Goodbye Tommy

At last we managed to get Tommy out of the garage - after a very hefty bill we scurried back to Auckland, having missed out on seeing most of the Bay of Islands because of firstly the weather and then being surgically attached to car mechanics. We managed to see NZ's tallest Kauri tree on our way down south though, at 51 metres tall its very impressive and reputed to be 2000 years old.
Then to Auckland where we had two potential buyers lined up for Tommy. The first neglected to tell us she'd already bought another van (thanks for letting us know...!) and the second seemed less than keen and didn't even take him for a test drive. We trundled back to the holiday park with heavy hearts - having just spent 800 bucks on repairs we started to lose hope that we would ever get our money back. After a contemplative fish and chips eaten in the van in the dark, the phone beeped. And no, it was not Mother (as is usual) but a lady called Avis who was interested in our van. Suddenly things were starting to look up. Next morning however, all attempts to contact Avis failed and we were again plunged into despair. Andy tried one last attempt from the phone box and lo and behold, got through. We arranged to meet, thinking that we could swing by the backpacker car auctions on the way back, all backpackers' last option before abandoning vans at the side of the road. However, a preliminary interest from Avis grew as she saw (a) our home made pink curtains and (b) our fabulously clean and tidy cooker. To our great surprise (as she had said that she thought she'd probably fly to Christchurch and buy one there), Avis bought our Tommy. One quick internet transfer later and Andy and I were a little richer and minus one van. If it weren't for the huge repair costs we would have broken even on buying Tommy.
Avis took delivery this morning and Andy and I are once again using foot power to get around and staying in hostels like ordinary skanky backpackers. First stop, the frankly not very irish St Patrick's Day parade.