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After a great few days in Wellington with Simon, Helen and the kids it was time for me to head out onto the roads of the North Island and make my way towards Auckland where I would be meeting my wife in a couple of weeks time for Christmas.  

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My plan was always to spend most of the time I had cycling in New Zealand in the South Island as that is where the mountains, glaciers and rain forests are.  The highlights of the North Island for me are the volcanic parks, Maori culture, beaches and good food.

I had only left myself two weeks to cycle a few of the off road tracks as I made my way to Auckland and would miss the main tourist attractions as I would be visiting most of the main sights by car with my wife when she arrived.

I had not really researched this part of the route and the strength of the wind took me by complete surprise.  Wellington is located within the ‘roaring forties’ which is a term that I had heard before but associated with sailing.  The morning that I set off from Wellington the winds were earning their reputation and I was cycling straight into a massive headwind.

The roaring forties are strong westerly winds that are found in the southern hemisphere between the latitudes of 40 and 50 degrees.  The strong west-to-east air currents are caused by the combination of air being displaced from the Equator towards the South Pole and the Earth’s rotation.

In the northern hemisphere there are land masses that act as windbreaks but in southern hemisphere the large tracts of open ocean below the 40th parallel are interrupted only by Tasmania, New Zealand and the very southern part of South America.  This means that very high windspeeds known as the roaring forties develop and the day that I left Wellington I had a very rude introduction to them as the headwind that I was cycling into was howling.

The first off road cycle track that I wanted to pick up on the North Island was the Mountains to Sea cycle track which ran 200km from the mountains of the central volcanic plateau to the sea in Whanganui.   The trail traverses two national parks which should provide some stunning scenery and be an amazing few days of cycling.  As I was cycling up the island from the very southern tip I would be cycling the wrong way up the Mountain to Sea track as Whanganui lies on the coast.  There was no way around this though and I suppose it would just be more satisfying when I eventually arrived at the mountain end of the trail.

When I left Wellington I had two choices for my route north – highway 1 or highway 2.  There is a cycle trail that runs next to Highway 2 but I couldn’t see the point of taking this as it essentially just runs next to the main highway for much of its 100km length to Palmerston North.  Highway 1 would also take me by Palmerston North but ran down the west coast and was shorter so I opted for this route instead.

The distance to Whanganui was 200km so it would take at least two days of cycling to get there, and maybe even three days if the headwind that I was cycling into didn’t ease.

Although I was cycling on Highway 1 the traffic seemed fairly light and the road was flat with a wide shoulder that could easily pass as a cycle lane.  In the areas that the shoulder disappeared they had put in separate cycle paths which ran just off the highway.

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Even though the wind was blowing the sun was out, the sky was blue and it was warm. The only downside to the day was that around 11am the hangover that I knew would kick in after being out on the town until gone midnight the night before with Simon would kick in.

There was only one thing that would cure this was a good dose of sugar and E-numbers, and now that I was on the more populated North Island my options for fast food were endless as every couple of kilometers there were shops and convenience stores along the road.  My hangover cure that day was a Mcdonalds milkshake.

The other bonus that I found out by stopping at Mcdonalds is that they provide free unlimited wifi for their customers and it works.  No 50 mega byte limit here, you get unlimited data and there is no password so if you want you can just sit outside without having to even buy anything.

I checked the weather forecast and the Met Service predicted that in the afternoon the wind would change from a North Westerly, blowing straight at me, to a westerly.  This would be a side wind and much easier to cycle into and although it was tempting to just sit inside out of the wind and wait for the wind to change the milkshake had seemed to have worked and so I headed back out into the roaring headwind.

Once I was back on the bike the road headed for the sea and there is something slightly magical about cycling next to the ocean.

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The cycle track that I had been following disappeared and I opted for cycling on the path rather than the road as there were big drains every 50 metres which I would need to swing out into the road to avoid.

The highway followed the ocean for 5km before making it’s way back inland.  I decided to stay on the ocean and followed it around the next headland where I continued to cycle next to the ocean.

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I hadn’t checked the map before taking the road that I was on and I eventually came to a dead end.  In front of me was a set of sand dunes that I could not cycle over.  I was resigned to cycling back the way that I had come when a lady came out from one of the houses and told me if I took an alley way then it would bring me out into the Queen Elizabeth Park Nature Reserve.  Apparently, they are putting a new expressway through the area and one of the environmental trade offs was the construction of the nature reserve.

I cycled down the alley way and into the nature reserve.  A brand new cycle path had been put through and the signs on the path showed that the path would lead me 15km further north to the town of Paraparaumu.

