Wednesday February 26, 2014

Thoughts on New Zealand

New Zealand is a wonderful country to visit. There is no better way to see this country and meet the people than on a bicycle, in our opinion. Almost every time we stopped whether it was for groceries or at a camp-site people were interested in what we were doing and told us about their area and places we should see.  One person said that when they see touring cyclists, they admire them and wish they could do it.  Of course, they can do it.  It takes a little bit of training and a lot of determination.

Over the last week I have been trying to write this blog and put into words what we have experienced.  It is very difficult to put it all into words. We have seen the beauty of New Zealand in the generosity of the people, the incredible scenery, the diversity of the North and South Islands, the cities and the small towns.  We have also seen the other side of New Zealand, where grandparents are looking after grandchildren because their children can’t manage because of drugs and other substance abuse. We have seen small towns that are dying because there is no work in the surrounding areas.  New Zealand has a small population of just over 4 million people and like so many other countries the vast majority of the population is centred around the big cities like Auckland (1.37 million), Wellington (397,900), Christchurch (467,000) and Hamilton (504,000).  There is a growing gap between the rich and poor.  This is not unique to New Zealand, but it is something to be concerned about in a nation with such a small population.

We got to meet and experience the generosity of the people.  We really enjoyed the campsites and the camp kitchens.  We have spoken to people from all walks of life and countries from Doctors, teachers and factory workers.  Often we have been invited to stay with people if we are going to be going through their Town or City.  We have spoken to other touring cyclists and backpackers who told us about their experiences and given us advice on what to see and where to go.  What has been a lot of fun for me is talking to young people who are travelling, whether they are on a gap year and working or on an extended vacation.  It has been really interesting to hear their perspective on how their own lives have changed since travelling or working in a different country and what they will take back to their own countries from the experience they have gained.

In a nutshell New Zealand has very generous and kind people, incredible scenery, the weather can change from one day to the next actually from one hour to the next – it can be very windy!  It has hills – some short and steep (18% grade) and nasty – others long and steep (10% grades) and nasty! the rewards of cycling up a hill is the view and the down hills.  New Zealand has natural disasters: earthquakes, cyclones, volcanoes and weather.  It doesn’t have nasty beasties that can eat you or bite you – but it does have sandflies – DO NOT underestimate the sand flies, they are similar to black flies in Canada and midges in Scotland, nasty little beasties that leave you itching all night.

Has this experience changed us?  I think it has a little.  We are more trusting of people and accept their generosity.  New Zealand has been a great country for us to start the Grand Adventure.  New Zealand has made the transition from our usual way of going on vacation with an ‘organized package tour’ to independent traveling and not knowing where we will be setting up tent that day very easy for us.  Bring on the rest of the world – we are ready for you – maybe.

For the actual route we took check out the Actual Route page.  I have updated the map with the routes we took on the North and South Islands.

Monday February 24, 2014

We did it.  Ralf and I jumped of the Sky Tower in Auckland New Zealand.  The Sky Tower is 328 metres (over 1,076 feet).  We jumped from 194 metres (636 feet).  Absolutely awesome.

We had talked about jumping off the Sky Tower ever since we had done the Edge Walk in Toronto and found out that Auckland New Zealand had an Edge walk and a jump.  The Sky Jump is a very safe jump from 636 feet.

Well here we are in Auckland and now is the time to do it.  We had gone into the Downtown City of Auckland last week, but there was a lot of things happening (the Nines Rugby league competition, the lantern festival), there were a lot of people wanting to do the jump so we couldn\’t schedule our jump.

We decided we would do it today.  We got up early and caught the bus by 9:15.  We still had to wait an hour before we could jump – 11:00 am was our scheduled time.

They suited us up and checked our harness, weighed us and wrote how much we weighed on our wrists.  My weight in kilos was the year I was born.  That doesn\’t make me a little porker, it was the weight of the harness etc!! then up we went to the Sky Deck.

Lovely outfits again, at least they weren\’t orange like the outfits we wore for the Edge walk.  I decided I wanted to be first out of our group of three to jump.   I went on to the platform first, had a few photos taken, had my harness checked out again and 1, 2, 3 of I went – 11 seconds and I was on the ground.

It takes about 5 minutes to get the rigging back up to the Sky Deck and then Ralf was on his way down.

