Carl and I never quite found the time over summer to do an overnighter after work one Friday to the Waikare River campground. Finding some mid-“winter” inspiration from somewhere, I decided I wasn’t going to wait until next summer to see what was there.
It’s a long time since I have ridden my bikepacking bike to work; while it felt slow compared to my commuter, to my surprise – it wasn’t really. Maybe the Niner rolls better than I imagine.
An unusual sight in the bike shed that garnered a few comments.
Starting work early Friday, meant I left early and was well on the way up familiar Waipunga Road gravel (which has really suffered under logging traffic) to meet the store-closing deadline at Tutira. In the late afternoon, the road was devoid of vehicles – I only saw farmer Roy passing on his motorbike. Making it in time to empty the cabinet of remaining hot food, dinner at Tutira was filling – it was even warm enough outside to make a large kiwifruit ice cream viable.
Dark now having descended, I set off on my roundabout route north – avoiding the highway and instead adding an hour’s worth of hills. Always exciting to be riding new roads, even if I couldn’t see much. The clouds were moving rapidly, constantly threatening to bring the forecast rain without ever delivering. A warm winter night, I was very comfortable in shorts and a short-sleeved shirt. Even thought I knew it was there, a 400 m high hill seemed out of place – but it was good fun rolling off it back to a short stretch on the highway (an hour after Tutira). At Putorino I was briefly close to the Waikare before leaving the highway and heading to the coast.
A little climbing was still to be done, before a wild gravel descent to the river. The surface deteriorated and certainly kept one on one’s toes flying down in the dark. Before I knew it I was at the deserted campground. I found the river in the dark and not much else: some toilets, a sink and some taps were the extent of the facilities. A beady-eyed possum watched me set up my bivy bag as the rain finally arrived in the shape of slight drizzle. I settled in for a warm night’s rest, the rain abated and I reflected on a great little ride through the dark after work.
Possibilities of exploring a whole lot of roads between there and Wairoa rolled around my head with the new found knowledge at how accessible this area is. I’d previously ignored it due to the nasty highway, but I now knew that this was mostly avoidable. The schemes continue to grow.
Saturday morning and I could finally see, and wander down to, the river.
I retraced my route back to the store for second breakfast, enjoying being able to see the countryside I was riding through. After keep a herd of cattle intrigued while stopping for the following photos, shortly after I was helping an ineffectual cattle dog (poor thing kept getting charged) round up a small mob of cows and calves. All in a morning’s ride?
Huzzah, the pie-warmer was full of Maketu Pies and as it was so warm I definitely deserved four scoops of ice cream… The strong westerly that hampered my early progress was at my back as I was blown up Darkys Spur, sweltering (relatively) in the mid-morning sun as I was back to short sleeves all round. I took the Kaiwaka, Tangoio Settlement Roads option back to work to round out a fun little exploratory overnighter.
Unable to say no to Anton’s invite to go MTBing, the most fun of the trip was had muscling my loaded, fully-rigid bike up the climbs and around the obstacles of the Mill Block mountain-bike park – whooping in delight at the extra momentum and challenge. A great twenty-four hours, now to get back to scheming how to build on this route.