All posts by bpheasant

bikepacking, bikes, event, GPS, NZ

Tour Aotearoa – My Day Eight – Whanganui to Palmerston North

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On the face of it, riding from Whanganui to Palmerston North should be a matter of four or five hours with little climbing. But that would be on highway and not nearly interesting enough for our route. Cue a rural route more than two and a half times as long, strewn with hills and six or seven times more climbing – on a lot of gravel roads. While this may sound a less attractive option – it was fantastic and I loved this day through northern Manawatu. Some may bemoan more farmland, but I found it beautiful, the hills not too bad and my favourite day of the Tour.

You’d have struggled to convince me of that assertion after ninety minutes of pre-dawn struggling into a stiff easterly towards Fordell. I had to stop and have a breather in the shelter of a still-closed store there. Knowing the windy reputation of the area, I was trying to prepare myself of two-hundred kilometres of strong headwinds. It wasn’t something I was looking forward to.

However, shortly after, the route turned north and dropped off the plateau into a valley – blissful shelter from the wind. All the hills that we encountered did a great job of keeping the wind from being too bothersome. I’m not sure how that worked as valleys usually funnel wind. Turning east again I was enjoying the rural nature of the ride again – there was plenty to look at.

I was surprised to see Mt Ruapehu in the distance all of a sudden (it’s the tallest peak in the North Island) as I looked out over all the hills.

Just before I reached Hunterville and State Highway One I had my first sighting of a trail angel. This was very exciting as I’d only heard tales of these wonderful people who provide refreshments trailside to riders of such events as this. I stopped for a while to partake of the homemade comestibles and chat. Despite all the good food, ride on one must. Hunterville was much bigger than I’d ever imagined having driven through on the highway many times. As there was a whole lot of not much as far as food supplies for a hundred kilometres, I managed to force myself to stop for second-breakfast and to buy first-lunch.

After a brief stint on the highway, we turned off at Vinegar Hill (which brought back memories of short-cuts driving to & from university many years ago). The climb after plunging down to the river was much more difficult on a bike; we turned off the sealed road soon after and I was on roads unknown to me once again. The climbing continued – there were more wide vistas, old buildings to catch my interest and few cars. With excellent cycling weather – warm, but cloudy enough to not be hot, no wind – the miles ticked by easily.

Just as I was getting peckish again – it had been a few hours since a meal, one can’t survive on bags of crisps and sweets alone – I found a little shaded turn-out at an ex-village. A pleasant spot for lunch. Here’s the history, if you can read it:

Old buildings continued to pique my interest.

Rangiwahia was bigger than I would have imagined if I’d ever heard of it. It would have been nice to poke around a bit and stay at the campground – but it was only just after noon. On to Palmy.

The highest point of the day came just as the route turned south towards Ashhurst – and about as close to the Ruahine Ranges as we got. From there it was downhill overall for the ninety kilometres to Palmy – but when there are rivers and valleys involved it’s never that simple.

Pleasant enough plains for a while.

Until you reach a valley carved out by water flowing out of the ranges – a big plunge and a steep climb to recover most of the altitude lost. You can just see the road going down the valley wall towards the left of this picture.

The clouds building up said the weather might not be so benign for so long.

I’d never been to Apiti either – I found the street signs caused a little bit of confusion.

There was a steep gravel downhill before the last tough climb of the day before dropping into the Pohangina Valley – things started to look familiar as I enjoyed a great day ride here a few months before as a little bit of reconnaissance. I stopped to visit the large totara trees that served as a photo checkpoint before carrying on down the valley. As I neared Palmerston North, the headwind strengthed – of course. I’d have been a fool to expect anything else.

Although it wasn’t far to the city, I knew there weren’t many shops on the route – it followed the bridle path besides the Manawatu. At least, that’s my excuse for stopping for second-lunch in Ashhurst. Still battling the wind I was content to call it a day in Palmy just shy of two hundred kilometres. The chance to stop riding before dark, and most importantly, do some washing was golden. While I’d had many more showers than I expected I would, my shirt in particular was pretty rank and seemed to be losing flexibility and setting into some shape with all the grime and sweat.

