Nelson to Takaka

Today was the first day of our short, unsupported tour of Golden Bay, with Nelson as the jumping off point. We had a wonderful breakfast at our B&B, in company with a Frenchman, an Italian, an Austrian, and a family of three from Freiburg, Germany. The Austrian was an interesting fellow, not staying at the B&B, but a friend of our hosts, James and Richard. They had invited him to meet the Italian/French couple because he is of Italian/German heritage. As they talked about places they knew in common, they discovered that his grandfather (Count Someone or Other -- he is the last count now) had sold his castle on an island in Lake Como to the grandfather of the Italian man, fairly recently. How strange is that that they should meet in New Zealand.

We got a somewhat late start (10:00) for our 60+ mile ride to Takaka, with the dreaded Takaka Hill to climb. Rather than riding entirely along the coast on Hwy 6, we cut thru a couple of towns, possibly adding a hill that we would have missed otherwise. Then we took Hwy 60, ignoring the advice of an American cyclist transplanted to New Zealand whom we met through our across-the-street neighbor and who had suggested we take a slightly longer, somewhat hillier route thru Upper Moutere. As it happens, we're glad we did. Before Takaka Hill proper, there were a couple of gentle climbs and descents at the bottom of one of which we saw a white faced heron and these amazing sculptures in a mud flat.

When we got to Motueka, we decided to have lunch before starting up the hill. We stopped at the first place we saw, T.O.A.D. Cafe, a delightful place with outdoor seating, ice cream, fresh vegetables and other comestibles for sale, a children's play area, a wonderful old shop dog who was very friendly, and good food. It was busy, so we spent longer than we intended, but the fuel was well worth the wait. We even stocked up on a "Gooey Slice" for when we got to the top of the hill.

Shortly after lunch, the climbing began in earnest. It was not long before we were in our lowest gears and grinding away. Fortunately, there were lots of turnouts and passing lanes. We were slow enough, in fact, that we (or at least I) did more turning of the front wheel to keep from falling over than usual. Between having fenders on the bide and my rather long cycling sandals on my feet, I had more toeclip overlap (interference between my foot and wheel) than usual and it was kind of hairy at times. You overlap hard enough and you'll stop yourself in your tracks and keel over. With David's Bike Friday having no toeclip overlap at all, he was mighty smug.

     Somewhat over an hour after starting the climb, we came to Hawkes Overlook, which didn't look like much but offered a convenient excuse to stop. In addition to an outhouse, it turned out to have a rather nice out-and-back walk of about 500m each way through a remarkable landscape of karst, water-worn limestone outcroppings, and sinkholes also formed by water erosion of the limestone. The latter were heavily vegetated and hard to make out, but the rock formations made it easy to see why the Maori had a legend of a giant lizard that had been burnt and left its scales scattered about the landscape.

The walk ended with a spectacular overlook down the hill we had just climbed (the left side of the picture), as well as an adjacent valley (on the right) entirely hidden from view as we climbed.

Only about a km farther and we appeared to hit the summit, along with another overlook on the opposite side of the road giving us a view of where we were going.

We bundled up and started down. Only a km or two later, we discovered that it had been a false summit, and we had another 5 km to go (now we understood the fluorescent markings beside the road that were probably left over from a recent bike race that came this way on one stage). Finally we reached the top and realized we needed to bundle even more, as the descent was a bit foggy and the temperature was dropping. Now it was downhill in earnest, and we weren't passed by many cars,

Upon reaching Upper Takaka, things were warming up and the descent was much gentler -- we were now following the Takaka River fairly closely -- so we unbundled and pressed on. Another 22 km or so to go. 

A long 22 km. We were TIRED. When we finally got to Takaka and stopped for directions, we were told to make the next right, go to the little roundabout, and turn right again. That would be Abel Tasman Rd, and the Ratanui Lodge where we had a reservation was along that. And it was, but it was a LONG way along that. In fact, two or three towns farther, in Pohara. Such are the vagaries of the Internet. Since it took us nearly half an hour to cycle there from town, we were sure hoping they had a restaurant. We were not disappointed. A prix fixe dinner of pumpkin soup, lamb rump, and some kind of tart for dessert awaited us. They were not fazed by David's request for a vegetarian option, either. Now we're stuffed and tired. And so to bed.

Total today: 113.5 km with 1120 m of climbing; total riding time 6 hours and 2 minutes.