planned it.
It doesn’t always work out quite so ideally as in this story, you might say it hardly ever does, it depends I suppose, on your ideals, but whatever happens, if you put yourself into the open hands of chance, or Life, such as when you are hitchhiking, the journey will always be a new and curious experience.