As I said when we did the Edge walk,

\”Life is not measured by the number of breaths that we take, but by the moments that take our breath away\”

Did you know the Sky Tower:

• Took 2 years and 9 months to build and cost NZ 85 million to construct;
• Weighs a massive 21 million kilograms or the weight of approximately 6,000 elephants;
• Is 328 metres high or around 37 buses standing end to end;
• Is primarily constructed from 15,000 cubic metres of concrete, 2,000 tonnes of reinforcing steel and 260 panes of glass;
• Has 1,267 stairs leading from the base of the Sky Tower to Sky Deck;

and the most important fact. . .

• Should remain standing in the unlikely event of a magnitude 8.0 (Richter scale) earthquake occurring within 20 kilometres of the Sky Tower.

Should remain standing . . .

We are heading to Australia on Thursday.  I wonder what exciting things we can do there.  Surviving the wildlife should be the first priority I think.

Saturday February 22, 2014

Today Chris took us to see his Mum and we went for a drive on the other side of Auckland – Pukekohe.

We had met Kath in Cyprus at my nephew\’s wedding and was looking forward to visiting her.  However, she is a very busy lady and she had to consult her schedule to fit us in.  Kath will be 80 next year and is so busy it is wonderful to see someone of that age still volunteering and helping out in her community.

A walk up to the lighthouse.

Although we had cycled in this area there were some places that we didn\’t get to.  The lighthouse at Manaku Head is 18 kms from the main road.  There were some areas that we didn\’t go to on the bikes, because we had to decide if it was worth an extra 30 to 40 kms added on to the mileage of a day.

On some directional posts for historic sites the sign would direct you down a No Exit road, and not indicate how far the site was.  Like Manakau Head lighthouse it was 18 kms down to the lighthouse and 18 ks back.

A great photo that Ralf took.

We had a wonderful visit with Kath.  Have a great birthday next year.

Tuesday February 18, 2014

Today we went to Rangitoto Island.  This island was created from a volcanic eruption that occurred only 600 years ago.

We took the ferry from Devonport at 9:30 am and could have caught the 12:45 ferry back to Devonport, if we had hurried back from the summit. We like not to hurry and have definitely embraced taking our time to see things.

The summit was 259 metres high and took a winding path from the wharf upwards.

It meandered through lava fields and we were able to go through lava caves, which was fun.

At the top we had lunch and walked around the crater rim.

On the way down we followed a couple of the side tracks and returned to the wharf at 1:30 pm. The ferry was at 3:30.

We then followed the coast line past some historic baches.  A bach is a small cottage like structure used for week-end retreats.  Twenty minutes from Auckland, but a world away.

It is well worth going over to this island if you are in Auckland.

Sunday February 16, 2014

Chris took us for a drive today to the west coast of Auckland –  Waitakere.  We drove up the Scenic Drive to the Waitakere Ranges Regional Park.

It would have been a great ride on the bikes, but what we saw today would have taken us three days!  We stopped a couple of times at pull-outs to take some photos and then stopped for about an hour at the Education Centre. There was about a 10 minute video to watch about the region and the flora and fauna of the area.

The decking around the visitor centre was really well done, you didn’t realize how high up you were until you looked straight down.

It was a great spot to take some photos and see Auckland from this area. I really loved the idea of this picture frame.

\”This natural masterpiece is cared for by the Auckland Regional Council\”.

I also liked the words on this board.

We then drove to Piha Beach, we had a nice lunch and climbed the Lion’s Rock and paddled in the sea.  The sand here is black.

Chris used to come here when he was younger and was a surfing dude and lifeguard.

After Piha, we went to Cornwallis (not the one in Nova Scotia where Ralf did his basic training for the military) it was a lovely area to do some fishing.  Chris used to come here with his son Steven to fish.

Sometimes while we are out and about we see Hobbit houses, this time we were really lucky and actually spotted a Hobbit.

We had a great day. Thanks Chris.

Tuesday February 11, 2014

Well, here we are back at Chris’s house – for now we have finished our cycling touring of New Zealand.  We will continue cycling, while we are here in Auckland but not fully-loaded.

Yesterday I could not work out why Ralf wanted to cycle to Papakura, when we could have easily caught a train from Pukekohe into Auckland.  Ralf mentioned that Papakura is where we started this first part of the Grand Adventure and that is where he wanted it to finish. (We took the ferry and train out of Auckland to avoid the Auckland traffic and did the same on the return). I am so glad we did.  It was a lovely ride from Pukekohe and incorporated a lot of what we had experienced throughout the last weeks.  Headwinds, hills, flats, rural scenery (no mountains) traffic.

When we arrived at the train station at Papakura this old fella asked us where we had been? where we were going? all the usual questions asked of touring cyclists.  We told him what we had done and this was our last day of touring in New Zealand.  His comment was “Good on ya – because you are no spring chickens are you.”  Ouch!