After the shorter first three days, I was now well into the groove of the Tour and clearly getting stronger and more able to ride for about twelve hours a day. Naturally this was pleasing, if a little surprising to me – especially as my legs never really complained about the hills. That’s not to say I was particularly fast, but I’d found a pace that I felt I could keep up for as long as necessary. Beautiful scenery, exploring this small but scenery-packed country and good weather also helped with well-pleased mood too.

bikepacking, bikes, event, GPS, national park, NZ

Tour Aotearoa – My Day Seven – Kaiwhakauka Trail to Whanganui

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I’d long given up the plan/hope of reaching the first jet boat down the Whanganui at eight o’clock. So I could afford a bit of a sleep-in as the forecast rain fell – I set off into the pre-dawn gloom at six. The rugged walking trail that I gave up riding the previous night didn’t last long. Instead the valley opened up a bit and flattened out into grass, that was being lightly grazed. Route finding in the semi-light and through the long wet grass wasn’t the easiest, but the GPS track meant I couldn’t go too wrong.

Leaving the valley floor, the route was now on a decades old-road and much easier riding. The rain strengthened and weakened with enough regularity to make layering & delayering a bit of a nuisance – it was too hot & muggy to keep the wet weather gear on if it wasn’t raining. It’s always a little disappointing to miss out on seeing as much as normal when the clouds are so low, I was curious to know what was out there. But the conditions helped to add to the feeling of isolation and remoteness – that people came to live up here seemed improbable at best. But more of that later in the next valley.

Found this where the track met the road/track in from Raetihi. Bike looking very lightly loaded as I’m wearing all my wet-weather gear.

Two hours after setting off, I had crested the highest point and was on the long downhill to the Bridge to Nowhere. As the old double-track descended further into the Mangapurua Valley, clearings now slowly being reclaimed by the bush became more numerous and larger.

This valley was one of the places around the country that servicemen returning from World War One were given marginal land to farm. Marginal is of course a complete understatement – as I was seeing, this land was extremely rugged and very isolated. I was astonished that a few families managed to labour here for over twenty years before the settlement was abandoned – and they had nothing to show for their toils. What a reward for surviving the trenches.

Every so often there would be some sort of introduced flowering plant still surviving – the contrast was stark. Still quite a few non-native pines growing strongly.

There were also many small signs with surnames displayed – remembering the families that had those particular plots.  This simple method of memorial was quite poignant – as there really is very little left showing forty-odd families lived here.

Across the valley – there are many ferns there reclaiming the grassland.

The riding was pretty easy, still heading down. There were quite a few bits where riders were advised to walk – but as they had nothing on the Old Ghost Road, I rode most of them.

There were many rather skinny bridges on the route – it got a little tedious regularly upending one’s loaded bike & wheeling it through on its back wheel.  Finally, I was at the Bridge to Nowhere!  A place that had held almost-mythical status in my mind since I’d first heard of it at the age of ten or so.  It really is a substantial concrete feat of engineering in the middle of nowhere.  Rather bizarre – it wouldn’t be out of place in many big cities (it reminds me a bit of Grafton Rd bridge in Auckland), here it is linking two sides of a valley covered in ferns.

It was built to give better access for the families described above – to save them clambering up & down the valley walls. But by the time it was built they had the road (that I’d just ridden in on from the north) for access – so it was of little use and therefore little used as river access was no longer important.

But river access was now important to me. After savouring my time at the Bridge, it was a short ride down to the Whanganui River and the landing to meet the jet boat. There was a big rock on the side of the river and not much else. Ten-thirty rolled around and no jet boat. The rain continued to roll in waves. Quite alone with no other riders, and most importantly no boat – this was most definitely the most vulnerable and not-in-control I felt on the whole tour. Which was a bit silly as of course there were plenty of riders somewhere behind me, but I’d not seen any all day and it was rather wet and miserable.

My bike, a rock and quite a river.

