Category Archives: family

family, history, NZ, roadtrip, travel

A little family road-trip to the start

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When I first hatched this plan to ride the inaugural Tour Aotearoa, Dad immediately volunteered to drive me to the start at the very top of the country. Not only that, he also offered to pick me up at the end – should I get there. This was a tremendous help as it took a lot of the planning out from the get-go.

It just so happened that I went and moved far away from my parents – all the way to Napier in the North Island. Nonplussed, Mum & Dad flew north and turned up at my house a few days before we set off on a good Pheasant roadtrip to far-flung parts of the country – wasn’t quite like childhood, as I had a bike next to me in the car not a sister.

We took it pretty easy heading north – as I was in Wave Two of the starters, I didn’t have to line up until Tuesday. So we spent three days making our way the seven-hundred-odd kilometres north visiting family and friends along the way. The highlight was definitely the visit to Matakohe – a place we’ve been many times before. Where the Pheasants settled way back when, there is a little bit of family stuff in the comprehensive and very well-done Kauri Museum. But this time I’d arranged a visit to a much smaller historic building.

Fortunately, David & Sherry were going to be in their small house the weekend we were traveling north. It just so happens that they had rescued their house forty years ago from its fate as a hay barn and faithfully restored it. This house was the house of my great-grandfather at the turn of the previous century and was where my grandfather and his siblings grew up, until the family moved south to Auckland for better educational opportunities. I was thrilled to be able to arrange the visit as Dad had never been inside the house, only looked in the windows.

It was a special visit discussing family history, how my great-aunt helped with the restoration details thanks to an extremely detailed memory, talking of the restoration in general, looking around the house in detail and roaming the grounds trying to imagine what it was like growing up on the edge of the Kaipara Harbour over a hundred years ago. Thanks to David & Sherry for having us – & doing such a thorough and incredible job of saving a bit, probably the biggest bit, of Pheasant family history around. Dad & I managed a walk down to where the wharf used to be – boats from here would have been the main connection with Auckland (boat to Helensville, then train to Auckland).

Leaving Matakohe, thoughts begin to turn more to just what I was about to embark on. This was probably brought on by driving north through, & stopping to buy riding food in, Dargaville – I could see some of the terrain I’d be riding through, up & over in but a few days’ time. At our accommodation in Kaitaia, the bike was pulled from the car and the final pack for 3000 km of adventure was completed with no drama. Ride time!

bikes, family, NZ, vehicles

Cape Palliser – Bottom of the North Island

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With not a lot planned for Christmas (mainly due to not having enough spare annual leave to make the trip south worthwhile), I was pleased to get an invite to my uncle & aunt’s down in Martinborough. My cousins were also due to be there from Wellington & Sydney it was a great opportunity for catching up with all – especially to see Sasha & Blair who have had two sons since I last saw them (they left London & returned to NZ around the time I moved to Canada in 2010, I think).

After a day or two of festivities, warm sunshine, relaxing and generally having a good time I was itching for a little bike ride. Funnily enough, I’d come prepared with a bike in the car and a route in mind. In the depths of my mind I knew Cape Palliser was the southern-most point of the North Island, but I’d never had any reason to go there – until the day after Boxing Day.

Trying to beat the heat, I set off before the rest of the house was up – the road towards the coast is pretty straight and flat so the going was easy with a light tail breeze. Hitting the coast about two hours in and over the only hill worth mentioning on the whole ride, the breeze was different – a cooling, but hindering, southerly. As I expected, from my ride around the coast a little further west earlier in the year (Bikepacking from Wellington to Martinborough), the coast was reasonably rugged here too. But on such a nice day, remarkably beautiful too.

This memorial testified as to how dangerous this coast could be for passing ships.

Like that previous ride, I expected this remote stretch of coast to be pretty deserted. But there were many more genuine Kiwi baches down here than I expected. Being prime holiday season, this meant there was more traffic on the road than is almost certainly normal – but not enough to be a problem. Pleasingly in amongst the baches (a bach being Kiwi slang for a small holiday house – traditionally quite small and cobbled together at low cost) I struggled to spot any pretentious holiday homes; the one or two newer houses I saw blended in pretty well.

Also, there was less gravel road than I thought – only the last seven kilometres past Ngawi to the cape. Of course, rounding the cape the headwind strengthened – and the gravel was quite corrugated, annoyingly so as the speed I was capable of into the wind seemed to match the frequency of the corrugations in a most horrible way. Nonetheless, I was at the bottom of the island for the first time – in about the three hours I expected. Such a rocky promontory, of course, deserves a lighthouse.

My legs were thrilled to find that the beacon was at the top of the longest straight staircase I’m pretty sure I’ve ever seen – 254 steps straight up. Still, I didn’t ride all this way to not get the view – so I clip-clopped up in my bike shoes.

