On the Road; the Twisty, Backwards Road

As Jamie tugged the parking brake firmly into place, I let out a long breath that I hadn’t realized I’d been holding. Behind me, I heard Andrea do the same. We had somehow managed to get our rental car from the Hertz garage downtown to our suburban hostel without incident. Well, perhaps not completely without incident. There had been that brief moment of panic when, turning around in a parking lot, the low belly of our little sedan seemed to get stuck on an unusually high speed bump. Jamie had simply gunned the engine, and we’d all pretended to ignore the unpleasant scraping sound that accompanied our escape. But, sitting outside the Lantana Lodge in one piece at last, the speed bump seemed hardly worth remembering.

It had been over a month since I’d been in a car of any sort; the last had been my little red Honda Civic back in Ohio. And the car I found myself in now was noticeably different from my familiar Civic. Actually, it was noticeably different from any car I’d ever been in. For one, I was in the passenger seat, but on the wrong side of the car. And for two, Jamie had brought the car to a halt on the wrong side of the road. Not that it was actually “wrong,” of course – we just happened to be in New Zealand.

When I tell people about all the daring, adventurous and dangerous things I tried while in New Zealand, everyone is usually impressed by the bungy jumping, the fixed-wing plane and helicopter flights, the sea-cliff climbing, and zorbing (basically tumbling down a hill in a giant inflatable ball). But they never seem to be phased about the fact that I rented and drove multiple cars in the foreign country. Perhaps it’s because most people consider driving to be second nature; natural almost, like riding a bike or tying your shoes. But I would have to argue that learning to drive in New Zealand was just as scary – and perhaps just as dangerous – as all of those other daring things I tried.

I had my first experience behind the wheel in New Zealand the day after Jamie navigated Andrea and me safely onto the “wrong” side of the road in Auckland after picking up our very first rental car. The three of us – all international students studying at Massey University in Wellington – had traveled up north to Auckland for a weekend of rugby and rugged New Zealand countryside. Following a Saturday night rugby match (in which the New Zealand All Blacks crushed the Australian Wallabies), the three of us woke up early on Sunday morning in order to hit the road to Pakiri Beach. The plan was to go horseback riding along a white sand beach on the untouched northern New Zealand coast (go ahead, commence being jealous), but in order to carry out said plan, we first had to brave the backward highways, twisting coastal roads, and sneaky traffic signs of a little Britain wannabe.

Jamie navigated our way out of the downtown area, and then it was my turn behind the wheel. Driving in New Zealand is not really all that different than driving in the States, when it comes down to it. Green still means go, stop signs are still red and octagonal (where they exist), and the signs warning you of an especially twisty road ahead are still big and yellow. New Zealand just has a lot more of these last road advisories. They also often substitute “give way” intersections or roundabouts in lieu of stop signs or lights, and they seem to be big fans of one-lane bridges. Which, of course, just makes driving in the country as foreigner that much more adrenaline-inducing.

I remember one thing distinctly about my first time out on a New Zealand highway: It was soggy. Normally a little rain wouldn’t be cause for nerves, but in a car where the controls for the windshield wipers and the turn signals are on opposite sides of the steering wheel from what you’re used to, it’s a different story. More than once, I signaled a lane change with a quick flick of my wipers. Luckily, our early-morning start and general northerly direction meant we weren’t sharing the highway with very many other drivers.

Other than realizing New Zealanders don’t really believe in things like guard rails or country road maintenance, our first long-distance driving adventure in New Zealand went off without a hitch. Things were admittedly twisty and muddy and Pakiri Stables ended up being more out in the middle of nowhere than we expected, but we made the journey without any major mishaps. Andrea even felt comfortable enough to take the wheel for a while, but got flustered when someone honked at her for making a turn too slow with her windshield wipers indicating her intentions.

This wasn’t the last time during that jaunt that we did something to annoy native drivers. It was as we were getting ready to head back to the Auckland airport and drop the car off that we experienced our first moment of New Zealand road rage. We had stopped at a large shopping complex in Mount Wellington to kill some time before our flight, and were pulling out of the parking lot and back onto the highway, with Jamie behind the wheel again. Andrea was in the backseat acting as navigator (since I get carsick while trying to read the tiny print on maps), and was yelling “AIRPORT! AIRPORT!” while pointing wildly to the highway signs above our heads. Jamie went to change lanes, but apparently did so too slowly for the man who was behind us. He pulled up in the lane beside us, rolled down his passenger-side window, and proceeded to fix us with a withering stare from behind the wheel. Then he yelled, “FUCK!” loudly, and drove off, still glaring. Jamie and I lost it, dissolving into the kind of giggles that give you abdominal pain, while Andrea kept yelling about airport signs behind us.

Though we returned that car (which we’d christened “Guadalupe” for no reason at all) safely, it wasn’t the end of laughter-inducing driving adventures in New Zealand for the three of us. Two months later found us renting another little white Mazda (this one dubbed “Shornty”) to take us to Castlepoint and the Wairarapa wine region for my birthday weekend. Since I was the birthday girl and feeling especially confident, I got behind the wheel first in Wellington. And, of course, I made an ass of myself by driving Shornty out of the rental garage with the parking brake still firmly in place. I drove about a mile down the motorway with Jamie and Andrea crying from laughter as our car squealed and screeched and other drivers honked their horns and flashed their high beams at us. We ended up turning around and going back to the garage, only to have our stupidity pointed out to us in front of a handful of highly amused kiwi men. In my defense (if I’m even warranted one), I come from Ohio; we don’t have hills in Ohio, and therefore have no use for parking brakes. And, although they nearly peed themselves from laughter, neither Jamie nor Andrea realized my mistake, either.

In the end, all of the nervousness and awkward mistakes paid off. I’m proud to report that my last time behind the wheel in New Zealand went off more smoothly than I could have hoped for. During our last week in the country, Andrea and I traveled up north and rented a car in Auckland in order to drive ourselves out to the Coromandel Peninsula. Not only did we navigate ourselves out of the city and around the peninsula without a single wrong turn, but I also was able to make every one of those correct turns using the correct turn signal. And the parking brake? Well, I just left that alone.

Driving is driving, even in a foreign country where everything is backwards. But I will note one important thing: When I returned to Ohio and my little red Honda Civic, I actually had to make a conscious effort to drive the “right” way again. I can’t say that I didn’t almost turn onto the truly wrong side of the road at least four times during my first week back, or that I didn’t once or twice flip on my turn signal instead of my windshield wipers. But isn’t that how it always goes? Always having to teach old drivers new tricks. Or, at least, re-teach them the old ones.