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Wutheringbikes Home -- New Zealand
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28th Jan 2011 - a Wail Tail on the Rail Trail
From Alexandra to the Crow's Nest Backpackers and Camping, about 60-ish kms or 40 miles. The morning saw us rushing about to get Guy's bike back, with a new back wheel, from the Cycle and Mower Shop. Looks like a good wheel - tho' we are shockingly unclear as to whether it is double walled... - shopping for food and a camera (since Milford Sound my camera has ceased to have a working lcd screen - it takes pictured that you can see with a computer attached to it but the screen is useless). I got a cheapish Fujifilm AV110 to continue the photos of our journey with - prices in NZ seem very reasonable (on average a touch less than the UK high street). We were pretty much set to go so, of course, the day then turned rainy. But after a brief moment of hesitation we set off along the Otago Rail Trail that should, in a couple of days plus a restored little railway (Taieri Gorge Railway), take us to Dunedin (equals Edinburgh in scots gaelic). Guy is not a fan of rough tracks but the scenery - schizt outcrops and some gorges and tunnels - kept us both interested for the first 25 or so kms. But after a puncture and some pretty rough sections (as bad as a poor gravel road) Guy was getting desperate for tarmac and I was wearying of gravel. It is also so slow - we had a couple of campsites earmarked as possible but at the current rate it would be dark before we reached them. We met, on more offroad capable bikes than ours, Rene and Monique - two Germans who have been travelling in Australasia before coming here and bike touring. We had a great chat about bikes and roads and our journeys. They have a travel diary at http://www.2bikepackers.com. When Guy's tyre punctured (well, the old puncture repair fell apart from the constant banging of the tyre against stones) again we looked for the shortest route to tarmac and a campsite. The nearest accommodation was at Oturehua which we reached at about 8.15pm. Hooray for long summer evenings, otherwise it would have been tricky - the sun doesn't set until 9pm-ish and it remains light for a fair while after that. It isn't properly dark until around 10pm. We camped in the field at Crow's Nest Backpackers and had the used of the very homely kitchen and dining room along with some helpful meeows from the very elegant looking cat.The picture is of Guy mending his puncture (one of several) on the Rail Trail, while clouds build up over the hills around him. Looks like we're fated to get wet doesn't it? Well, it did rain later. Wonderful clouds though.
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Wutheringbikes Home -- New Zealand
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