Living with Emma, the first frustration and the new car

On 11.12. we arrived here in Murrays Bay (a quieter district in the north of Auckland) at Emma's place. Great first impression: Very large apartment with conservatory, terrace and sea view. The beach is about a 5-minute walk away! Emma is 30, an art student, and lives here with her dog Mona, who is really adorable. We felt welcome right away.

Otherwise, our second week here in New Zealand was completely contrary to the first. No time for tourist stuff! Our search for a car had already started in the last days in Newmarket, and now this project took up pretty much all of our time. Research on the internet from morning till evening, short breaks at the beach or an unavoidable visit to the supermarket determined our daily routine. The big problems with finding the right car: wrong timing (high season), wrong island (cars on the South Island are much cheaper), wrong place (Auckland has the highest prices). Unfortunately, you're pretty much stranded here without a car. While Auckland is still well equipped with bus and train connections, you have to think of something else to get from A to B outside of the city.

Our wish - preferably a camper van with self-contained certificate to be allowed to freedom camp - seemed more and more unattainable and slowly the endless searching was getting on our nerves. Either we found ancient boxes from the late '80s/early '90s with a mileage far over 300,000, which we didn't trust for another long-distance travel year, or younger models at horrendous prices. Even empty vans that we would have converted into a camper ourselves were simply too expensive for us. After some unsuccessful bus rides to all possible districts of Auckland to see cars there, we decided to first buy a 'transitional car'. It should be a station wagon - not a car with camper van potential - but still big enough to spend a few nights in it. This way we could be mobile right away on one hand and bridge the high season on the other hand, and then look for larger cars again in February or March.

But our booked week with Emma was slowly coming to an end and Christmas was just around the corner. We probably would have ended up in a shared room at the hostel if we hadn't been lucky that our successors had spontaneously made other plans. So we could stay! Emma will visit her family in Christchurch over Christmas, but she leaves us the apartment for this time and we can stay as long as we want. It couldn't have been better for us! That gave us some relaxation again in searching for a car.

On 18.12. then the first station wagon viewing: a 2003 Mazda MPV, mileage around 230,000 and with an already built-in new bed frame, including mattress and bedding for two, for about €1,600. Sounded great at first. When we arrived there, however, we found the car in rather poor condition. Countless dents and scratches on the outside (okay, that's relatively normal here) and unfortunately quite dirty inside. Nevertheless, we took a test drive, which actually went well, and finally decided (I think out of desperation) to take the car. We simply thought that we wouldn't get anything else for this price and would have to lower our 'German standards' instead. It was supposed to be just a transitional car anyway. The owner then drove with us to the bank, where we had to realize that the ATM was temporarily out of order. So we went to the next bank branch. It was easy to notice that the guy really wanted to sell on the same day - very strange. However, the ATM was also defective at this bank branch, and we had to line up at the counter. As if these were not enough signs not to buy the car, we also couldn't withdraw the required amount all at once at the counter. A real relief spread over us and we told the car seller that we would come back tomorrow with the money. But secretly we had long since decided not to buy the car under any circumstances. German standards or not - we didn't want to spend a dollar on a car in this condition. We should have listened to our gut feeling from the beginning. Lesson learned. We were sooo relieved!

When we were back in the bus, we decided to visit Turner's, the largest used car dealer in Auckland. Emma had already given us this tip. It could only get better.

When we arrived at Turner's, we immediately had a much better feeling. Everything was professional and we could look at all the cars alone and in peace. We had seen a Nissan Primera station wagon on the internet, but couldn't find it on site. An employee at the information desk told us that this car had only recently arrived and had not yet undergone the usual workshop check. But he immediately offered to bring forward the check. During the approx. 30 minutes of waiting time, we tried not to get too hopeful. The key data sounded great: year of construction '99, automatic, only 148,000 km and exactly within our budget of €1,700. But the workshop check could burst our soap bubble in no time.

When we finally held the evaluation in our hands, we could hardly believe our luck: Everything was fine! Except for a few small scratches on the outside, no defects or issues. The super clean interior made us smile as we thought back to the Mazda in the morning. This Nissan was so much better and just as affordable! Now the test drive only had to convince us, which it promptly did. In the end, we didn't have to think long: This car was an absolute stroke of luck and we couldn't wait to take our new sweetheart home. The paperwork was quickly done. Here you don't have 'papers' for a car like we do in Germany and the change of ownership can be handled via a form to be filled out at the post office (Turner's apparently has a special authorization - at least we didn't have to go to the post office). Finally, we could proudly drive off the lot with the car . The first time on the left side of the road on the motorway was quite exciting, but not a real problem. It's all a matter of getting used to.

We are now car owners! :-)