And Gilligan thought HE was marooned!
As I rushed out the door for a New Zealand vacation right after the first of the year, I knew that I would need to compose this monthly letter during, or immediately upon my return from the trip. So I figured that I’d do a little feature story of Porsches on the North and South Islands of New Zealand. I envisioned lots of lens loving poses of locals with their cars and a backstory. I even had a title in mind- “Cars and Kiwis”. As usual the story took an unexpected turn. After covering maybe 1500 miles of roads over 14 days, I learned that seeing a Porsche in the wild in New Zealand appears to be about as rare as sighting a Kiwi Bird or maybe even a Hobbit. Sure, there were a few newer 911s around the financial district parking lots in Auckland (as well as one 912!), and several Cayenne and Macan (1) sightings in the smaller AWD oriented cities. I even tried to give credit to a Toyota “Ionic” because it was part of a fleet, and had a “991” decal on the back window. And even the single Macan that I saw, had a license plate that read “JAG”. For a moment I thought the owner might have been seeking comfort in an homage to New Zealand’s Mother England- despite driving a German car. But with the exception of one Cayman GTS having lots of fun- and I means LOTS OF FUN- with a fellow Audi R8 driver on a true “Porsche Road”, that was the only Porsche FUN that I saw. (Funny side note. The place they were having this little mountain run was in Lyttleton- the ONLY town that I recall visiting that had the same name as a town in this PCA zone. Might make a good sister town to Littleton, Colorado.)
I was hoping that the wonderful roads leading down to Milford Sound might also carry a double meaning accompanied by some music from a Porsche sport exhaust. No such luck. And when I did manage to corral the owner of a Cayenne GTS in Christchurch, I asked him “where are all the Porsches”? He told me that there were lots of them in New Zealand. I bit my tongue, choosing not to ask if they were nocturnal animals, just like the rare Kiwi Bird. He then told me that he personally owned several. I asked if there was an issue with parts, being so remotely located. He said no problem at all, I get all my parts from Pelican or Suncoast Parts. That’s right- not Auckland, not Wellington- but Florida and California. Again, I bit my tongue to avoid commenting that both suppliers are on water in places where, just like NZ, there seem to be more boats than cars. New Zealanders are proud of the fact that there are more boats per capita, than any other country in the world. Roughly one in three families owns a boat. And to a large degree they are sailboats. Perhaps sailboats represent the competition for the dollars that would normally put the Porsche in the garage. Porsche has a history with tractors, cars, bicycles, and even Porsche Design Power boats. Maybe New Zealand would do well with Porsche sailboats.
Speaking of being along the water, please pay close attention to announcements from PCA.org, as hotel registration for the Porsche Parade in Boca Raton Florida will be opening around the time that you are reading this issue. Hope to see you there, or in your region during 2019.
Rich Sanders
Zone 9 Rep, PCA