Keep Right on to the End of the Road (literally).

Today was the first time the bikes were used in anger, when we left Westport and cycled 62 miles north to the most northerly settlement on the west coast (or the Last Resort) as it bills itself.  The first 30 miles were more or less flat, the next 20 certainly weren't and the last section was flat again. We started up a road that at times appeared to be actually below sea level, sandwiched between mountains on the right and the sea on the left. We went through townships which were once prosperous mining communities, but are now reduced to trying to keep the population from dwindling any further. A classic case was Granity, where there is a primary school, a Community Police Office (not permanently staffed), a Volunteer Fire Station, a library open 3 hours a week, a theatre (see photo below) a museum (closed), 2 art galleries (closed), a judo club, a Pensioners Club, a Fundraising Office (shut), a Community Hall and a Community book exchange. What it didn't have was anywhere you could buy a pint of milk or loaf of bread. I'm assuming the surfeit of halls was due to stuff being abandoned when the mines closed.

Onwards up the road we arrived at Mokinahu (or something similar, it's not on the map). There we found a cafe selling wonderful homemade cakes to be enjoyed with mugs of tea or coffee - perhaps unsurprisingly we were the only customers. After this we turned inland and were soon climbing over Karamea Bluff, a fair climb but nothing outrageously steep, but the cloud had broken up and the sun was beating down, so it felt harder than it should have done. We rolled down the other side, back to the flat and then to our surprise found ourselves going up and over again.  We finally made it back to the coast and carried on to Karamea - The Last Resort.  This is an odd place (population 575), but it pales into insignificance compared to our accommodation!  

I'm not sure where to start, but let's say that the description of the place I booked on booking.com bears little if any resemblance to where we are. Imagine a small holiday unit by the sea that has not been touched since the 1970s and you will have some idea. The carpet is going to give me nightmares and the TV is a collectors piece, even the mugs we are drinking out of advertise Vavoline, which I am reliably told was an engine oil used in the 60s - the same era as the fridge! Hoping it stays dry tonight as the ceiling is bulging where the damp patch is..........  The only TV programme C could find initially was the muppets!!

We walked up to the only small supermarket and were unable to construct a meal from its contents that could be processed on the ancient equipment provided - the promised stovetop and oven are conspicuous by their absence.  As a result we had to go to the local hotel to eat and sample some local beer / wine. It's a hard life but someone has to do it!!  I was going to give you some snippets from the local paper but Chris appears to have trashed it with a collapsing nectarine, so I will leave that for now except to report that the only crime worthy of note (????) in the last month was that of 2 cars going off the road (allegedly) but failing to be found after 2 hours - police, fire service, ambulance and a nurse attended, which is the entire emergency personnel of the area.  You find your fun where you can round here........ 

Photos include the West Coast's answer to the West End, Granity Library, an interesting bike stand, coffee stop at the Old Boiler and some scenery

Go West Old Folk (apologies to the Village People)

Today we left our very comfortable accommodation in Picton (to return in 3 weeks and reclaim the bike bags) heading down to Blenheim and then turning west to reach the west coast - from coast to coast by lunchtime!  Unfortunately the minor road we remembered from our last cycle trip has, in the aftermath of November's earthquake, become the diversion route for any vehicle trying to get south to Christchurch and beyond. To say the road is unsuitable is like saying the Tasman sea is a bit wet.....

Luckily we were driving it on a Sunday morning so despite the road works, narrow sections allowing traffic in one direction only and poor road surface, we only took an hour longer than predicted. Not sure what it would be like at a busier time with trucks on the road, but overtaking opportunities were few and far between. Things improved eventually as we merged on to SH6 and eventually the diversion turned off south and the road to Westport was deserted (as we remembered) from then on.  

The journey through the Buller Gorge was fabulous, but did not allow for stopping to take any photos and although the sun was shining we could see clouds building ahead of us.  We headed to Cape Foulwind and walked along the coastal path to Tuarangi Beach passing the seal colony where we spent a long time trying to spot the seals with their excellent camouflage. There were quite a few pups slipping and sliding their way round the rocks as the adults lounged around and had the odd scratch - see how many you can spot in the photos!  We stopped for a cold drink at Tuarangi Beach and it was then we felt the first spots of rain - amazing how much faster our return journey was!  Westport is a really old fashioned place, with strange buildings that look as if they could form part of a film set, interspersed with super modern supermarkets. The entire population of Westport, plus all the other 'towns' in the 70 odd miles before the road to the north simply ends, comes to around 6,000 so not exactly overcrowded. 

