When the Honda City goes off road

When you think of a Honda City, you might think of a car designed for parallel parking, not river crossings - built for errands, not off-road exploits.

Over the weekend, enthusiasts, from as far as Australia, joined a convey of the little cars from Christchurch to a working farm station in Canterbury's Avoca Valley, for the annual Great Honda City Road Trip.

The event's creator, Jared Campbell, told Morning Report that about seven years ago he decided to give it a go with a few friends.

"I had a Honda City at the time and I used to do this particular off road track back when I was younger with my father, I remember it being not too harsh on the cars so I decided to give it a go and it was a lot of fun."

The first year about eight people in about five cars took part in the event and that had increased to about 30 people in 20 cars this year - including a couple of people from Australia, he said.

Campbell said as organised he was usually at the front of the group of cars.

"After we pass the traffic, about three or four cars, they start to realise there's something weird going on and they start getting their phones out and filming us as we drive past - it's definitely a sight."

Campbell said he had always like the Honda City and "as a small silly car it was quite easy just to do silly things in them".

It was a well designed car that some features that had some features that made it capable of going off-road, he said.

Evidence that the Honda City was a good car could be seen in the fact that there were still so many of them around and that so many were sold when they were new, he said.

Campbell said the route started in Christchurch.

"We start off in Christchurch in Belfast and from there we take some back roads out to Sheffield to the famous pie shop, from there we take the inland scenic route out towards Mt Hutt and then we get access by private station in the Avoca Valley."

The terrain on the road trip would vary from gravel roads to up and over hills, he said.

The main track did not go through any major rivers, although there were some minor river crossings, he said.

"The main track in and out is quite easy but a lot of us like to go a little bit further and a little bit harder and we try and get across the Avoca River."

It was a big challenge to get through that river to the other side, he said.

"We do take recovery vehicles with us but we try our best not to use them."

But he said that people who tried "to do things that they really shouldn't do in a Honda City" would get stuck and in that case the recovery vehicles would be put to use.

"We can be quite hard on vehicles too so we have some issues like cracked open gear boxes ... but we've been slowly modifying our cars to be able to handle this type of stuff with bash plates and snorkels."

He said they often ended up pooling car parts bought along for the trip since because everyone was driving the same type of vehicle they often bought spare parts along which could then be used on their or someone else's car if needed.

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