Four day info dump.
Days 9,10,11 & 12
Mountain? what Mountain?
After raiding the old style Lollyshop in Ohakune for sugary sustenance we headed along the undulating back roads out of town.
Rolling along all we can see of the majestic Mount Ruapehu is its' snow dusted feet. It looked chilly and damp when we were starting off and even lightly rained, but five minutes down the road we were peeling off rain gear as we were now basking in glorious sunlight. Rolling country back roads took us through the middle of a herd of fiesty young bulls on the move from paddock to paddock and past an unconcerned farmer that did less herding than we did.
A nice grassed shoulder beside the gravel section of the road provided a pleasant lunch stop. Soon enough we popped onto Highway 1 and peddled on to Taihape for the obligatory giant corrugated Gum Boot photo.
We hit the Taihape local New World supermarket and early Chinese takeaway dinner. Tottering down the state highway with full stomachs we pottered up Heartbreak Hill and down again to the white gorge walls of Mangaweka. In the second holiday park based in a domain of the trip, we stayed the night in the sports ground tuck shop that had been converted into a bunk cabin.
Day 10
Windy hills.
Leaving Mangaweka we ambled gradually up and out of the gorge depths into logging truck and sheep keeping country. We followed "The Country Road" section of the NZ Cycle Trail instead of dealing with the madness of Highway 1. At Rangiwahia we decided to keep the increasing wind at our backs and travel to Palmerston North in a zigzag fashion to keep the wind our ally. It was a good decision and the increasing wind shoved us along and had us scrambling for our rain gear in Kiwitea.
A chilly squal later saw us and many other patrons purchasing hot pies at the Cheltenham "corner" store. Soon it was a case of rain gear off as the gale force winds forcefully assisted us all the way to Ashurst. The price paid for all the windy assistance was horrible crippling cross winds half of the way into Palmerston North till we reached the shelter of the Manawatu river paths. A excursion into Palmeston North city centre revealed a Burger Fuel restaurant as our first dining option. We looked no further for a early dinner! Woohoo kumara fries! As Pahiatua was our destination we ground up and over Pahiatua track past the thrashing wind turbines. We ended up in our one and only hotel room of the entire trip.
Pahiatua has extremes of accomodation; the cheap "Carnival" camp grounds which had cabins, but they were booked out weeks ahead or the expensive (for us) hotel. We decided on the hotel room due the length of the day just past and the threat of crap weather that night. The luxury of a bathroom all to ourselves was nice as well.
Day 11
Baa, Ram, hills...
Leaving Pahiatua we daudled along tring to get in the goove for the day. We were riding country roads again to connect to our next bit of trail, the Rimutaka cycle trail (day 12). Today's route took us along some of the Manawatu cycle way and Route 52.
The Nga Haerenga/Nz Cycle Trail signs were well placed along the entire day's route of an easy 77km,
making navigation a diddle!
Almost nothing of note bar sheep and farms caught our eye, it's a lovely but unremarkable part of the country to travel. Sheep, sheep and sheep were the only livestock I recall from this section. There were no services at Alfredton except Domain camping, toilets and water. Our lunch stop for the day was a livestock loading ramp where a wandering German retiree traveller riding a reasonably fresh looking ex rental mountain bike joined us. When packing up from lunch I discovered I had a broken spoke and so added that to our list of things to sort that afternoon in Masterton. Masterton was reached only a hour after lunch. After pitching the tents at the Holiday Camp we daudled into town surprised by the extremely bike considerate motorists to get supplies and be unintentionally stalked by the German traveller. Washing, wheel trueing, bag patching, food shopping, clothes washing, sunset photographing, and trans Cook Straight ferry booking, it all happened that afternoon.
Day 12
The Crack!
On the morning of day 12 we roared along highway from Masterton to Greytown assisted by a partial tailwind. As my brother and I neared the last 3km into Featherston we were buffeted by blustery cross winds. Even our semi-fat tyres couldn't keep us on the road all the time. Lunch in Featherston saw the gale force wind die down. Thankfully we had a tail wind gently shoving us toward the Rimutaka Incline Cycle Trail.
The starting singletrack joyfully ridden we pottered up the rail trail section. Gusts started licking the sides of the range a little too lovingly. By the time we reached the Little Siberia section the winds amour was more like domestic violence. While taking photo a gale ripped up valley, in the very same location as the famous train derailment due to wind, flicked my bikes back wheel out and over, and that was a fully loaded bike! I pushed up to the ahead tunnel and rode through noticing that bike felt funny and sluggish. At the tunnel exit I stopped, looked down and noticed a crack at the chainstay-dropout junction. Bugger! There was only one thing to do, and something that we had packed for; a Zip tie fix. It is something that the Cooke Bro's are famous for, and my brother plied his expertise well.
We limped along trail through the expansive last tunnel to Summit station and started trundling down what could have been a blistering downhill.
When in mobile phone signal range I contacted Mr Rohloff Nz, who I was due to meet that afternoon. He said he would meet us and tracked us down using the Spot Tracker Share page that updated our progress every 10minutes. He offered to pick us up and take us into town. Mr Rohloff NZ knew someone who might be able to fix the frame Sunday. Our ferry was booked for the very next day(Saturday) I graciously declined his offer and vowed to limp into our Lower Hutt accommodation along the riverside trails, for if this was to Bev the last day of the CBNZB I was going to ride while the zip ties held! Mr Rohloff said he would be intouch as he had other options to explore. We continued along the gentle riverside trail, the bike behaving fine apart from pinchy up hill sections where a concerning creak eminated from the MacGyvered fix. The trail popped out onto a suburban street and we heard a frantic beeping of a car horn. It was Mr Rohloff who had again tracked us down thanks to his local trail knowledge and assistance from Mr. Spot Tracker (best birthday gift ever from my wife and in-laws!). Our solution was his man Brendon that had access to an Arc welder.
My Machinist brother had doubts about our success but half an hour later my frame was fixed with metal chewing gum and tacky grey undercoat. We would make our ferry date after all!