We fly out to Australia in just over two weeks time.  We have a list of things to do, getting the camping gear cleaned, getting the bikes cleaned and serviced, pack the bikes ready to go to Oz and go over everything we have and decide if we need to keep it or send it back to Canada.

We also have time to do some touristy things around Auckland as well.  We are going over to the islands near Auckland – Rangitoto and Waiheke.  Waiheke island we can cycle on and has vineyards we can tour and taste some more New Zealand wines.  Rangitoto Island is a recently erupted volcano (600 years ago). We will walk up to the crater of the volcano.  We are also going to jump off the SkyTower and have a wander around downtown Auckland.

We are not going up to the Northland, we figure the only way we would have the time to cycle that area is to take public transport north and then cycle south.  We have decided that from now on we will take as little public transport as possible, unless we are advised to do so by locals for example “don’t cycle into Sydney”!

Sunday February 9, 2014

I felt as if we were holding ‘Court’ this morning.  We were the centre of attention as we were preparing to leave the camp site.  Lots of questions about where we had been, where we were going, and lots of questions about the bicycles and the amount of gear we were carrying.

We usually wake up with the sunrise and often are getting ready for bed at sunset.  I have noticed over the past couple of weeks that the hours of daylight is getting shorter.  It is getting light now at 7:00 am and dark around 8:30pm.  It is noticeably the tail-end of the New Zealand summer, although the weather is very hot.  It is a little like our August in Canada, you can sense the change in the season, but really do not want to admit the summer is almost over.

We were given advice on the best way to Pukekohe.  Follow SH 1 until you get to Pokeno (there is a Sunday market there), then take the back road through Tuakua to Pukekohe.   We were not told that part of SH1 becomes an Expressway – a divided highway.  A divided highway with a cycle lane!!

Sunday on the Expressway, was not very busy.

We had not managed to get hold of Matt’s Gran-in-law, so we were unsure whether we would stay the night with her in Pukekohe or carry on to Auckland.  As it happened as we were cycling along SH1 Chris and Kath spotted us and stopped.  They were on their way to Napier and would not be in Pukekohe.  Again the generosity of Kiwis became apparent when Kath offered up her house for us to stay the night, she gave us a key and told us we could stay a couple of nights if we wished.  Kelly my nephew’s wife was in Pukekohe/Auckland for a couple of days as well.  Chris texted her and told her we were on the way.  She was waiting for us when we arrived.  It was lovely to see her, we had a quick chat with her before she had to leave to go back to Auckland.

We stopped for lunch at the Pokeno market and had a little wander around. To get to Pukekohe from the market, Ralf checked the route on his garmin and it had us going north of the highway and then down into Pukekohe.  We had a little discussion about relying on the garmin or following locals directions.  On this occasion we followed the locals direction and admittedly it added about 8 ks to the route, but it was a nice scenic route!  This area is a farming area but primarily vegetables – lots of potatoes, onions and carrots.

We were only going to spend overnight in Pukekohe but decided to take another rest day before heading back to Auckland on Tuesday.

We have realized that we are very close to the end of our stay in New Zealand.  We are ahead of schedule because we didn’t do the west coast of the South Island.  We will spend the next 2 weeks with Chris (Matt’s father-in-law) that will give us lots of time to sort through things, what we need to keep, what we may send back to Canada.  More importantly we have to clean the bikes and all of our equipment.  Australia is quite strict about not importing any bio-hazards and as we have been camping for the last two and a half months we need to make sure the camping equipment is very clean.

Saturday February 8, 2014

A very late start this morning.  Darby had indicated last night that they usually like a lie-in on a Saturday morning.  We got up around 8:00, Darby and Tammy didn’t get up until well after 9:00.  We had a relaxing breakfast with them and eventually left at about 11:00 am.  We had time to look at their work – Tammy does some lovely work and won an Award at the Hamilton Art Show recently.

The first part of the ride was drizzly, not real rain but a fine mist.  It cleared up to a lovely warm sunny day.  It was only a short distance to ride and most of it on SH39 which was quite scenic and rolling hills.  Some of the Village names make me laugh. Whatawhata – How did this Village get named?

We got into Huntly by 3:30 and found our camp site quite easily. It was another Council run campsite, which means it is reasonably priced and very clean and well maintained.

Not sure what sort of bird this is.  The next one is a Heron.

The site was located next to this wetland, it had a 4 km path around the small lake which was being well used by runners, bicyclists and walkers

Friday February 7, 2014

We woke up to rain pattering on our tent this morning.  Fortunately my mum’s saying of “rain before 7 cleared by 11” works in New Zealand as well.  We took our time over breakfast and by the time we were ready to pack up the tent it was almost dry and it had stopped raining.