The bikes are ready for tomorrow when we will be heading off up this road north. Hopefully the forecast of south-westerlies tomorrow will be correct and that the threatened showers hold off until later in the day, also as per forecast.

Photos are views from Cape Foulwind, some seals and proof we are a long way from home!

The Mother of Invention

Today the mechanic spent the morning (with some help from his lovely assistant) doing what he is brought along for - so we now have two re-assembled bikes ready for action. The Logistics and Operations Manager was then left with the slightly tricky problem of getting them in the hire car, leaving room for the luggage, walking rucksacks etc and without getting dirt or oil on the cream upholstery (actually more like light beige, but you get the idea).  Finally, with the aid of 2 bargain basement large tarpaulins and 2 cheap and exceedingly nasty pillows, I think the issue is resolved. Whether they will still be intact when we get to Westport tomorrow for the start of the first trip remains to be seen.

The weather was cloudy and windy today so we took a walk round the marina and seafront, then took the bikes on a test ride up to Karaka point, where we gave a few tourists a bit of a surprise by tramping (one at a time as the other minded the bikes) down to the historic site (which appeared to be 2 holes in the ground) and the beach - would should really be reported to Trade Descriptions. The surprise was the fact that we were wearing helmets and wearing cleated shoes which, perhaps unsurprisingly is not the outfit of choice round here.

When I come to NZ, and especially to the South Island, I always feel I have stepped back in time. So far, although plenty of the local bars (The Thirsty Pig, Toot 'n Whistle etc) are playing music, the most recent thing I have heard so far is the original version of Hard Days Night!  Also the addiction to phonetic spelling appears to have been taken to extremes - I don't suppose Phoebe Archer (currently at Oxford) has her tutors spelling her name 'Feebee'.

Chris is devastated to be missing the Omaka flying day.  'Those magnificent men in their flying machines will be lined up against the fence (??) for your entertainment.  Nana's Cream Freeze will be serving up a storm of the best kind and the sausages will be sizzling'.  Who needs the Farnborough air show?

By the way I take back anything derogatory I might have said about Anglican vicars in the past. Having just finished a bottle of exquisite Sauvignon Blanc (from Marlborough of course) called Vicar's Choice (as a vicar originally picked it out as the best of a number of samples), I can now see that they are men of distinction and taste!!

Photos of the day - no red blooded Irishman would want to be labelled a 'Drinking Consultant'!!!

Heading South

Feeling much better this morning, if somewhat empty after the last couple of days, we left the comfortable surroundings of our upgraded room in Stratford and headed to Wellington to catch the ferry to South Island. To keep us amused on route we passed the following businesses:

Junk 'n Disorderly (Antiques), Kiss and Bake Up (kind of obvious) plus McSharp (for all your sharpening needs). Devastated to find that we had missed the 'Festival of Pots and Garden Ornaments' (I kid you not) we were intrigued at the idea of a medieval fair in New Zealand.........

Anyway we made it in plenty of time for the ferry and enjoyed a smooth, if very windy, trip across from Wellington to Picton - you have to admire the tenacity of those past explorers who made it through the Cook Straits (obviously before they had that name!), in a sailing boat. We were thanked profusely by the captain for choosing to travel on the Interislander ferry - but I was at a bit of a loss to work out what the alternative might have been.  On the plus side we have managed an entire day without getting locked either into or out of the car - one has to take one's pleasures where one can!

We are staying very close to the harbour in Picton and have somehow managed another upgrade, so we are in a fabulous one bedroom apartment within easy walking distance of everything (though in fairness the size of Picton means that everywhere is within easy walking of everywhere else). There is a lot of money floating in the harbour!  So far today my camera has stopped working, now diagnosed as a completely flat battery with a non working battery warning light!, and a massive scare when the booking.com app on my iPad showed that all my accommodation bookings for the rest of the holiday had been cancelled - still haven't got to the bottom of that, the actual website still shows them all OK. Now we are in Marlborough I am showing solidarity with locals and indulging in the main local product - Sauvignon Blanc. It's a hard life, but someone has to do it!!

Pictures from the boat and a pub some of my male friends might like to have as their local.....

