Day 18 - January 28, 2023

Day 18:  Hunterville - Kimbolton

Some smooth seal starts the day, but don't get too comfy!  Soon we're back onto a mix of gravel and farm roads.  Taking us from Hunterville to Kimbolton.

Well, it poured rain all night last night.  Between that and the Friday night party animals at the bar downstairs, some people didn't get a lot of sleep it seems.  Me - I slept through it all.  It was still raining this morning but everyone geared up and set out on the bikes.  Sounds like it's a good thing we're not close to Auckland.  Apparently a state of emergency has been declared - heavy rains and flooding.  The airport has been closed and flights cancelled.  A university friend is amongst those stranded at the airport trying to head for home.  Good luck to them.............

Given the forecast for the day, I buried my phone/camera in a waterproof bag for the day so didn't end up taking any pictures.  This will have to do......

That's pretty much how everything looked anyway.  Although the rain didn't seem terribly hard, I did have trouble keeping water from accumulating in my eyes without glasses on and between the drops on my sunglasses, the garmin, and the cuesheet, I was glad that we didn't have any complex directions to follow.  This morning's roads were very quiet.  We were on gravel for a while.  It travelled through beautiful terrain - lots of hills and sheep - although the road was a bit soft in places due to the rain.  We went about 30 km without any significant climbs; just cruisin'.  And as a bonus - there was about 10 km less gravel than we were expecting.  

In the afternoon we were on the Manawatu Scenic Route for almost 20 km.  It was a bit more open terrain than this morning's route, but still an abundance of sheep in the fields.  Lunch was shortly after 40km.  Kerry found a nice sheltered spot to set up in the town of Rangiwahia.  She also declared that there wouldn't be much climbing in the afternoon.  Hmmmm -  RWGPS showed 8 distinct climbing segments.  Granted, none were very long, but.........  They were usually preceded by a downhill to a creek or river, over a bridge and then the inevitable uphill would follow.

I was ready to be done by the time we rolled in Kimbolton.  Very tiny town.  We're staying in two old restored houses side by side.  I'm one of the folks in the old bank building and manager's house.  Very tastefully renovated and the hostess is very welcoming.  She quickly offered up her laundry facilities and drying rack.  A rejuvenating shower (and a peanut butter sandwich and cup of tea) and I feel human again.  

Since that's not much to write about on today's ride, I'll take this opportunity to give a shout-out to our two guides, Kerry and Zoe.  They are really looking after us well.  They prepare our breakfast in the morning and clean up after us, drive the van to a morning snack stop, lay out a lovely lunch everyday and clean up from that.  One rides in the morning and the other rides in the afternoon.  The owners keep us supplied with fresh baked treats - a new batch seems to arrive by courier every few days.  K & Z keep on top of letting us know where they'll meet us on the road during the day and in the smaller towns will ensure that we have some place to eat dinner.  They look after all the details behind the scenes that make a tour like this run smoothly.  I especially appreciate that they tend to my rental bike - keep it cleaned and lubed.  When I mentioned that a small gearing issue had developed, they took it to a shop in Whanganui to have it looked at.  Not their fault that the bike shop messed up the gearing much more than they fixed anything.  It may have to go into another bike shop down the road.  

Speaking of support - when we were in the cafe in Hunterville yesterday waiting for our hotel to be ready for us, we ran into the woman driving support for the fast group that we met on the Timber Trail.  They were already on the ferry to the South Island yesterday, but she was heading back to Auckland for something.  Small world..........

The forecast doesn't look stellar for tomorrow so I'm going to take the day off.  My friend Linda (from Southern Tier, Canadian Rockies, Sierra Cascades and NZ reunion) is coming to fetch me and I'll spend the day catching up with her.  Looking forward to that!

Stats for the day:

Distance:  80.1 km

Elevation (Garmin):  2563' up, 1842' down (I think Garmin tends to miss some of the elevation changes in heavily overcast conditions)

Elevation (RWGPS):  5196' up, 4583' down (I think we did substantially more than Garmin, but probably not as much as RWGPS says)

Weather:  13C - 15C.  Rain all day.  Sometimes light and sometimes a bit heavier.  The temperature was actually quite comfortable.  Much warmer than that and I find it too hot to wear a raincoat.