Stubborn Little Subaru

As you know we were sooo excited about going to WILD FOODS!!! But our sassy Subaru had to get in the way of things. We woke up early and picked up Irish and Chicago at the hostel. We were ready to rumble and eat some weird shenanigans!! We had our new CD playing and nothing but smiles as we traveled down south J!! However, it was about 20… 25 minutes into the trip and the temperature gage started playing with our hearts. Long story short, the car was over heating. And therefore, we had a situation….It was about 9AM and it would take us about 4 hours to get to Hokitita! What could we do?? We had already paid 40 bucks for the tickets. Our options: rent a car, go to a mechanic, take a painfully slow bus, go wine tasting or call AAA to get the car. Keep in mind we were running on little sleep and were overly anxious about this Wild Foods experience. We collectively decided that taking the car to a mechanic was the best decision. Another odd thing about New Zealand is that nothing is open on the weekends (or 5 o’clock week days)--we are still trying to understand that, but that is beside the point. So we headed back to Nelson, dropped it off at the only mechanic open, and went to the Saturday morning market while we were waiting. The mechanic called us an hour later and said that the car was good to go. For you car people, the mechanic had replaced the thermostat and a rubber hose that is supposively important. Therefore, with new spirits, we collectively decided again to continue the journey to Hokitika. But just as we had made it passed the original troubled spot, our bad fortune was once again upon us. Temperature gage extremely high, weird noises, and smoke coming out of the front of the car typically, are not good signs we have now learned. Long story short, we missed the festival and instead wound up playing charades on the side of the road wearing our wigs while waiting for the tow truck.

The final diagnosis for the car was a cracked head gasket. We took a cab back to Nelson and left the car in Wakefield, where it was towed. We went a week without the car, confused about what our best options were to do with it. The mechanic at the tow place said it was done and we could try to sell it for parts. However Marcus, the owner from the hostel we stayed at before moving into our apartment, believed he could fix it with a bottle of $20 adhesive stuff. With nothing to lose, we went with Marcus to Wakefield the next weekend to witness his resurrection attempt. With careful hands and a little bit of luck, Marcus worked a miracle. The car is now up and running, although our day drives are motivated by skepticism. We are planning on keeping the car as long as it is drivable. Marcus believes it will work for another thirty years. We will see. Until we got to Nelson, there were no problems with the car. After careful observation, we believe we have the answer of why this is happening: hills and boys in the car. We can avoid the boys but hills in the south island may be difficult to avoid. We will keep ya’ll posted.