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It was a great surprise, especially as I had been resigned to being stuck on the highway all day.  In certain parts of the reserve the wild flowers were in full bloom which looked wonderful as I wound my way along the path.

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After 15km I was back on the Highway 1, and as there was no alternate route it was a case of getting my head down and trying to forget about the howling wind.

Around lunchtime just as the Met Service had predicted the winds changed to a westerly which made life much easier from a wind sense but the change brought with it rain.  I now had the full monty in terms of a cyclists nightmare ride – strong winds and rain.

Up ahead there was another Mcdonalds and so I decided to pull over to get out of the rain and get some lunch as I didn’t fancy firing the cooker up and needed to do some research on the off road tracks that I was going to be doing on my way north.

After a bite to eat the weather cleared up and I was back onthe bike and pedalling north.  The break in the weather didn’t last for more than 10km and I was soon looking for shelter as the next shower came pelting down.

I needed to top up on petrol for my cooking stove and so to get out of the weather I pulled into a BP garage to fill up.  It seemed that after a dearth of internet on the South Island even the petrol stations gave free wifi access and so once the cooker was filled I decided to take advantage of the internet and grabbed a coffee to wait out the rain.

When I had set off that morning from Wellington my planned destination was the town of Foxton’s which was a ride of 100km.  The wind and rain had conspired to slow me down and when I checked the map I was still 30km short of that target and given the conditions it would take me at least another 2 hours of riding, which to be honest I didn’t fancy with the hangover I had.  Instead, I decided that once it stopped raining I would head for the nearest D.O.C site for the night.

After an hour the weather wasn’t playing ball and so I put on my wet weather gear and headed for Waikawa Reserve where there was a free camping place.  It was only 12km away and was accessed down a gravel track off the highway.

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I cycled down the access road to the field area but when I got there most of the grassy area that had been set aside for tents was water logged from the rain that had been falling for most of the day.

A quick check of the map showed that the gravel track continued past the field to a stream so I followed the track to the end and found a dry spot on the river bank.  Across the stream there was another much nicer looking grass area to camp.  It would mean fording the stream and after the day that I had had I couldn’t be bothered as I was cold and wet so pitched the tent where I was stood.

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In the morning it was still raining and so breakfast was cooked in my tent in the hope that it would stop raining by the time that I had finished and could get on with cycling to Whanganui to pick up the Mountains to Sea track.

Like yesterday, it was wishful thinking waiting for the rain to stop and so after breakfast I broke camp in a steady drizzle.

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It was a good job that I hadn’t decided to ford the river the night before as the overnight rain had swollen the stream into a raging torrent and there was no way I would have gotten back across until it had gone back down.

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Once I was back on the highway for the first time on my cycle ride in New Zealand I was cycling through an area where they grew fruit and veg rather than the typical sheep and cattle rearing.  My snack stop that day was slightly healthier than the Mcdonalds hangover food that I had eaten the day before.

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All morning it had been raining and for a break from the weather, and to warm up, I pulled into a BP garage to use their wifi for a while.

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The upshot of all of this free wifi was that I had now planned my route to Auckland and would be able to cherry pick 4 or 5 of the better off road cycling tracks that the north island offers cyclists. One of these tracks was called the Timber Trail, which is widely regarded as the best mountain bike trail on the north island, and even though I was on a fully loaded touring bike I still fancied doing it.  Hey, it’s all about the experience – in for a penny in for a pound.

The rain eased so I set off again and soon came across a new sign that I had not seen before on the road and kind of summed up my first two days of cycling on the north island

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I think that whoever had put the sign up was having a laugh as you would really have to be from a different planet to suddenly discover that it was windy in this part of New Zealand.

There were so many fast food options available on the North Island that I really could now survive without carrying food with me if I wanted but the bank balance would sure take a knock if I started relying on convenience food places as New Zealand is priced about the same as the UK with certain things even more expensive.

Despite the temptations around me I pulled over at a picnic area by the side of the road and got the water boiling for my usual pot noodle feast washed down with a steaming hot cup of coffee to try and warm me up.

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So much for this part of the north island being warmer.  Hopefully once I got over the central mountains it would warm up.

After lunch I passed the first touristy sight that I had seen in over 100km – a windmill.

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Now, this may not seem like a big event to you and I but to the town of Foxton they celebrate their Dutch heritage with a full size operating Dutch windmill which is open to the public and in their words “it allows visitors to experience a little of Holland”. In the small town there is also a Dutch market and a Dutch cafe where you can get more of the Dutch experience.

