Keep Cycling! South Island New Zealand 2021

Another beautiful morning! Left Gore at 7.30am. A flat, straight road with light Sunday traffic to start - and not a hill in sight for 15kms! (Only 3 hills whole trip!) Wore a thermal and windbreaker as well as cycling gear. Fingers and toes were numb for the first couple of hours.  Stripped off our thermals mid morning. Waited for a break in traffic, then stripped down to bare skin and pulled our cycle shirts back on quickly. Getting expert at this! Great to cycle at a good speed without effort for a change! Lush, green paddocks and large herds of cows or flocks of healthy looking sheep everywhere. Stopped for a Del-made cheese and tomato roll at 11.30am before we hit the town. Arrived Invercargill around 12.30pm and chose a motel close to Countdown. Went for a wander around the town. Most shops were closed and there were large areas of development in the CBD.                                                 Del couldn't resist a photo of

This morning we were keen to see if removing the heavy tent and camping gear from our trailers made our day easier. It did, but it was still a difficult ride today. From the first hill out of Balclutha, to the 15kms of hills that followed, we laboured and walked.  A roller coaster of hills and hollows led us through the pretty south Otago countryside. Herds of cows and sheep greeted us as we plodded past. We passed lush, green pasture and fields of yellow flowers - possibly canola. Luckily we haven't struck a single day of bad weather so far. We start the day with a thermal and windbreaker over our cycling gear. By 10.00am these are stripped off.  Stopped at Clinton for a coffee and home made cheese and tomato rolls, then off to attack those hills again. Finally we crossed the Mataura River and entered Gore where the statue of a  leaping brown trout welcomes visitors. Gore is a Mecca for Trout fishermen.  It

To date progress has been pretty slow - too much walking due to the hilly terrain and our weighty trailers.  We needed to do something to make the journey easier. We couldn't change the hills - but we could reduce our load - again!  We resolved to courier/freight the heaviest item, the tent, and any other item not used regularly, as soon as we arrived in Balclutha. With 26 kms to cover, we left Milton a little later than usual, at 8.00am. The road undulated through lush farmland - obviously serious sheep country. The undulations were enough though to get us off our bikes. We must have dismounted and walked around 15 times! That settled it! The tent and accessories had to go! Tall rectangular hedges, typical of the area, are often found stretching across hectares of farmland as windbreaks. We checked out the Old Sod Cottage on the way. I think that the old sod must have lived a pretty miserable life in this dark and dingy little home.

Set off at 7.00am as usual and began the cyclist's alternative route south, out of the city, with extra help from Google Maps. The route took us first through quiet, flat suburban streets.  Then it rose steeply as it took us over the hills and out of the city. More walking!  By 9.00am we'd only covered 8kms!  At 15kms the route returned us to the highway - and the traffic. We were now on the relatively flat terrain of the Taieri Plain. The traffic was dominated by heavy trucks - namely logging and stock trucks- and needed our full focus on cycling in a straight line on the road shoulder. We crossed the Taieri River Bridge and cycled with the river on our left and the railway line on our right for several kms. The road was undulating and, with a developing head wind, we quickly tired and began to take regular breaks. We passed Waihola Lake and stopped at The Black Swan Cafe to refuel and re-energise. Back on the road, we had 24 mor

Today we woke early but allowed ourselves a short sleep in. A trip to the albatross colony, at the furthest point of the Otago Peninsula, was planned.  No buses went as far as the Taiaroa Heads. The Royal Albatross Colony itself organized hotel pick ups, but these had been cancelled when COVID arrived. Monarch Tours organized a variety of wild life tours, but only did so if bus numbers were sufficient. Numbers are down.  No tours today! We decided not to hire a taxi or car for over 3 hrs. It's 31kms each way, so would be a full day's cycling so  -  no visit this trip! Instead we walked over 6 kms, checking out the route to take tomorrow.  We had chosen a south Dunedin motel to make our getaway more straightforward. No cycling on the motorway so we found a safe alternative route. After lunch made a quick visit to beautiful St Kilda Beach - white sand, blue sea and goose-pimply sunbathers. Still a chilly wind! Then back to the motel for some R&R before we take off

Got off to a good start at 7.00am this morning. No rain so far and little wind. Walked a long hill out of Palmerston then enjoyed a good cycle.  Full of energy, we cycled over the Waikouaiti River and through the town. Around the 23 kms mark, things changed drastically. We walked virtually the whole 3 kms, only to find that another 5 kms followed. More walking! We stopped for coffee and a snack to re-energise at The Spot, a convenience store at Blueskin. Previous cyclists had suggested that, to get to Dunedin without the heavy traffic, we should head for Port Chalmers and take the cycle path from there into the city. A good idea, we thought. Just south of Waitati, we left the highway and took the Blueskin Road. It was quiet with virtually no traffic, but it quickly became steep, winding hills. More walking - in fact - these were the steepest hills we'd come across.  Eventually, after endless walking, we were rewarded with