WEEK SIX
Wowee we’ve finished week six. Half way through next week I’ll be half way done in terms of weeks, but have more than half the mileage left.
I’m in Tekapo writing this, a day later than expected because I’ve had a couple of brutal days of headwind and cut the days in half because of it.
I’ve nearly ridden 3,500 kilometres and am due to finish my lap of the South Island in the next week and a half, maybe two.
On Monday I finished the last cruisy (mostly downhill) 120 kilometres of the Otago Rail Trail. I’m glad it was an easy day’s riding because I had barely slept the night before with how cold it was.
I’ve since invested in a warmer mat in Dunedin and nights have been far more restful, and my bike is 500g heavier which just means I’m getting even stronger. Silver linings.
Tuesday was a real adventure. I was caught in a debate between locals and cyclists I’ve met along the way as to if I could make it through the back roads, or if I’d have to take the highway.
I decided to attempt it. I’d already ridden past three ‘no exit’ signs and had stumbled across the first ‘private road- keep out’ sign where three railway engineers were standing. Searching for the final shred of validation I wanted to continue with my decision, I came to a stop and asked them “reckon I’ll be alright going for it to Dunedin?”
A: “No, there’s no route through here. You’ll have to go back and take the road.”
Not the answer I was looking for.
Me: “Are you sure?
A: “Yeah”
Me: “100%?”
A: “Absolutely positive, 100%”
B: “Ahh hang on mate, I think there’s a road. But it’s private farmland. You might be alright”
The answer I wanted.
Me: “Yeah I think I’ll give it a try, thanks”
They very kindly offered me a lift back to the paved road I’d come from, fifteen kilometres back, if I got stuck and had to come back whilst they were still working.
Off I went, into the gravelly hills, 95% certain I’d be able to get through, but already cursing myself if I got much further and had to turn back. I had 1,300 metres to climb in 60 kilometres before reaching something that resembled civilization, and wasn’t keen to make it much more than that.
It had rained heavily the night before and I began riding through peanut butter mud, my back wheel stopped moving and my spork got sacrificed to scraping it out of between my back wheel and frame. I soon descended into a gorge and gave my bike a proper clean in the fast-moving water. It was freezing, the sun didn’t penetrate down to the bottom of the gorge and my hands were bright red and stung.
Once clean, I had the problem of crossing the ford whilst keeping my feet dry. I’d convinced myself if I went in slow enough then the water wouldn’t splash up but I went in too slow and misjudged how far I had to go to the other side so I had to pedal and splash my feet into the icy water.
On the relentlessly steep hill out of the gorge, I looked up to see a cloud of dust dispersing through the huge expanse of sky above me. Shit, shit, shit. A farmer!
I was looking for a bush to throw myself into when a black, mud-laden 4×4 came around the corner, throwing mud and rocks over the side of the road. Too late. I’d been seen.
I gave him my friendliest ‘please please don’t send me back the way I’ve just come’ smile, and stuck my hand up to wave and he did the same as he cruised straight past me. Phew. I was good to carry on.
I’ve been trying to eat more on the go. I often find myself pedalling up hills and on long stretches of flat and being hit by extreme hunger out of nowhere. I want to get to the point where I am eating anticipatorily and not reactively as it will make riding a fair bit easier, but I’m not doing a great job at it. On Tuesday, I made myself eat three Oreos at the top of every single hill I crested.
So, at the top of this hill and three Oreos later, I was surprised to see a smooth, flat surface in the distance. Tarmac! About an hour earlier than expected.
I wasn’t to trust it. One of the many bits of advice I’d give to someone if they were coming to ride in NZ is ‘don’t trust tarmac will stay tarmac’. I was riding along it, waiting for this perfect buttery smooth road to once again turn to rubble and mud, but it never did. I only ended up doing 35/130 kilometres on gravel that day, but they took up their fair share of time.
I’ve ridden up some big hills in NZ, but the area surrounding Dunedin takes the cake for steepness. A mile at 13.4% average where I saw, to my dismay, 25% flash up on my screen around the corners, wiped my legs. I was ready for the big descent my bike computer was promising.
I got to Dunedin and dumped my bags in the hostel I was staying at for a couple of days, giddily excited to spin my legs out on an unloaded bike for 50 kilometres along the pancake-flat coastal road to a place called Aramoana. I threw the coastal village into the ‘take me to’ option on my bike computer and followed the route blindly out of Dunedin.
I wanted to take the flat, purpose-built bike trail. My bike computer wasn’t finished with the hills.
I cycled past the world’s steepest street (genuinely, I’m not being dramatic) and wondered where this bike trail was. And then a wall of a road came into view and suddenly I was at 18%, 20%, 23%. Eh? Where’s the coast?!
I was cursing my computer and attempting to get up the gradient when a car came round the corner and I looked down and saw a cabbage sitting in the road. The car reached me and I reached the cabbage at the same time and there wasn’t enough room for all three of us and I don’t have the skills to unclip and kick it out of my way at the best of times, let alone on a 20% gradient, so I swerved into the side of the road and had to unclip.
