Start – Lake Tekapo
Finish – Twizel
Daily Distance – 54 km
TA Distance – 2477 km
Bluff Distance – 564 km
I mentioned yesterday that I have a bike hire booked for today. You may rightly ask “What heresy is this?
You’re supposed to be walking!”. The reason I am biking today is that after Lake Tekapo the next spot
where camping is permitted is 47km away. While I have walked 42km in a day before, it was an
exhausting and generally miserable experience, which I was not terribly keen to repeat.
The whole situation is especially frustrating as I passed loads of inviting spots for wild camping on my
ride today. However, if caught illegally camped, I would face being moved on and a $200 (£100) fine. It
would probably be fine, but it seems like the Canterbury region authorities spend a disproportionate
amount of their budget on posters banning camping, so I’d rather not risk it.
Anyway, that’s why Oren (of Haggisland) and I saddled up this morning for the 60km ride from Tekapo-
Twizel. Judging by the lack of TA hikers that we passed along the way, I guess most people are choosing
to hitch this section rather than pay for a bike, or walk the huge day. It’s rather a shame really as it’s a
lovely route. Most of the path follows a beautiful, blue canal, past salmon farms and rolling hills, before
heading cross country for the last hour into Twizel. The only slight downside was being continually
outpaced by groups of cyclists twice our age and significantly more than twice our girth. Given the
supersonic speed with which they zoomed by I can only assume that they have discovered a way to
nullify petty physical laws like gravity and wind resistance. They didn’t stay still long enough to ask,
although I have a nasty suspicion that it will involve more lycra than I’m comfortable wearing.
Last night saw some (hopefully temporary) good-byes. Cyclone Gita is due to impact NZ on Tue/Wed
and most people are preparing to hunker down in town while it passes. Not wanting to waste a day of fine
weather and already having the bike booked anyway, I moved on, leaving Ben, Natalie, Matt and Mieka
in Tekapo. I have hiked almost 600km and shared many adventures with these guys in the past weeks, so
hope they manage to catch up again. As for me, I had fortuitously already planned tomorrow as a rest day,
so should miss the worst of the weather. Wed is currently predicted to be no more than showers, so I will
move on then towards lake Ohau and Wanaka some 8 days later.
Sorry, another bad photo day. I couldn’t find a good way to wear my camera bag and ride, so it stayed in
the cycle bag all day.
