Nicole Kleinhoelting, Another German Tourist Loses All in New Zealand

New Zealand’s reputation as a safe tourism destination took another hammer blow today with the news that one more foreign tourist has been robbed in the country, this time whilst on a Lord of the Rings tour in the South Island.

25 year old German tourists Nicole Kleinhoelting had travelled through both New York and Chicago without a problem, it was only when she arrived in New Zealand she was robbed of everything she owned.

She’d left her car parked in Gore Road, Roseneath for a few hours, according to a Stuff.co.nz report

” When she returned from a Lord of the Rings tour at 7.30pm, someone had broken into her car and stolen a bag containing all her clothes and her toiletries. She was also robbed of a hard-drive containing most of the photos of her travels, a Swiss Army knife given as a going away present when she left Germany, and her passport.

”I could cry all the time. I’m really thinking about going home,” she said.

”I have no idea because I wanted to travel around for a year. But right now I’m not in the mood to travel anymore.” …more here

and who could blame her? Crime against tourists is one of New Zealand’s growth industries, and one that’s sure to become more successful as star struck visitors come in their thousands to follow the Hobbit trail.

There have been so many of these thefts in recent times that we’ve almost stopped blogging about them here at E2NZ.org. We continue in the hope that we can try to get the message out that New Zealand is not as safe as people think it is. If you must visit be sure to take the minimum with you, never leave anything in a vehicle that you can’t afford to lose and if you’re staying in a hotel use its safety deposit box.

As far as we know, the German government does not issue any travel advisories for New Zealand, unlike Britain who gives a warning about crime in New Zealand.

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