My heart thudded more than Helen going through a Palmy pothole when the road to my accommodation became gravel. The only time I've had an accident (touch steering wheel) was on a gravel road. I was at journo school and had taken two fellow budding journalists with me to Wairarapa. We were in Helen's predecessor (also called Helen) and, as I was about 10 years older than my friends, neither of whom then drove, I was aware of the responsibility.
We wanted to get to the coast. Coming back I lost control on the gravel and Helen #1 went into a bank. One friend had to go to hospital and her mother came from Taranaki to get us. Helen needed some serious bodywork and suffered the ignominy of being towed through the Manawatū Gorge. The other friend credited me with saving her life as on the other side of the road was a steep drop.
So I treated this gravel road between Raglan and Pirongia as if there were trolls in the gullies, locusts trying to get inside Helen, and drones hovering above ready to record any mistakes for the BBC.
The most sobering sign was a munted car bumper on the side of said gravel road with the number plate intact. It was almost like a work of art.
I discovered Bay of Plenty and Waikato have a greater range of speed limits than we do here, which meant I had to keep my wits about me. Sixty kilometres an hour was a common speed in reasonably built-up areas, while it was 30km/h through Mount Maunganui and 110 on the Waikato Expressway.
Helen might have got excited at the chance to see if she still had it, but torrential rain meant the fastest she expressed was 80km/h. The weather was also a stern reminder Mother Nature trumps all signs; at times I couldn't even see the white lines on the road and those grey and white cars without lights on put the m in muppet.
In Raglan it was 40, dropping to 30 in the shopping streets and five at the campground.
Helen is a manual so those signs advising the best speed for the next corner were great warning me to drop a gear or three.
The road narrows signs were disconcerting as Helen and I thought how could the road possibly get any narrower and we would collectively suck in our stomachs.
Two for one signs, while saving on erecting another post, raised a few eyebrows and windscreen wipers. A picture of a rider on a horse was accompanied by the words trucks crossing.
Like anything, signs and their environment require maintenance. A 60km/h sign near a school was almost obscured by vegetation, another so dirty it was almost illegible.
The sign we have become all too familiar with - the Covid tracer app QR code - was even on the toilets at Wairēinga/Bridal Veil Falls near Raglan. Covid doesn't care how spectacular the scenery is or how sparsely populated the location.
I also made a trip to Ōtaki and for the first time spotted marae signs, which I love. New experiences are the best thing about road tripping, no matter how minor.
The best sign, of course, was turning into my street and seeing my house after my trip away. Helen was ready to put her tyres up and me my legs.
