To Haaaaast

The restaurant in Makarora started serving breakfast at a very normal and round 8AM. I had a sausage roll while I waited for the main stuff to come out. James wanted to wait a bit longer before leaving in case there were other sandwich flavours (for lunch). More sandwiches for sale didn't eventuate though.

Super meta rock art image

 The first part of the ride was through some shady rainforest. It was really nice. We had some side trips to see things like blue pools. I also had trouble getting through some uphill roadworks. All that nice gravelly stuff and one-way controlled flow.

Blue poolness

Snow capped mountains behind other cycle tourists

At our lunch stop we shared a picnic table with other cycle tourists. There was a couple from Wales and one bloke from Germany. I don't remember much of the conversation, apart from trying to get my sandwich away from James' DEET spray (there were many sandflies at this location).

The rest of the afternoon was more generic fantastic scenery which will be turned into a hyperlapse.

The campground was a bit awkward with tent sites pushed and squashed right to the front of the property, by the road. It was a hot evening in the tent and I woke to someone not more than 20 metres away not being able to decide whether they wanted to be in or out of their van. There was also water on the inside and outside of the tent fly. Some drying time was needed.

Dinner was cous cous, about half a kilogram of veg and tuna. The veg really helped get things moving inside!