Eventually a jet boat appeared around the corner and zoomed up the river merrily ignoring me. Just as I traipsed a bit back up the trail to a shelter, other riders started to arrive and the rain stopped. Things were looking up. They had a boat booked at one o’clock, I was confident I’d be able to blag a seat on it. So there was a couple of hours to kill – spent chatting, cleaning bikes, snacking and enjoying the non-rain.

So it happened that I did get a ride on this boat – I think we had ten bikes and riders. I was pleased my bike didn’t go on a rack projecting out from the stern.

Still a bit miffed that the boat that was supposed to pick me up never arrived (apparently they ran one at about nine o’clock) – don’t use Bridge to Nowhere if you want a jet boat on the Whanganui, go with Whanganui River Adventures – they were great. It did make my decision to ride into the night before look even less sensible than it already did. In the end I made that two or three hours lost over the following couple of days.

In one of the more surreal moments of my Tour, one of the other riders was carrying a ukelele the length of the country. Someone else got hold of it and there we were sitting on a jet boat waiting to cast off listening to a rather stilted rendition of Cows with Guns.

I realised that I’d never been on a commercial jet boat ride in NZ before – so I soaked up a quintessential NZ tourist experience. It was magnificent – the dense native forest coming right down to the river, steep cliffs and numerous waterfalls after the morning’s rain. Wonderful.

Our third boat ride of the Tour over, most of us went up to the company’s base to stock up on what ever food we could and clean our bikes of the morning’s mud. It was now sunny and warm. I set off for Whanganui – the largest place we’d been since Auckland. It was mostly undulating road, a mixture of gravel and seal, near the river with a couple of larger climbs to keep us honest. I was intrigued to cycle past Jerusalem on the Whanganui River after studying James K. Baxter way back in sixth form.

Number plate shed caught my eye.

Just before dark I was in town and as there were no campgrounds near the route, I booked a comfortable room in a backpackers. Apart from the jet boat not turning up, another excellent day. I had made it through what I considered would be the most remote and challenging section of the course and was rather pleased with that and excited by what I’d seen – although I still want to see it all again at a more relaxed pace and in better weather. Only just over a hundred kilometres for the day had me back on average to make it back to work on time – but I wasn’t worried as I knew the route would get a lot faster than the previous two days. Tomorrow there would be more new roads, I was looking forward to seeing parts of Manawatu that I’d never seen the four years I lived there.

bikepacking, bikes, event, GPS, NZ

Tour Aotearoa – My Day Six – Timber Trail Start to Kaiwhakauka Trail

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I don’t remember it being a particularly early start, but apparently it was well before five o’clock – early enough for me. The climb I knew was coming was steady and emerged from native forest to cleared land to reveal a vast star-scape in the pre-dawn darkness. I’d only heard great things about the Timber Trail (a new trail since I went overseas that delves into the logging history of the area – as well as being a great trail in its own right), so had long been looking forward to it. Just as I went back into the forest I passed Kirsty, Ian & Ness breaking camp – they made it considerably further than me the previous night.

The trail wasn’t too hard to ride in the dark, although I did rather miss most of the scenery while I climbed. Near the summit of Mt Pureora, dawn arrived and there were glimpses to the east of Lake Taupo (NZ’s largest). I was pleased to have a bit of extra visibility for the first part of the descent – a downhill that went pretty much for twenty-five kilometres. But the clear sky I’d enjoyed previously had misted over completely.

There were plenty of valleys to cross and the feature of the trail I’ll remember most vividly were the huge swing-bridges that had been built to span the valleys. Quite an engineering feat, not to mention the cost, in the middle of nowhere – all for a bike trail!

Standing fifty-odd metres above the valley floor, one gets a good idea of how dense the forest really is.

It’s quite a way down – I’m glad this wasn’t a standard-issue DOC swing-bridge.

The trail then followed an old bush tramway that was used to haul logs out from all over this part of the forest – much smoother riding on a gentle gradient.

The Ongarue Spiral – a very small railway spiral, but interesting as it used both a bridge and a tunnel.

Heading for the tunnel exit.