Oh no, I thought. I’d have to walk. What a shame.
A little walk and a huge descent later, I was where I intended to be about forty-five minutes earlier.
In Port Chambers. I cruised along a flat road that winded in and out of bays with crystal clear water reflecting off little white sailing boats.
Soon enough, I reached the furthest eastern point I could that day.
Wednesday and Thursday were rest days in Dunedin, I managed to catch up with Sara on her last night in New Zealand which was so lovely. I felt such joy and grinned so hard when I saw her in her black beanie standing outside the ice cream shop we agreed to meet at.
I’ve started to notice I don’t feel great taking time off the bike in big cities. I’m not entirely sure why this is but Wednesday was a bit meh and then on Thursday I walked around feeling rubbish within myself. I couldn’t wait to be back on the bike, moving, climbing hills, and being in wild landscapes again.
Even after bumping into two of the thru-hikers I met in Bluff in the supermarket and spending the evening with them, I still felt a bit empty.
I’m going to experiment with taking days off in smaller places to see if it makes a difference. I also miss the peace of my tent when I’m in hostels.
The ‘meh’-ness continued into Friday morning, a mix of grey clouds, a grey head and a really huge hill out of Dunedin (the same one I had climbed on my way to the coast- see the remains of the cabbage)
I let myself stop at a village corner shop earlier than was planned and sat with my first coffee of the day and messaged Gemma and got all my stresses out. Then the sun came out. I pedalled away feeling ten times lighter and began to enjoy the day. I was by the sea the entire ride and it felt great to have the sun warming me up and to be able to smell the salty air. I had intended to ride to Oamaru but, nervous about how I’ve started to feel in built-up areas, was delighted to find a small village campsite about ten kilometres south.
I spent the late afternoon and evening sitting on the beach, feeling calm, tired and happy.
I think this is the first day I realised/ revelled in how much freedom I have day to day. I went for a walk on two beaches during the ride, sat in a cafe longer than I normally would, and changed where I was planning on staying without a second thought. It felt good. It felt natural.
Saturday and Sunday were spent on the Alps2Ocean cycle trail, or Ocean2Alps for me. It took me 250 kilometres west to Lake Tekapo off-road, and as the name suggests, was all uphill.
I spent Saturday hopping on and off the trail, as I fancied, as the roads were quiet and took what might’ve been a nine-hour ride based on the first 50 kilometres, down to seven and a half hours.
It was a beautiful ride, seeing the mountains of the Mackenzie district in the distance, never really getting any closer. I think this has been the most awe-inspiring part of New Zealand I’ve seen and feel very grateful I’ve been able to experience it.
On Sunday, the wind was wild. I got about two kilometres into where the road turned into corrugated gravel and met a cyclist coming the other way.
He’d just had a 20-kilometre descent and stopped to kindly tell me the descent on the other side was rough and wouldn’t be enjoyable. That’s not what I wanted to hear, already fed up with how much harder the ride was being made by the wind.
He left, and I thought ‘fuck this’, so I turned around and sat outside a little vending machine farm cafe and phoned my sister and then sat there for a while longer before crawling to Twizel on the road. I had to break the ride into four-kilometre chunks and celebrated each and every one.
I didn’t have the patience for that ride at all, so scrapped the idea of getting to Tekapo and instead set up camp in Twizel and had a nice evening chatting with TA hikers and eating pizza.
Then I cleaned my bike with another cyclist. I took all the bags off my bike and hosed the previous seven weeks’ worth of dust and mud off the frame and wheels.
Then I pushed it right into a patch of mud we’d created with the hose and caked it in mud again. Half an hour well spent 🙂
I’m finding solo bike-packing much easier than I was expecting. When I set off from Bluff I was pretty nervous. I’m learning more about myself this way.
There’s a lot of flexibility to adapt days to how I feel, like yesterday when I stopped at lunchtime. It was quite hard to practise self-care and I felt guilty that I’d stopped early.
Once I’d re-realised I’m on no one’s schedule but my own, and there’s no need to ride further if I don’t feel like it, I had a chilled afternoon and enjoyed being in such a beautiful place.
I’ve felt pretty proud of myself this week. I’ve been in a reflective headspace and have been thinking about where I was a year and a half ago vs where I am now.
A year and a half ago, making it through a day was a huge achievement. Today, I’m solo cycling around New Zealand.
I’m proud I pulled myself out of that space and not only am I a lot happier, I’m pushing my limits every day and experiencing life at its fullest.
I’ve not felt lonely at all. When I got to Tekapo this afternoon, the cafe was full apart from a bit of bench next to a TA thru-hiker. We spent an hour chatting about our journeys and it was super fulfilling. I then checked into the hostel and there was another TA thru-hiker in the bed next to me. This place is full of incredible people doing wild adventurous things and it’s giving me such energy and excitement for life.
Probably to my dad’s horror, speaking to all these adventurous souls is giving me an insight into life when I get back home. I’m seeing more and more that life when I get back home doesn’t have to look as linear as tying myself back to a desk in a 9 to 5 and living for my weekends.
Onto week seven!!!
Thanks for reading 🙂