Thursday, April 17, 2014

Day 40: Christchurch to Rakaia Gorge

April 13th 2014
Distance cycled: 60 km
Total distance to date: 2426 km

After 3 days with Alec and Alison, it was sad to go! We'd had so much fun talking and sharing cycle stories. Michael was great too. I felt like we had a little family and we all had to say goodbye. 

Me and Michael:


Michael and Alison: 


Alec:


Alec rode about 5km through the suburbs to the edge of town with me, which was great since it saved me some navigation headaches and gave me a riding companion to boot. (He'd done the same to get me to the International Antarctic Center.) Then he turned off and it was just me and the flat, open road leading through the Canterbury Flats. 


The first tiny town I came to had some clothing donations sitting outside a shop near a donation bin. I took a fleece that may come in handy as the weather has been so chilly recently, I might need extra clothes in the tent tonight. Having spent the last 3 nights indoors, I'm not really sure how cold it gets at night. 

I stopped in Rolleston for a snack and a coffee. They were having a little Saturday market so I strolled through that too and bought a half-dozen free-range eggs for a knockout price of $1.50. So now I can have eggs for breakfast tomorrow!

I stopped briefly in Horokata but there wasn't much there to see, except for this mysterious business card:


Does Robert hang gnomes? Do they Han you? What is going on here? Tempting to call the number just to find out. 

Finally, after lots and lots of flat pedaling, I only had 18km to go to Rakaia Gorge. 


It was already quite cold by this time and you can see the mountains in the background indicating that it might get a little colder still. 


The campground at the gorge is nice, with hot showers (non-coin op!) but the kitchen is just a sink with a counter. Hmm. Good thing I have my stove.

At least it's quiet here.

0 Comments:

Post a Comment

<< Home