Luckily as I set off to try and hitch to Raglan from Waitomo I met an Israeli guy leaving the hostel who was driving in the same direction. Marcus the Israeli kindly gave me a lift and on route we stopped at some really cool places, including a natural bridge which used to be a huge limestone cave until it collapsed.
It became apparent that Marcus was a bit odd when he pulled over to check out some roadkill. Marcus proceeded to take pictures of a dead possum for over 10 minutes.
At our next stop, a waterfall, I met two Brit girls – Auckland doctors Hannah and Kelly. They turned out to be heading slightly nearer to Raglan than Marcus and so I begged for them to rescue me from the Israeli roadkill enthusiast.
Hannah and Kelly dropped me off at the junction for Raglan which was about 15km from any civilization. The road to Raglan was over 50km of gravel. I sat for 30 minutes and not one car passed me – as I began to accept that I may be spending the night sleeping in a bush a white sports car came towards me. It was a MX5 – same as what my old man used to drive. With the knowledge that the boot was tiny I wasn’t hopeful that I would get a lift. The guy came to a stop and offered a lift, I accepted but told him that there was no chance of my bag fitting in. ”No worries!” he said. ”I’ll strap it on top.” I told him how much I liked his wheels, he loved the compliments and without a second thought slung the keys at me “You can drive.”
Terry my hitching saviour turned out to be a top bloke and reminded me of my Grandad with his old school witty jokes (Terry 83).
I finally made it to Raglan and checked into the Raglan Backpackers. Hot tub, Sauna, Swedish girls and 5 minutes from some great surf – my kinda hostel. I spent the next few days making great use of all of the previous.
{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
Bit worrying! Went out for an Indian with P&W Loc last night and P had picture of roadkill on his mobile phone.
That is worrying!