I looked from the outside but never paid to go see the inside.  Next to windmill was the Dutch Café so I got my phone out to check if they had wifi as now that I had stopped I wanted to go somewhere to sit out the rain for a while.  A wifi signal didn’t show up for the café but one did for Spark as there was a pay phone next to the café.  I opened the link and even though I was with Vodaphone I could still get 1 gigabyte of free data per day by logging onto the Spark network via a phonebox. I now had data options coming out of my ears.

There was a shelter next to the phone box so I sat in there for an hour using the free wifi from the phone box to continue researching for any more off road tracks between here and Auckland as I didn’t fancy just cycling up Highway 1 for the next 500km.

The rain had stopped by the time I was finished researching and it looked like I now had at least 300km of bike trails and a section of hiking through Tongariro National Park to do on my way to Auckland.  It would not be a direct route but that didn’t matter as I had already had enough of cycling on busy main roads.

I set off again and after 20km I came to the only turn that I had to take in nearly 150km of cycling since I had left Wellington the day before.

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As I turned I was heading due west and into what could be best described as cloud soup.  It wasn’t really raining, it was more like I was cycling though a cloud.

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A couple of kilometers from the turning I came upon the town of Bulls and this is where highway 1 turned north and I continued west on highway 3.  There was a supermarket in the town and so seeing as I had cycled through the rain for the second consecutive day I decided to treat myself to a steak for dinner and picked up some potatoes too.

When I set off from Bulls I still had 30km to go to get to Whanganui which would take me a couple of hours given the weather.  The rain never stopped and after just 10km I really had had enough and decided to find somewhere to sleep for the night and call it a day as Whanganui was another 20km down the road and all I wanted to do was get out of the rain.  I came upon a sign for Koitiata and when I checked the map it was about 8km away on the coast so I decided to head there instead.

As I started cycling towards the town the rain intensified but I could see light on the horizon and it looked like the sun was trying to break through.

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That was enough to make me think that I had made the right decision, even though I had no idea if there was anywhere to sleep once I got to Koitiata.  If there was nowhere to stay at least I could kip on the beach for the night, although it may be a windy affair.

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After 8km I cycled into the village and stopped to ask the first person that I saw what my options were for camping in the town.  The woman said that there were no facilities in the village – no shop or anything just about 30 houses. There was a domain though in the village (an area that a community set aside for people to camp on) and it was at the very end of the road before I got to the beach.

When I found the domain it was a grassy area with a toilet block and taps.  There was a sign asking for people to walk to house number 15 to register and pay.  I left my bike and walked back down the road to find number 15 and rang the door bell. An elderly gentleman answered and said that it was 6 NZD per person to camp on the domain but there was hot water available and I could have a shower if I wanted for an extra 2 NZD.  It sounded like a bargain to me so I paid for a shower to.

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Once my tent was set up I headed for a shower to warm up. For the second day running I had spent the entire day cycling through the rain. The only bright spot really was the patch of light that I had seen from the main road and here in Koitiata at least it had stopped raining.

By the time that I had finished showering the sun had set and I was left to cook my steak dinner in the dark.  I went to fill up the pan with water from the tap to boil my potatoes and found that one of the villagers had left eggs for campers to use.

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There was even an old frying pan on top of one of the cupboards, and that evening I had a hot feast of steak, eggs and boiled potatoes which was so much nicer than dehydrated food.

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The next morning for the first time I saw the sun when I unzipped the tent and it was a very welcome sight.  The weather really does make such a difference to my day when cycling and I was able to dry out my clothes while I got breakfast on.

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I was able to put on dry cycling clothes which although they didn’t smell that good having been worn in the rain for the last two days without getting dry they weren’t cold and wet when I put them on.

As I set off towards Whanganui that morning I was surrounded by blue sky and even put my shades on.

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The 8km back to the main road sure did seem much shorter than when I had cycled it the night before and I’m sure that cycling in the sunshine had something to do with it.  I passed a building that I had not seen the night before which looked a little out of place.

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I only hope that it will be some sort of tourist attraction when finished rather than somebody’s attempt to build their own garish castle.

Once I was back on the main road I hit a hilly section that made me doubly glad that I hadn’t pushed on the extra 20km to Whanganui the night before, plus I think that I may have been tempted to ditch the bike and hitch into town.

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On the outskirts of Whanganui I passed a sign that made me laugh.

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I know that New Zealand doesn’t have the history that Europe has as it was only inhabited about 700 years ago when it was discovered and settled by Polynesians, who developed a distinct Māori culture centred on kinship links and land.  Perhaps tourists do really do pull over here at the mere hint of a historic place.

To get into Whanganui you have to cross the aptly named Whanganui River to access the very centre of the town.