Ngawi seems to be where bulldozers come to retire to a life of occasionally launching small fishing boats out to see on large cradles – & then retrieving them later, one presumes. There were dozens of them in various states of repair. It was all rather curious.

Apparently, this one would be called Byron; I’m a little glad that I had to look that up.

At least going back on the gravel road the wind was at my back – so the bumps in the gravel were less noticeable. As I left the stunning coast, the wind was back to the nor-easter coming down the valley – which managed to sap most of my energy five kilometres from home. Pleased with a nice six hours on the bike finding yet another part of NZ I’ve not been to before.

After refuelling and cleaning up a bit, we popped down for a drink on the square in the centre of town. Looking quite of place (I suppose they/we usually do), three fully loaded bikepackers rolled in and stopped at the adjacent cafe (on Surly Krampii if anyone is interested). I couldn’t resist going & chatting to them – they were nearing the end of a week-long reconnaissance of the lower half of the North Island part of the Tour Aotearoa route. So it was interesting to hear of the beauty of the ride I hope I’m doing in two months’ time.

With (cousin) Chris having to get an early train the following morning to start the journey back to Sydney and the considerable amount of catering Antoinette & David had done the previous days, it was somewhat appropriate that we went out for a delicious Thai meal that night. That is because I figure the last time I had Christmas with my cousins was when David was a diplomat in Thailand and we went over for a Christmas-time visit. A bit of rather irrelevant Pheasant history there; hopefully it’s not so long between drinks (Christmases) next time – as I really enjoyed my weekend away. Although, I hear there’s a family wedding next year – so that should be fun.

Unfortunately, this weekend’s bikepacking adventures were put on ice as the New Year’s weather forecast was horrendous up towards Rotorua and I’ve been unusually ill – which is rather tedious, but hopefully next weekend works out.

around home, bikepacking, bikes, family, NZ

The Christmas Letter 2015

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Looking back at this year, I can safely say it’s worked out better than I imagined it would when, in last year’s Christmas missive, I wrote: “I’ll slowly start looking for a job in the new year, hoping to find one that means I can live in a large town/small city that has easy access to good mountain-biking – I think then there would be a chance I may be able stay still for a while and not spend so much time and money on travelling…”!

As it turns out, I did rather slowly, in fits & starts, look for a job at the beginning of the year. I was rather picky in what I was applying for, so I had plenty of time to spend time with family, ride bikes, visit friends and travel a little around NZ. Highlights before starting a job were:

My first brevet – the Kiwi Brevet – 1150 km of self-supported riding around the top of the beautiful South Island. I was pleased to finish in a few hours short of seven days.

A bit of time in and around Wellington catching up with friends and family – with some bikepacking thrown in to keep the legs happy/wrecked. The photo above from an excellent day’s ride around the coast from Wellington to Martinborough – a spectacular coastline so close to the capital.

A few weeks further up the North Island meant a bit more easy bike touring visiting friends and family, a quick trip over to Sydney to see family (particularly my aging grandfather) and an excellent wedding of family friends over Easter.

Two trips to Westport to visit Adele in her home-for-now were of course filled with plenty of adventure: caving, hiking, and more biking. This picture from the spectacular Old Ghost Road trail – which has since been completed, I’m very much looking forward to riding it in its entirety.

This photo from the other memorable ride from those trips – the Heaphy Track. It’s spectacular! Disappointed not to be able to ride the whole thing due to weather at the first attempt, the two-day Heaphy-Double James & I did was great fun and slightly-epic.

During the second Westport trip I’d secured a job as a process engineer again – it ticked all my most important boxes: in a plant that makes something, a good small city (Napier) to live in, some mountain-biking and a feasible bike-commute. So after quite a few months enjoying staying with Mum & Dad in their new home and exploring the area, I moved north to become a North Islander again.

Just like that I’ve settled into a strangely normal non-wandering life. I’m liking the work (it’s still novel after five months); disturbingly quickly I bought a house; this city is great with its climate, history and beautiful art deco; the local produce and wine is exceptional – along with the Farmers Markets; there is mountain-biking next door to work and plenty of gravel roads to explore in the hills. Much to my surprise, I found Italian language lessons locally – so that’s a complete bonus. I’m still a little amazed it’s worked out this well so far.

Arranging the purchase of my first home-of-my-own and then moving in and furnishing it has taken much of the last few months. Well worth it though – I can have visitors!

A few pictures from around home:

Probably the most astonishing news of my year is that which sees me now own a road bike. It’s great for the commute, but I’m still to be won over for distances longer than that. I only really post it here so Grandad may see it, although I may have left it too late for him to comprehend; not that I’ll ever get to his standard of extreme road adventures.