Eighty kilometres and seven and a half hours later, the Timber Trail was over and I’d lost a lot of altitude – it was decidedly muggy down lower. What a great trail, it hadn’t disappointed; I’m looking forward to going back and riding it again more lightly-loaded and with the time to stop and read all the information/history panels. I’d caught up to a guy from Christchurch at the trailhead – we rode the twenty or so clicks to Taumaranui (on the main trunk line – the only town for over two days) together, he didn’t seem to be having a very good time of it.

There were a lot of riders around town stocking up – I expect most from Wave One that I’d caught up to. As I devoured another cooked breakfast (yes, it was well past lunchtime) the heavens opened and I considered how far I’d get that night. The weather was supposed to be closing in the following morning and the Kaiwhakauka trail didn’t sound like one you wanted to do in such weather. The rain cleared and it was remarkably humid as I rolled out of town for the concerted climb up to Owhango.

As if I needed a reminder that the North Island is very hilly. They never get particularly big or mountainous; but by gosh, there are a lot of them.

General consensus seemed to be that the North Island topography was much more punishing than the South. Having done my small amount of training on the hills behind Hawke’s Bay, I was at least a little conditioned for this.

Nearing Owhango, I decided to push on towards Bridge to Nowhere. I arranged a jet boat pick-up at either eight or ten-thirty the following morning (not really sure if I’d make it through the night to the Whanganui River) and set off.

The long gradual ride down to the Retaruke River and Whakohoro in the evening light was a highlight of the trip.

I think it was in this isolated place I started taking photos of curious, remote buildings from another time. This community hall is still occasionally used, apparently – I saw no signs of such.

The gravel road riding was excellent.

Reaching Whakahoro around sunset I had to decide whether to stay in the large DOC bunkhouse there or push on into the unknown to try and meet the boat the next morning. As it wasn’t raining, I kept going – the fact that there were campsites along the way being the contingency. The ex-road that followed the Whanganui River for a short time was a boggy & slippery mess. Turning up a side-valley the trail narrowed and wasn’t a bike track at all, more a rugged hiking trail. Night fell, as did light rain, and it became clear that my dynamo light was little use on such a slow trail. Donning my headlamp, the slipperiness was a bit of a nightmare. After sliding into the bank softly a couple of times, I had more of a crash into another bank. Self-preservation prevailed, and not having any idea what was actually off the left hand side of the trail, I decided walking was the best and safest option. So ten kilometres from Whakahoro took me almost two hours – I was very pleased when the first campsite came into view; I called it a day there.

What’s more – it had a large shelter, I wouldn’t have to put my tent up in the rain. There I met and chatted to Brett & Helen (it turned out that they know well one of my colleagues I share an office with) who had set their tent up in the shelter – & who I probably woke. I slept well, satisfied with another big day – not in terms of distance, but sheer ruggedness of the terrain. I was excited to see finally see the Bridge to Nowhere the following day.

bikepacking, bikes, GPS, MTB, NZ

Tour Aotearoa – My Day Five – Matamata to Timber Trail Start

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Having slept well through the night, I was on the bike at the much more reasonable hour of six o’clock – almost three hours later than the day before. It was a short distance into Matamata and a bakery for breakfast and to stock up on pies for the day. Heading for the central North Island, towns and services would be much further apart for the next few days.

Sunrise wasn’t too bad as I breakfasted.

The first sun of the day hits Hobbiton – another photo checkpoint.

I thought that the two Triumphs one of my early primary school teachers owned was excessive, evidently not.

The mist slowly burnt off as I rode through flat land surrounded by dairy farms. I stopped briefly to chat to a farmer on his way back from milking – the first of quite a few “why are there so many cyclists on my quiet back road this week?” conversations.

Back on State Highway One for a short time, I was finally riding beside the Waikato River (the longest in the country). Much of this day was on parts of the Waikato River Trail. I learned later that I passed another family connection – a farm Dad worked on one summer while at university.

