DAY TWENTY-NINE: NZ NORTH ISLAND BY BIKE? CHECK.

Day 26 (Wanganui to Himitangi) Daily Distance: 76.06 kms
Day 27 (Himitangi to Wellington) Daily Distance: 139.42 kms
Days 28-29 (Wellington Rest Days)
Total Distance: 1447.94 kms

I didn’t have far to travel on Day Twenty-Six so I had a leisurely Saturday morning in town. There were some local markets by the river, I met some giant pencils (still not sure why they were there?) and went up New Zealand’s only underground elevator to a lookout over the river we’d canoed as well as Wanganui town itself.

Even though I’m impressed that the elevator was built to develop the suburb of Durie Hill way back in 1919 and still works, I still found it underwhelming. The pencils were more exciting.

The ride that day was uninspiring given the scenery didn’t much deviate from flat hot farmland, although I did get to ride through a place called Bulls, a town like no udder. That night I was hosted in Himitangi (just outside Palmerston North on the Foxton side) by Gerald and Sue Turk, Monique’s Uncle and Aunt who I had met at the wedding when they kindly invited me to stay. I had a full guided tour of their free-range poultry farm, and it was extremely interesting to see how one farm can manage 135,000 chickens at a time!

Given that it was a Saturday night, I joined Sue and Gerald at their ‘local’ with the whole family – the only two properties that separate theirs and the pub are home to their two daughters and their respective families – good planning I say! It brought back so many memories seeing a huge group of kids, six of which were Sue and Gerald’s grandchildren, roam free and unsupervised (not in an irresponsible way, in a country town sort of way) as they ran around the huge yard having water fights and playing rugby and jumping fences and falling over and doing things that I did when I was little and too few iKids seem to do these days…

In terms of distance, the next day was the longest of either of my touring trips so far, but conditions obliged and I got it done in reasonable time – a tick under six hours of actual riding time – even though I stopped to pick over half a kilogram of blueberries … which only cost me five bucks!

On arrival into Wellington I rode past the workplace and apartments that housed me when I was sent here for work back in 2007, and also got to Kelburn where James lived and where the top of the famous cable car is found.

Given I’d seen much of the city back in ‘07, it was a relaxing couple of days, although I did re-visit Te Papa, NZ’s National Museum, stroll along the waterfront and reunite with LSR. It was as windy as I remembered.

So with that it was NZ North Island: check.