Sometimes you spot odd things when you are on a bicycle that you may miss if you are in a car or on a bus.

The wind had picked up and we had a windy ride to SH3.  Fortunately we were only spending about 8 kms on SH3 and then following SH39 to Ngahinapouri to our warmshowers hosts Darby and Tammy.  Our plan was to get to Hamilton today and then on to Matt’s Gran-in-law for Sunday.  Darby and Tammy live just outside of Hamilton so that is where we ended up.  They are both artists, Darby is a metal-worker/Blacksmith and Tammy is a potter – they both work part-time as well.

They weren’t going to be home until 5:00 pm so we took our time and stopped at the Town of Pirongia for lunch and a wander around.

Pirongi has a small historic museum which tells of the Maori wars and the European “invasion”.   Often these small museums are not open when we go through the Town or village as they are primarily run by volunteers. It also had a redoubt which is similar to a small fortification to protect the European settlers from any Maori incursion.

The redoubt was a lot smaller than we thought it would be.

We arrived at Darby and Tammy’s place at 4:30 and they arrived home just after 5:00pm.  Bimbo the dog was protecting the property.

Darby made us a great dinner of green-lipped mussels, lamb kofkas, coleslaw, sweet corn – lovely.

We stayed up late chatting to them about New Zealand and some of their travel experiences.  They ride a tandem and have cycled a lot in Europe.  We are looking forward to going to some of the Eastern block countries after talking to them about their travels.

Thursday February 6, 2014

Michael (the German cyclist) offered us his telephone so that we could call Intercity and find out what is happening with my pannier.  It was put on the Waitomo Caves bus and I was able to pick it up here.  It felt awful to think that I had almost lost all my clothes, I will definitely have to be more careful for the rest of this trip.  The ride would have been over for now, I would have had to replace everything and we would have had to go back to Auckland to buy new stuff, an expense we didn’t need.  19 hours of panic over.

After we had picked up the bag from the bus we were walking down the hill back to the campsite and met a couple from Detroit, Michigan.  They were visiting New Zealand as part of their 40^th wedding anniversary celebrations.  This is a small world.  Jim mentioned that his longest bike ride was cycling from north of Detroit to Ohio, cycling GOBA and then cycling back to Detroit approximately 806 miles (approx. 1,300 kms).

We had previously met Jim in a little museum on GOBA in 2012, and chatted to him about his trip to GOBA.  It’s a small world after all.

After we had picked up the pannier we carried on with our plans for the day and booked our Blackwater Rafting adventure – we had a couple of hours to spare and took advantage to relax a little.

What is blackwater rafting?  It basically means that you are rafting in a cave.  In this instance it is ‘rafting’ on individual inner tubes in caves and as we came to an underground waterfall, we had to jump from it, into the pool below – in the dark, a little scary.

\”This is the original Waitomo subterranean adventure that will have you climbing, black water tubing, leaping and floating through Ruakuri Cave\”.

The Blackwater Rafting was awesome, the two guides Miko and Nicki were really good and a lot of fun.  We all got kitted out in wetsuits, boots and helmets, then we were driven to Ruanaki cave.  First we had to practice jumping into the water backwards with an inner tube around your bum. Once we got into the cave we floated along for a while looking at the glow worms.  When we stopped, Miko gave us some information on what glow-worms actually are – they are the larvae or maggots of this particular insect that only lives for 4 days to reproduce and do it all over again.  Her comment was that if they had called it the maggot caves it may not have been as successful as the glow-worm caves.

We walked through another cave and saw a fossil of a whale and then jumped from our first underground waterfall, it was about 2 feet high.  The next waterfall was about 3 feet high and the last one was about 6 feet high.  It was quite scary but when I successfully jumped from the 6 feet one it was awesome. The last thing we had to do was turn our lights of and follow the glow worm lights to the exit of the cave, floating on our inner-tubes.  Now that was scary.  At one point I couldn’t hear anyone around me and the water was pushing me against the rocks.  I looked up and the glow worms were to the right of me, I paddled towards them and kept saying to myself follow the lights, go towards the lights!! From being 3^rd in the group I had moved up to first and was the first one Miko greeted at the end.  Ralf had drifted to the back.

When we got back to the Blackwater Adventure building we were given hot soup and a bagel.  We could buy photos that had been taken throughout the trip, but they weren’t very good.

We were taken back to our campsite and then met Jim and Irene for a drink before going to bed at about 10:30.  A good day.