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The 1990 Toyota Hilux, known for its distinctive blue coating and bright pink door, was stolen in the middle of the night from outside the actor and comedian’s Wellington home inSeptember.
Now, almost exactly a month later, the beloved ute has been found.
It’s a miraculous turn of events, and O’Leary couldn’t be happier – but there is a slight problem, she says.
“I’m kind of in a situation now where I’ve got two utes ... it’s excessive.”
After a couple of weeks of searching, O’Leary accepted she might never get her ute back, but it was hard to fully let go of it.
“I was very sad, I had kind of given up on it. I put the claim in for insurance and gone past the 10 days, I was supposed to send my keys up to Auckland so I could get the payout, but obviously, if you send the keys then they own the ute.
“I kept thinking, what if it turns up the day after they get the keys and I don’t get the ute back?”
Karen O'Leary and Eilish Wilson with their son and the Toyota Hilux. Photo / Eilish Wilson
O’Leary eventually accepted her fate and got a new ute, a modern Nissan Navara. She was starting to move on with life until her partner Eilish Wilson called on Thursday with some intriguing news – that’s when everything changed.
“She said, ‘I’ve got these random messages from one of the guys on Vic Deals’. It was some lovely Wellingtonian who was driving through Wadestown and saw the ute, and sent a message saying, ‘I’ve admired that ute from afar for years, so I couldn’t not go back and see if it was yours’.”
The man went back to assess the Toyota Hilux: the canopy had been taken off, its licence plates had been replaced, and the whole thing had been shoddily repainted with a thick blue house paint.
But the specks of pink on the door were a giveaway.
“The stealer guy came back to the ute and this lovely stranger just got out and said, ‘Oi, that’s a stolen car’. The guy’s like, ‘Nah, I purchased it’ and he’s like, ‘Nah, it’s stolen’.”
After some back and forth, the alleged thief ran off, leaving the 1990 Toyota Hilux behind. After a bit more assessment, O’Leary got a call from police.
“They said, ‘Yeah, we’ve got your ute, it’s been taken into the towing place’.”
Now, O’Leary is torn between whether to repair her beloved old ute or to carry on with her new Nissan Navara.
The former holds a lot of dear memories – O’Leary bought the ute while on a road trip to Timaru with her late father and they’d promised to give it a new look together, with multicoloured panels and white spray-painted hubcaps.
Karen O'Leary with her ute before it was stolen. Photo / Eilish Wilson
But the comedian says the theft may have been a sign for her to move on.
“It’s the last thing I wanted to do for my dad before he died. I’ve been thinking long and hard about what the best thing to do is, and I think this whole thing has taught me a couple of things.
“The first is, a car is just a car, and someone can steal your car, but they can never steal your memories. Those memories with dad, I’ll always have them.
“The second thing is, Wellington is a city full of people that care about others and it’s so heart-warming, we have had so many messages from members of the public wanting to help out, people that don’t know me but just wanted to take the time to show me they care.”
O’Leary’s potential new plan is to get the ute back, make it look beautiful again, and sell it.
And what’s happening with the profits? Well, the actor and comedian hasn’t forgotten about the party she promised to throw for the good people of Wellington.
“If someone really generous wants to buy it, anything I get that covers more than what I would’ve got from the insurance, I’m gonna put towards the thank-you party that I promised.
“My partner’s in a band, so that’s already organised, and maybe it was time for me to move on from that ute so someone else can enjoy it and really love it. And hey, we also get a party, so it’s a win-win-win.
“I should be getting the ute back in the next few days, it’ll need some fixing because obviously the ignition and the driver’s lock is a bit munted, we’ll also have to fix the horrible work they did with the paint job. That might take about three weeks, so I’m thinking end of October, maybe sometime around Labour Weekend, that’ll be nice.”
O’Leary might be moving on from her old ute, but she still has her old memories. And the blank canvas of the Nissan Navara is a chance to make some new ones too.
“Obviously the new ute I’ve got is white, it’s gonna be easy to paint that every single colour and I will definitely do that.”
