Not a story but I just want to write a bit about my experiences hitching rides in this wonderful country.
I hitched rides every where I went for the first month and then I bought a car. My first ride lasted a week, I met Kate and Thomas through a message bored at a hostel. T & I bought the gas cause Kate owned the car. We visited many places and had a great time, it was a good introduction to traveling around that country, I had some people to make mistakes with and we all learned little secrets to traveling from one another. Then Kate and I went on a hike for a few days but I got sick after day one and bailed out on the third day and hitched into the nearest town with some crazy German ambulance driver who had a 90lbs! pack! From there I continued to hitch rides until I arrived on the south Island.
I had some great rides and some sketchy rides, here are two that I remember. The first happend one day while I was having horrible luck with rides, standing on the side of the road for over an hour as traffic filed by I was astounded that no one stopped. There was a momentary lull in traffic and then the next vehicle was an 18 wheeler traveling fast, well I thought there was know was no way it would stop but I stuck my thumb out anyway and sure enough he grinded to a halt. This turned out to be one of the best rides I've ever received! The man was a Maori married to a woman of British decent and both were extremely friendly people. As the man learned that I had no place to stay and neither of us knew wheter or not there was a hostel in the town I was headed to, he offered me a spare bed in his house. I helped him unload his haul and by the time we arrived at his house his wife had prepared me a nice hot steak dinner! After that we all sat around talking and when his wife was went to bed we got out some beers and stayed up late drinking and talking, it was really an interesting experience. When I awoke I was greeted with smiles and a nice hot breakfast. It was here that I first tasted MarMite and made the horrible mistake of loading it on to my toast as I would an american spread. My hosts sat by with a knowing little smile on their faces while I bit into this atrocity. It really is amazing that after my first tramatic experience with the stuff that I later became a huge fan and was never caught without it. I got a ride out to main road where it was likely I'd catch another ride shortly and I thanked my hosts and said goodbye doubting that I'd ever run into a more gracious host while hitchhiking.
The sketcy ride was my last ride on the North Island. I was about 1/2 hour drive away from the ferries peir and got a ride quite quickly. The man was originally from Samoa, an Island in the south Pacific and had many characteristics typical of S.P. Islanders, specifically he was a very large guy. He spoke some english although he was far from fluent and lacked many words neccasary to hold a smooth conversation. But we managed for a while, both learning the basics of each other. Then he began talking about the dangers of hitchhiking, I tried to tell him I believed the dangers to be overrated, a product of the media exploiting the few and unfortunate cases. But he continued on the subject mentioning a recent case of a murdered hitch hiker in the nearby vacinity. Then he began to explain that it would be very easy for him to bring me to a sand pit or an abandoned warehouse parking lot and then proceeded to tell me it would be easy for him to either rape or murder me, or both. I didn't like this conversation one bit, in fact I felt very nervous. Well I did my best to maintain composure and change the subject but he seemed quite adament to continue on the ease with which he could kill me. He said all this with a small smirk on his face and occasional quick glances my way. Eventually he changed the subject but the new content just spurred my uneasiness. He said he needed to make a quick detour to his sisters house and then he needed to swing by his place but afterwards would bring go out of his way in order to bring me all the way to the pier. Due to the previous conversation I was a bit nervous and figured this detour was only going to lead to a sand pit or empty warehouse parking lot where he would proceed to do things to me I was unwilling to accept. Well we stop by his sisters and I'm about to make a run for it but the chance never presents itself. Then we head towards his home and by now I have my knife in my hand just trying to maintain my composure and carry on a conversation still hoping for the best. He pulls into his driveway and a big smile crosses his face, I figure this could be the end but I just get a feeling from the guy that he is genuinly a nice person. So we go into his house and he is overjoyed to show me pictures of his family, he has a beautiful wife and an adorable littel girl! It turned out to be a great experience as we sat there going through photos and sipping some tea, both of us talking about our homes and listening to each other with true interest.
All my experiences hitching in that country were great and many of them ended in much more hospitality than anyone could have expected! Judging New Zealand on the quality of it's people alone would easily rank up there with any in the world!