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There were lots of small boutique type restaurants and businesses in the centre and if I hadn’t only cycled 30km that morning I would have been tempted to set up the tent as it looked like a great place to hang out for a few days.

There was an i-site in the town, which is much the same as a tourist information place back home, and so I headed there to see if I could pick up a few maps for the cycle tracks that I wanted to do on my way to Auckland.

Once I had picked up lots of information I headed out to find a park to have lunch and to look through the brochures that I had picked up.  I soon found a picnic table next to the river and fired up the cooker for a portion of noodles while I picked apart a piece of cooked chicken that I had bought at a shop on the way.

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As I sat down to my chicken noodles I set about digesting the information that I had picked up as I didn’t want to carry all of the brochures with me.  The great thing about a smart phone is that you can photocopy the relevant pages and then take the brochures back – a type of modern recycling I suppose.

When I checked through the Mountain to Sea ride that I was about to set off to do it seemed that there was a 64km river trail section but then I would have to take a boat for 16km up river to continue cycling.  The only problem was that the boat cost 90 NZD.  Now that was expensive and seemed to me to be way too much.  If I wanted to pick up all of the trail I had no option but to pay it as there was no way to get to the next stage of the ride but by boat, which I think is what the boat owners were banking on.

As I couldn’t justify paying that price I decided that I would cycle the 64km river road section of the Mountain to Sea trail to Pipirki, where the boat section started, and from there take a mountain road for around 30km to the town of Ohakune where I could pick up the Old Coach Road off road track.  This way I would get to ride two different off road tracks and save myself 90 NZD to boot.

After eating it was time to take the brochures back and head out of town to find the start of the Mountain to Sea trail which I knew was about 10km up the river valley.  There was a cycle path next to the river so I followed this out of town.

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The sun was still beating down and just before the turning where the track started I passed a pub which was just too tempting to pass by so I called in to get a pint.  There is something slightly special about sitting outside in the sun enjoying a pint in the afternoon.

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It seemed that the local loggers had the same idea as they had knocked off early and had all headed for the pub.

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They were very interested in what I was doing and said that the river road was only open at certain times of the day for vehicles as they were busy upgrading much of the track as parts had been washed away by the river erosion and land slips over the previous winter.

The good news was that the loggers said that I could still get through on a bike even if the sign at the start of the track said that the road was closed.

After emptying the pint it was so tempting to have another but I wanted to at least get someway down the track before having to find somewhere to camp.  So I reluctantly said goodbye to the loggers and headed off in search of the start of the river road track.

I needn’t have worried that I would miss it as there were a plethora of signs a couple of kilometers up the road to mark the turning.

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From the sign it looked like I would have a 4km climb to get me warmed up.  So far in New Zealand river roads have been gentle inclines but the next sign that I passed let me know that this one wouldn’t be so easy.

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If that wasn’t enough they added another sign for good measure

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At least the road was open, which was a bonus, and I set about climbing the first part up to the lookout point.  The road wound its way through a pine forest and as this section was used as a logging road the surface here was tar sealed which made the climb much easier.

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After 4km the road in front of me dropped away as the track dog legged to the right to leave a pretty spectacular view all the way down the valley that I was about to cycle.

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From the view it looked like I wouldn’t have much trouble finding somewhere to sleep that night and raced down the hill into the valley below.

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The source of the Whanganui River is Mount Tongariro, and for over 700 years Maori have lived in the river valley building kainga (villages) and marae (gathering places).  Today, the valley is still home to many descendants of the original inhabitants.  There is a sign at the start of the river road which reads “Ko au te awa, ko te awa ko au”.  This translates as “I am the river and the river is me” which kind of embodies the spiritual relationship that Whanganui Maori have with the river which holds their ancestry.

When European settlers arrived in the late 1800’s the river was a major tourist attraction and became known as the Rhine of New Zealand as up until around 1930 the only access to the settlements along the river was by boat, and tourists would enjoy leisurely cruises along it’s length.

The track that I was following first opened in 1934 and took over 30 years to construct as the valley walls were prone to landslips.  Today, the work to stabalise the track is still ongoing as parts of it have been completely washed out and there are major landslips along it’s length.  Hence the reason that the track is closed at times to vehicle access.

In the fading light of the day the river looked stunning and I could really appreciate why the maori and then the Europeans had flocked to the valley

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It was now time to find somewhere to camp for the night and although from the viewpoint at the top of the valley I had thought that there would be plenty of opportunities to pitch my tent  there were not that many as much of the track I was following had been cut into the side of the valley and there was a long drop off down to the river.

