Gravel Cycling the South Island

Woke this morning in Waihola, or as it has come to be known, Whatahola.  Like an Amazonian tribe, undiscovered since time began, so in a way do the inhabitants of this dreary lakeside village exist. Happy, in their own way, pottering in their gardens, counting flies on the wall, pulling out the cutlery drawer and replacing the knives where the spoons used to be.                       Literally used as a transport stop between Dunedin and Invercargill, stock drivers named "Trevor", complete with stubbies and work boots, enter the confines of the roadside cafe, for a triple shot coffee and a "Jimmy's" pie.     Mid morning we left the cell-like features of our holiday park cabin, complete with two, middle of the night freight trains, rolling on endlessly into a parallel universe. Our move took us directly across the highway to a motel, booked well before we knew, that suicide was a preferable option than staying for two nights.                                     

Alarm off at 5.30am. Apart from putting last minute stuff away we had a bit of fruit and cleaned our teeth and we were out of camp and rolling on State Highway 8. We decided that this was our best bet as the other way was longer, hillier and pretty desolate from what we'd heard. However, the down side on this road was the traffic.                             I'd checked the forecast the previous night, which suggested cloudy with a high of seventeen degrees. No wind.  We'll take that, so off we set.  A gradual climb to begin, but we were fired up to make as much distance as possible, before peak traffic. A steady pace saw us making great time and with only a few cars and no big trucks, we were humming along.  After climbing without really noticing, it was great to get a brilliant downhill through the Manuka gorge. By 7.50am, we had arrived in the metropolis, that is Milton. One street, most of the businesses are for sale, the wind was now up and the temperature was a balmy

After a good night's sleep, which I have to say, we've been enjoying on a regular basis, we were up at about 7.45am and straight into packing up the tents.  Have thoroughly enjoyed the whole camp life aspect once again and living out of a tent. I know it doesn't appeal to a lot of people, but we love it.  The sleeping mats we bought for this trip have been great. We've always been a bit nervous about buying a blow up mat as they seem so flimsy compared to self inflating mats.  But we bit the bullet and purchased two klymit v static mats for this trip, mainly because they were half the size of our old mats.  They have been awesome,  and so have the two inflatable pillows we bought.  We have been getting good sleeps from day one - when we haven't had noisy Russians on the blower to their comrades.                                                         Quietly rolled out of camp and headed for Beaumont on a very nice trail.  Smooth surface, nice bends and easy riding

Beautiful campground, great pitch, but last night after 11pm, we had a Russian woman who thought it  was okay to talk loudly on her phone, when everyone else was asleep, except me. Of course, when she laughed, it was even louder than her conversation. I'm picking at that time of night she was talking to a northern hemisphere caller.                     We have been on the road for over three weeks now and I'm amazed at how much hair I find in the tent.  With very little left to worry about myself, and the length of hair, it can only be one other person. I am totally expecting to wake up one morning to find myself staring at Bruce Willis.                                           Most people that know us, have wondered why it's taken so long for me to start pulling my hair out!  Of course the answer is that I started with Pete's hair. Looking out the tent when we woke at 7am, forced us to pack  up toute-de-suite as there was a misty cloud looking as though it could turn

Awake at 5. 45 am and finished off last nights blog. The day had dawned slightly overcast and a little cool, but looked as though it would burn off. After Eileen had taken care of the horses we all sat down for some toast and marmalade, which was yummy. Unloaded some fresh hay off the trailer and then loaded the bikes. It was lovely to catch up with Eileen and Stu again and have the luxury of a bed.       Eileen was driving us to Clyde, so that we didn't have to cycle through kawarau gorge, which is also a busy highway. Forty five minutes later she plonked us down in Clyde, where we cycled 8km to Alexandra to begin the Roxburgh Gorge trail.                                                                 Ju and Brody visited the supermarket to grab some lunch, while outside, looking after the bikes, I met some lovely people, the guys name being Frank, who had also done a lot of cycle touring here and overseas. Frank especially was very keen to go over our setup and even took photos