May 27 Amazing 2012 Corolla Specials save you thousands

We are very happy to be able to offer this amazing deal on the all new 2012 Toyota Corolla GX 1.8L auto hatchback, saving you an amazing $7000 and we will even sweeten the deal with a free set of alloy wheels!

Offer valid until 30th June 2012.
Offer Extended! We have 2 left that have got to go!

1205-bt-corollagx-web500

The Corolla is indeed New Zealand's favourite car, and has been so for the last decade. There is a very real reason for this.

May 25 Simon from The Nelson Mail has some news for us!

Local Nelson Mail advertising rep Simon Adlington came in on Thursday to do the Prius Challenge. He quite fancied the thought of using the Prius C for a week.
We challenged him to show us just how green he was and he came prepared and ready to go!

priuschallenge-simon-a-500

For someone that has never driven a hybrid car before Simon jumped right into it and pulled off a great score!

May 22 The Prius Challenge Leader board - can you do better?

The Prius Challenge has been underway now for a couple of weeks and we have had quite a few people through. It has been amazing to gauge their reactions to the whole experience.
Some of the celebrities have been very competitive, and fitting 2 massive Nelson Giants in the back seats was certainly entertaining.

The Prius Challenge is a competition though, so lets take a look at the Leader Board at the moment. Check out those figures - the top 3 drives are achieving fuel consumption around 3 litres per 100 km, and the Top10 are all under 4 litres / 100km!

priuschallenge-lb220512-500

For those of you that know your car stats this is quite remarkable, and the whole point to the challenge. For instance, NZ's most beloved car, the Toyota Corolla has a 4.5 star fuel economy of 7.3 litres/100km. But there is so much more to this story than just fuel economy.

May 19 The Extreme 4X4 OffRoad Westport Challenge debrief

On Friday night we hosted an event to celebrate the success of the Bowater Toyota sponsored team at this years 2012 Extreme Off Roading Westport Challenge.
The came in a very credible 2nd overall for the event and showed once again just how tough the Toyota trucks are in extreme off road conditions. We certainly enjoyed watching their progress over the course of the event back in April 28/29th via live updates to facebook from the two Leigh's (Miss Leigh Kirby & Mr Leigh Jones) who just so happened to take the freshly cleaned indestructible red FJ Cruiser over to the wild West Coast to film the event.
Check out the article we posted about the event complete with a huge photo gallery here.

That film was one of the reasons for the party. That and a great excuse to just have a get together, chuck back some steak & cheese pies, 50 scoops of chips and sauce, some hokey pokey and of course some delicious Old Mout Cider.

Tony Bowater with the Extreme Off Road Challenge Team
The trucks stopped by for some photos. Serious Machines!
The tyres on this truck are awesome.
Another old local Nelson business, Redwood Cellars,came to the party with some Old Mout Cider!
The Hilux really has got a multitude of uses! Look a chilly bin.
It was quite a cold night, but we had a great turnout.
Jontee Bowater holding onto his Steak & Cheese mate
That sneaky Hilux Chimp even made an appearance
Great night, the Old Mout went down a treat, cheers Nelson!
Heinz Schwarze won one of the seats to the Mt Riley Off Road Open Day
Erika & Alice Westley gave us a hand on the night.

The video of the night is great - it clearly shows how the prizes we sometimes give out get enhanced within the process! The trip for 3 to the open day at the Mt Riley extreme off road course somehow turned into a breakfast in Havelock on the way there, and dinner on the way back as well!