A gradual climb for over twenty kilometres was a mixture of riverside trail, rural roads and a small reserve of native forest. Most of that altitude gained was very quickly lost with a big dive back down towards the river. From there the trail followed the river much more closely and there were an awful lot of short climbs and descents. It was now the middle of the day and hot again.

A sign of things to come – big swing bridges began to appear. This one, I think, was used in the construction of one of the many hydro power stations on the river.

Crossing to the left side of the river at Waipapa Dam, the next section of almost twenty kilometres was beautiful trail indeed. However, with not much overall altitude gain, there were plentiful pinch climbs and corresponding downhill bits. I see now this took me the best part of two hours. As became a common sentiment – I looked forward to riding this again with a lighter bike and a lighter load. Approaching Mangakino and second-lunch (I’d eaten all my pies by then), I was pleased to find Steve (on his way to a triathlon in Auckland – and my training buddy for this event, he’d been easily talked into a couple of bikepacking weekends). In my excitement, I missed the turn off-route to the shops and had to back-track a little. It was excellent to see another familiar face and hear a bit of news from home and how my little tracking dot online had gathered a small following at work.

Steve insisted he get a photo of me – I was bemused to find this in the weekly division news when I returned to work. But, definitely pleased to have a photo of me riding on the event – even if it’s on a road, & off-route!

There was only about six more kilometres of the River Trail before our route left it. When I caught up to fully-loaded cycle tourist (touring bike, skinny tyres, four panniers and more), I was astounded to learn she was attempting the Tour Aotearoa route. I had a feeling it was going to get a lot more difficult for her very soon (the route had been either road or relatively good trail to that point) – for the rest of the trip if the trail got a little rough and tricky, I only had to remember this encounter and then I didn’t feel so bad about how I was going.

Fifteen more kilometres of road, the first half was pretty flat before the climbing that would last for much of the rest of the day began.

Suddenly the road ended and there was but an overgrown old track to follow. Now in Pureora Forest Park, this was our link to the start of the Timber Trail.

This was easily the worst and most difficult swingbridge of the entire route. It was so skinny, my handlebars would not fit through – and as I couldn’t walk beside my bike and steer it, I definitely could not push it through. The floor was only wire netting, so it was not practical to lift the front of the bike & wheel it through. In the end, I had to walk backwards along the bridge pulling my bike behind me – guiding it through every handlebar barrier; on the way puncturing a dry bag, most annoying. Still, I only had to make one trip along the bridge.

Up ahead I spied the first TA riders I’d seen riding all day. I caught up and lo & behold, it was Kirsty from last year’s Kiwi Brevet (great riding company, most memorable for the fire alarm incident pre-dawn in the Hurunui Hotel), her partner, Ian, and friend, Ness. The company and chatting helped the five-hundred metre climb pass much more quickly. They’d started the same day as me, but I’d not seen them as they’d ridden longer than me the first few days and got the Kaipara boat ten or so hours before me. I was encouraged that I’d caught them as I remembered Kirsty was a strong rider & experienced adventurer and had put in some long days and easily beaten me home last year.

A photo of me at a checkpoint! Despite the three pies that day, looking a bit thinner than normal. Geographical centre of the North Island, apparently.

Drizzly rain threatened and I lost the others somewhere on the ten kilometre downhill to the start of the Timber Trail. I really didn’t know where I was going to camp that night, figuring I’d find somewhere on the trail. But I knew that the trail started with a big, long climb – so after thirteen hours and much more climbing than the previous epic day, I wasn’t really keen to do that in the light rain & then make camp. Just after where we joined the trail there was a historic Caterpillar. It even had it’s own shelter – perfect! After a bit of internal debate, I decided that was a great spot to end the day.

So it happened that I slept next to this relic of a tractor that night.

I was pretty pleased with my progress that day backing up 260+ km, I’d done the kilometres needed to keep me on the required pace and a fair amount of climbing too. I wasn’t too concerned of not using all the daylight and so set up my sleeping gear and went to bed the earliest all trip. Unfortunately the mosquitos didn’t get the memo, nor the trio of riders that arrived much later, woke me and faffed for ages. But that could not detract from another great day on this increasingly enjoyable trip.