Bush walking and torrential rain

A better day, if you discount C's sunburn and my better, but still delicate, stomach.  My somewhat unhealthy diet today has consisted of bread and jam (breakfast),  chic chip cookies (lunch), more bread and jam plus yoghurt for dinner (plus wine!). It may not read like a diet gurus ideal but it has all stayed put, which was the main objective. The weather today started sunny and windy and ended windy and extremely wet. We drove up to Stratford Mountain House and set off on a 5 hour bush walk which was totally deserted except for a small area round Dawson Falls, which people could get to in 10 minutes from a car park. Plenty of bird song, none of which was recognisable to people from Bristol plus more climbing than we had anticipated as we had to descent steeply to each river crossing just to climb back up. Dawson Falls were worth seeing (if you ignored the people) and the bush itself was fascinating. Sadly it started to rain heavily after lunchtime and we were soaked and frozen by the time we made it back to the car. Luckily, for the first day so far, all the doors opened and closed as expected. Yesterday we managed to get a back door seemingly locked open (which makes driving a bit tricky) but is marginally better than all doors except the drivers locked shut (getting your gear out of the boot in these circumstances is somewhat difficult, especially if you have 2 bicycles!

Back at the motel I did a washing run, not because we had masses of dirty clothes but it was the easiest way to get stuff dry.  We have obtained our first local paper, which is always the source of much interest on holiday. Can anyone tell me why someone in New Zealand would want / need to import breeze blocks from Ballyboggan in County Meath? There must be a cheaper way to build your garage.   However in today's bigger stories it was revealed that a man had queue jumped to hire a rowing boat in New Plymouth (Walter Rayleigh eat your heart out) and the real scandal is reported as follows:

'Unfortunately the wrong puzzles page was printed in Wednesday's paper. The page was from January 11th 2016 rather than 2017. Today's puzzle page is correct but the 'yesterday's solutions' will not correspond to the puzzles from Wednesday.  We are working with the puzzle company and our internal systems on an on- going issue and apologise for the confusion'.

What I want to know is - did anyone notice??!!

He who fights and runs away lives to fight another day

The plan today was to start early and climb Mount Teranaki, which at over 8,000 ft is a bit of a brute. The route climbs one mile in 4 miles distance and it doesn't take a mathematical genius to work out the gradient. The day started hot (out of the wind), but the forecast was for gales on the top with a maximum temperature of minus 6 degrees when you factored in the wind chill. We didn't really feel we had enough gear but we decided to give it a go and turn back if conditions deteriorated. We never had to make the decision! Having been very ill overnight and then unsuccessfully attempting to keep some breakfast down, I should have had more sense than to start. I stopped to wait for Chris on the path and the next thing I knew everything was spinning and I had to lie down. To cut a long story short we decided to head down immediately, at which point the top of the mountain disappeared into cloud. To be honest I felt so awful I didn't even feel disappointed!  It is now 21.30 and after Chris lovingly preparing a tin of chicken soup for me (!!) I am off to bed to hopefully wake revitalised.

PS - the chicken soup has just suffered the same fate as breakfast!

From a land a (very) long way away

Just checking in to let you know we arrived in Auckland yesterday after 36 hours travel. All went smoothly with everything running to time and our bikes already in the baggage hall 10 minutes after the plane landed (and we were through customs as well). In fact all went swimmingly until we got to Jucy to pick up the hire car. We discovered that instead of the car we had booked - 'El Cheapo, 8 Seata' we had been given an upgrade to an 8 seater which was presumably not supposed to be cheap. First problem was that the baggage doesn't go in!!  The seats don't fold down, you can just push them forward a bit, so getting 2 bikes in made for an interesting exercise - we haven't tried to get them out yet! The expected cheap manual car is an incomprehensible automatic and so far has left Chris locked in with all the doors except for the driver's one locked fast despite the fact the car had been opened. Then today, with all the doors firmly closed, it refused to move from its parked position until the doors closed. Getting moving involved opening and closing all the doors several times until it got bored with the game and randomly started 😡.

Anyway we have safely got ourselves down to the Mount Teranaki area, after 12 hours sleep last night. No sign of jet lag - we are just really tired and I'm about to go to bed again ready for hitting the hills on foot tomorrow. Hopefully more photos / news tomorrow when I can keep my eyes open.

BTW: sign by the roadside today informed us that today's risk of Facial Eczema is low - bet you are all relieved to hear that, it certainly had me worried.

Today's pictures are our own car packed ready to go, our very discrete hire car, me modelling for Jucy pin up girl and today's lunch spot