KEY POINTS:
It began in Ngaruawahia - home of one of those elusive creatures - a traditionally National Party voter who had decided to change to Labour for this one.
The catalyst for the shift was little - a pile of pink batts.
Donna Slater had insulation put in her
family home in 2002 - and the difference to her family and the health of her son Chase, who has cystic fibrosis so impressed her that she is now a crusader for others to have the same.
So when she heard National intended to ditch the $1 billion fund for such projects, she decided that was enough.
"It can only take a little thing sometimes," she says.
This was such great news for the PM, buffeted by polls for so long, that she decided to visit them. Chase decides he's quite taken with "the boss of the country" and invites her in to look at his hat collection. She does, and they hatch a hats for votes scheme - she promises to send him some of the ones she is apparently inundated with in her travels.
So began the lightning-pace day in Hamilton, moving from audience to audience with no space in between, other than a quick stop by the side of the road to eat lunch in the car. She lays out the same plan at each, casting the same curses at her rival - claiming they are "trashing KiwiSaver" to fund their tax cuts, and trashing research and development. What's more, she says, they would have sent troops to Iraq, although she doesn't mention this at the Muslim mosque.
"Who do you trust?" she asked the staff and students crowded into the lecture theatre at Waikato University, and again, "who do you trust?" of the 40 or so who turned up to see her at Hamilton's Muslim mosque. She also makes much of these straitened times, saying repeatedly that only a fool would "change horses midstream."
The applause was vigorous at Waikato University and at a subsequent address at Weltec. Labour had just delivered its plan to phase in a near-universal student allowance, after all, and never mind that most of those there wouldn't benefit from it.
But it wasn't just an easy ride. She puts an extra $133 million on the government credit card to raise the wages threshold after which beneficiaries will start to lose benefit money, to $140 by 2014 from the current $80. At the announcement she's asked why it took so long. Nine years, you've had, the questioner said. The similar question was asked of the student allowance policy after she declared she'd "always had a dream" to do such a thing.
Her response to both was that the country was such a shambles when she first took over, that other things had to be done first.
Between tertiary institutions she dons a head scarf to speak at the mosque about the value of immigrants to New Zealand's economy. Meanwhile, down in Nelson her former foreign minister was beating the opposite drum - calling for a dramatic reduction in the number of migrants to help ensure New Zealanders would have jobs.
Clark does not look surprised - dismissing the line as Mr Peters' "bread and butter."
By the end of the day, the morning's start has come back at her. The Greens' whom she has been wooing because their poll results take Labour's up nearly equal to National, are not pleased at her taking the credit for their insulation retrofitting schemes. She remains unrepentant, saying simply that in elections each party must "paddle their own waka."
And despite their advice for her to put her feet up until she gets her memory back, she gets in the Crown car to rush to the next appointment, and to ask who they trust.
