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MARSEILLE - All Black supporter Dan's battered van dates back to 1985, two years before the inaugural rugby World Cup in New Zealand.
But the one-time cream coloured vehicle, which has more than 240,000km on the clock, has been pressed into service for a rugby odyssey in France
as part of a European tour for a group of enthusiastic kiwis.
Daniel Hill, a 27-year-old aeronautical technician, hit the road with four friends also based in England, negotiating an unpaid holiday to stay in France throughout the rugby World Cup where his beloved All Blacks are firm favourites to emerge as the winners.
The van has seen it all, including a breakdown in Poland and an accident in Greece that has left its number plate hanging precariously by a few strands of wire.
Stickers from 30 countries adorn the dented driver's door of a vehicle that reaks of the smell of dirty clothes and stale beer.
"Don't kick us, pass us!", reads a sticker on the back window.
"We drove down pretty much directly to Marseille (where New Zealand began their World Cup quest with a 76-14 thrashing of Italy), went to the tourist information centre and they got us this parking place for two euro," Hill said.
"We made the news back home that night, my parents called us. It's great."
The only blip in the rugby-dedicated trip is a brief detour to Munich this weekend ahead of the beer festival, a time when the All Blacks travel to Edinburgh to play Scotland.
With eight bodies in the small van, including three of Hill's friends from Auckland, there are some simple rules in place.
Two sleep in raised hammocks, two on pullout beds, one on the floor, and the others cram themselves into a nearby tent.
And if there's any travelling to be done "the navigator decides where we go, no one else can talk, there is no arguing", according to Hill.
He has lived for 2-1/2 years in London, home to a large community of expatriate New Zealanders.
"From New Zealand, it's three hours to fly to Australia. From London, three hours and you can be in any one of 40 countries," Hill said.
But one thing never changes wherever the Kiwis are, and that is the love they have for the oval ball.
"In New Zealand you grow up with a rugby ball in your hand, it's the first toy you get. In Brazil, it's football, in New Zealand it's just rugby," Hill said.
"It's a big social thing. You play rugby three times a week, and on the weekend you hang out with the guys.
"You work and you play rugby, that's what you do."
Hill was confident the All Blacks had it in them to claim only their second World Cup trophy, their sole previous win coming on home soil in the inaugural 1987 tournament.
"Graham Henry (coach) is the man. He has brought the team to where he wanted it to be, they've never been so focused."
Lizara Muir, a 26-year-old from Auckland, admitted, however, that the fans' expectations often surpassed the performances of New Zealand at World Cups.
"I reckon sometimes there's a lot of pressure for them to win. It's our fault," she said.
After decamping to Lyon to watch a 16-try pasting of minnows Portugal, and with the All Blacks on their way to Scotland, the campervan will be on the road again next week.
Their destination this time is Toulouse, the capital of France's southwest rugby heartland, where New Zealand complete their pool C programme against minnows Romania on September 29.
"That should be a great trip to a place where locals really appreciate the game," Dunedin native Adam Paterson said.
- AFP
