Skip to main content

Day 11: Homeward bound

The final day of our trip lived up to my hopes. Last year we were unable to do the Rainbow road and so I was quite keen to do this 100km road from Hanmer to St Arnaud. I first heard of it 20 years ago when they used to run a mountain bike race along its length. It fully exceeded my expectations for both incredible beauty as well as fun riding that seemed to get better the further north we went. The coffee stop at Lake Tennyson  must be one of the better settings on the trip. Perfect weather to round it off. 
Beyond that a bit of melancholy as we approach our return to real life, balanced for me by looking forward to catching up with Jennie and the boys. 
So it is time to finish the final episode of one of the best trips of my life, which is setting the bar high as I have been fortunate to have had some good ones indeed. 
Thanks to Dave Lear who helped plan the trip. Many hours of pondering what has been a big project, from being prepared to also buy a KTM 500exc and go through the complex process of turning it into an adventure bike. This led into the trip planning, from routes to accomodation to what to pack. Our ultralight philosophy worked and the fact that we had such a good time didn’t happen by accident. 
Thanks to Dave Mac. He was a true sport and was out the door every day before 8am! Being able to spend time together again was awesome. We had so many laughs and good conversation and somehow seeing you on the bike with us makes the world seem right. Thanks for making the effort Dave. 
Of course thanks to Bernie as well. The few days we had with you were fantastic. The Upcot ridge will live long in our memory (etched I think)! Thanks also for introducing us to Hayley and Jeremy. Best night of the trip. Next time you will come for the whole trip, you promised. 
Lastly thanks to Jennie who always encourages me to live my best life and makes sure I go with a light heart. You are the best. 
It feels like we have been away for months. https://drive.google.com/uc?export=view&id=1NdmHg4-JhNjCNuKMTp3HxAnBBqoxw8s-https://drive.google.com/uc?export=view&id=1lv97RRPA8tUFHPGr4tk01OtQUwUjRIAihttps://drive.google.com/uc?export=view&id=1l_4-ps9E6TTWgmSwhR0bdKwAqhiuHIGUhttps://drive.google.com/uc?export=view&id=1MS6b4wm3zDvTbMLq1zVw_GgancPm46LUhttps://drive.google.com/uc?export=view&id=1wwN4baE5LdfhYnNJfDpCYMGT1b5QCVuG
https://drive.google.com/uc?export=view&id=17iCstnw6msR5cGNA1pYf2h7hOSZOEZBR

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Day 6: Waikaia

Naseby and Ranfurly are separated by 12km of straight road. If one is uncertain of where to go, there is a large mountain range behind Naseby that could serve as a land mark, visible from pretty much anywhere. So you might be surprised that the 3 world adventurers, all equipped with gps, managed to take about 40 minutes to find it. I could explain but it’s too painful. Once we did find Naseby we climbed up into the Hawksdun range on the Mt Buster track. This was always going to be a highlight for me with a big climb followed by a flowing double track full of hole and erosion mounds designed to play with. Dropping down into several crossings of Guffies creek and then the upper reaches of the Otematata river I was feeling quite vindicated in spending the children’s inheritance and education fund on the 500exc adventure project.  From there we climbed to over 1500m on Johnston’s creek track and the moonscape that is the top of the Hawksduns. Huge country. It’s both beautiful and intim...
Post a Comment
Read more

Day7: Mossburn

We arrived at Mossburn after another fantastic day. I’ll get back to that in a minute though. More importantly, we were quite relieved to find that there were laundry facilities and also that we had arrived early enough to use them. My feet have suffered but they tend not to complain. On the other hand, and I have to give them credit for being smarter than I thought, my nuts were beginning to complain. Turning your undies inside out doubles the lifespan but apparently turning them inside out again doesn’t reset things to pristine. So after 4 days.. well I really don’t need to go any further with this now do I? Picture if you will a forest of a different sort. We started off from Waikaia a little later than I originally intended. The ride up towards Old Man Range is beautiful, rising through beech forest on a winding little gravel road with the ever shrinking Waikaia river for company as we headed both upwards and northwards. Once above the tree line the track deteriorates into a rough,...
1 comment
Read more