That’s about my year. Not too much on the horizon for next year (except one ride I signed up for without really considering the consequences of doing so) – still enjoying having a place to call home and not having a great desire to travel some distance at every opportunity. Assuredly, there will be bike adventures to be had and I’m hoping for at least a couple of trips south.

Merry Christmas to all (although I’m struggling to believe it’s actually Christmas) and all the best for the coming year. If it happens to bring you to Napier, get in touch.

around home, bikes, family, house, NZ

Where does the time go?

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Naturally, now that I’ve moved into my own house leisure time is much reduced. But the busiest period, moving-in and setting up a home from basically scratch, is over and summer is all but here – so looking forward to getting out a bit more.

There was a bit of a lull in house activities between sorting the purchase out and settlement date, so I tried to make the most of that.

My bike fleet slowly grows – this one a town bike for doing the shopping and various other errands. It will also get put into service during the annual Art Deco Festival.

I savoured the view many a time from the window seat of the house I was boarding in – I can’t afford such a view, so it was worth taking the time to so.

Finally, I got further into exploring the hills in the distance of the picture two above. I was particularly pleased to find a decent length of gravel roads – I’d been led to believe there were few around. This picture looking towards the Kawekas.

I combined a work trip away in Rotorua with a weekend around the Bay of Plenty visiting various people and places from my time growing up there. Great to do so, especially seeing how much it’s changed around the orchard I spent the first eight or so years of my life on. For the first time since we left, I took the opportunity of having a good look around the property (it’s been subdivided a few times by now) and our old house. Fairly nostalgic.

The shed on the orchard that was my first home. Our family quickly outgrew it when Adele was on the way. (It may be about to fall over and sink into the swamp.)

The only picture that I snapped of the family home that Mum & Dad designed and had built once Adele arrived. It’s changed a fair bit in superficial ways, but still brought back plenty of memories.

I was definitely pleased to get back to Hawkes Bay, strangely a few hours of traveling didn’t really appeal. I may have just been quite anxious to get into my house. But there was still a long weekend before I got the keys and a mortgage. So a shorter trip away to Palmerston North was in order to catch up properly with friends from my years at university – yes, some people still live there! The streets are plenty wide I suppose. It was good to get out on the bike, as well as doing a bit of secondhand shopping for the house.

I went on a brilliant few hours’ ride reconnoitering the Pohangina Valley for next March.

Settlement day finally rolled around and there started much cleaning, packing of the things, moving all the things, buying the other things and a lot of work. It was, and still is, exciting to have my own home and set it up as I want – even if it is an awful lot of work by oneself (I did have generous help moving the bigger items), it’s very much worth it still.

At some stage, I escaped from house setting-up and Sunday morning fog and went and found some more gravel roads. This photo look back towards Napier and the fog.

And this one look west for a different angle on the Kawekas.

I was very excited to have my first house guests – finally after many years abusing others’ hospitality, I could start to repay my debts. Elizabeth and Nigel and family came up from Wellington on a little road-trip and all of a sudden I had five extra people in the house! That was a change, but we all coped – even with just one chair in the lounge (a suitable source of many jokes apparently); that may have been a factor in Elizabeth being keen in helping me to choose a lounge suite.

From Te Mata Peak looking north along the coast to Napier.

West from Te Mata Peak.

The visitors continued – Mum came up later that week and we had a great time doing a few things around the house and exploring little bits of Napier and around. I also had my first cycle tourist stay from warmshowers (like couch-surfing, but for cycle tourists) – so that was fun hearing about a big tour and sharing some of my less adventurous stories.

I finally found a correctly-sized secondhand road bike for sale locally. The fact that it’s steel and has some nice Italian componentry on it helps to lessen the horror of actually owning a road bike. It’s service is getting me to work, and back, five to ten minutes faster and a lot less tired than the Ogre. I tried to go for a road-ride one day, but cut that short as I was horribly bored by the ordeal and could think of many better uses of my time.

While Mum was here, we went on plenty of walks. This one, pictured, I finally walked the trail around the estuary (I’d not explored it before as bikes are not permitted). But my favourites were exploring Napier Hill from home – it’s so interesting with plenty of hidden stairways, a fantastic variety of houses and even a little bit of history.

Dad joined us for a week before he & Mum went home back to south. Unfortunately he wasn’t up to walking far, so couldn’t share as much in my keenness for walking around and up and down this end of the Hill. At least he managed to cope without a TV for a week – my library card finally got some use.

Last Saturday morning was pretty hot; I exhausted myself going further into the hills behind and north of work. Great country and good gravel road riding.

Now that November, the month of moving in and setting up the house is long-since over, I’m moving to work on the garden and house exterior – but hope to have plenty of time to get my fitness and endurance up to an acceptable level, with the help of a few consecutive days of riding here & there. We’ll see…