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At about the 24km mark up the valley the track left the side of the river as it wound its way through a wooded area and I came across a grassy area that had been cleared next to the track.  There was even a tap to get water and a type of bench area which I can only assume is a place that loggers use when they camp overnight along the road.

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As it was getting dark I got dinner on and that was when I realized that I had lost my fork.  I must of left it in the park in Whanganui when I had stopped for lunch.  Normally, I would wash my stuff after eating but as there was no tap in the park I had just packed the pan and bowl away dirty to clean it later on.  The fork must have fell off the bench I was sat at when I packed up.

I now had nothing to eat with as I only carry a fork and no spoon.  For a knife I use my penknife which is razor sharp so I didn’t fancy eating with that.  I went through my stuff and the only thing that seemed to work was a half full tube of condensed milk that I could bend the end over and use as a type of spoon.

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The next morning I woke to the sound of rain drumming down on my tent and had to eat breakfast in my tent while I waited for the rain to blow through.  As I had no phone signal I had no idea what the forecast was and so when it was still raining after breakfast I had a snooze.

When I woke and looked out it had stopped raining and the sun was trying to make it’s way out.  At least it was much warmer now that I was making my way up north and so I packed up camp and headed out just in my cycling shorts and t-shirt.  Even overnight it was touch and go whether I needed the sleeping bag as I could have probably slept just in my liner that I had slept in throughout the Asian leg of this cycle ride.

I had another 40km to pedal before I had to leave the river at Pipiriki and the views of the river were just as stunning as the day before.

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After 10km the river valley opened up and I was now cycling through a sheep farming area.  I cycled through a village called Ranana which even had a school and a sign for a shop but when I followed the arrow the shop turned out to be somebody’s house which sold ice creams and drinks but was closed.

Now that it was getting warmer all along this part of the valley were boxes and boxes of bees that were busy creating honey.

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There must be a commercial company that pay for the boxes to be on the land as the boxes that I kept passing were all the same.  In one field that I passed workmen were busy off loading more boxes off the back of a truck.

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As I neared Papiriki I entered a hilly area and the track once again rose next to the river and just kept on climbing

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Eventually after a few kilometers I came to a viewing area and I could see the river valley closing in as the river entered the gorge area

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This was the part of the river that could only be accessed by boat and would cost me 90 NZD if I wanted to cycle the track on the other side of the gorge area.

There was a campsite and café in Papariki which doubled as the boat departure point so I pulled in to see if there was any chance of getting a better price on a seat in the boat as you never know if there was just one spot left on a boat that was leaving in 10 minutes.

It turned out that I wasn’t that lucky and would have to pay full price if I wanted to continue up the river. I asked about the road to Ohakune where I could pick up the Old Coach Road track and the lady at the camp told me that it was 27km uphill from Pipiriki.  I said that it couldn’t be all uphill and she assured me that it was.  Guess what – it was !!!!

It took me the best part of two and a half hours to crawl my way up that road and around every corner the road in front of me just kept gently climbing through a Pine forest.

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I was then at the top of the climb and out of the forest area and the view in front of me opened up.

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I had climbed over 1200m up the road from Pipiriki to get to this point and thankfully the road then descended for a couple of kilometres and I rolled my way down to the village of Raethi.  There was a café in the village so I decided to reward myself with a burger and ordered a steak and egg special for 6 NZD.

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When it arrived it tasted so good that I ordered a second one. I also took the opportunity to avail myself of a fork so that I had something to eat dinner with that night.

I could have stayed in the village as there was a campsite but the owner had said that Ohakune was much better as it was a ski town and so had more life to it.  Even though my legs were tired from the climb the burgers had worked there magic and I hopped on the bike to pedal the extra 11km to Ohakune.

As I cycled into Ohakune there was a petrol station so I pulled in to top up my cooker and asked what the camping options were. They said that there was a D.O.C. campsite about 3 km out of town on the mountain road that led to the ski fields and so I headed there.

As it was now going dark I picked up a portion of chips on my way through the town and put them in my pannier to eat for dinner once I had set up camp for the night.

When I found the D.O.C campsite it was already pitch black

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Once the tent was pitched I jumped in the tent and ate the chips that I had bought in town. The final job of the day was to phone my wife Deirbhle as it was the weekend and due to the 6 hour time difference is the only time that we really get to chat.

Here is a video I shot of my cycle along the Whanganui River road:

The town of Okahune had looked lovely as I cycled through it with lots of independent cafes that you associate with ski towns and so I decided that now I had climbed my way back up into the mountains I would take the day off tomorrow and enjoy the chance to eat good food and get a few jobs done that I needed to do.

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The road to Whanganui

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