Playing in the mud

Long weekends rock!  Especially when you get some nice weather to go out and play in.

On Sunday it was the Connies turn to get some loving and after getting everything done really early (due to daylights saving ending but still waking up at the same time) I was geared up and off down the road by just after nine.

With still just a T-shirt and shorts on under my gear I cruised on over to Bulls to fuel the bike up and to scrape the bugs off my visor that I should have cleaned before I left...

I had a number of options in my mind and plenty of time for a decent ride.  I was keen to do some sort of loop that would give me a few k's but also didn't want to run foul of the 4km/h tolerance running this weekend.

Getting closer to Whanganui I had to start making up my mind - a run up the Para's, further up the 'naki or somewhere else completely?  Turning towards Fordell the Para's were definitely on and I was even wondering about going further North and doing the Forgotten Highway as well but then I thought - what about the River Road?  I hadn't been up there for a while and it was definitely a lovely day for a slow cruise along the river...

In Upo there was a mufti cop giving some boys in a WRX some bad news and that suggested that perhaps he was patrolling around the Para's - how terrifically unsporting of him.  That made my decision a little easier and I took the turn-off to head up the river.

It was still pretty early but there was the odd car on the road - mainly tourists in crappy rentals or campers, all doing around 20-30km/h and doing great impressions of mobile chicanes.  Never mind, I wasn't in any hurry and it was fairly easy to get past them.

Not very far into the ride up the river I came across my first section of roadworks.  They weren't too bad, just reasonably hard packed dirt and a bit of metal here and there.  The roadworks soon gave way to a very long section of new seal - they are obviously doing the road up a bit as some of the roadworks were where the road was being widened.

I kept on heading North until finally the urge to take a photo overcame me...

Not much further up the road I came to another section of roadworks and this lot soon turned fairly interesting - so much so that I thought that I'd better video some of it.  Check out the mud and puddles - no match for the Connie and her worn out PR4's...

Bog hole safely waded, I flopped the bike gently from side to side to hopefully remove any of the slippery stuff and carried on to Pipiriki.

I love the last bit from Pipiriki through to Raetihi - the road opens up a bit with what is generally a better surface and it is a lot of fun.  But today I had to be a little careful as there was some sort of run/bike event on and there were bikes and people all over the road...

After a wee diversion to avoid all the action in Raetihi I rode across to Ohakune and attempted to find some lunch but failed.  I couldn't be bothered waiting around at the few busy outlets that were open, so I recleaned my splattered visor and aimed for Waiouru.

Rather than hit Waiouru for food and then have to ride some of SH1 I turned off again to take Fields Track back towards the Parapara's.  The road was in really good condition and I had a ball, so much so that I got a little wam from all the action.

The climb up from the bridge and back down to the Para's was particularly fun...

Riding South I was still managed to have some fun and it was great to be on the Paras again.  They were in pretty good nick - just one set of lights that turned green as I arrived and not too much crap on the road.

By now I was getting fairly keen to take on board some lunch and a cold drink but at Upo the cafe looked overrun so I carried on into Whanganui where I managed to find grub at one them there fast food places - not ideal but the big drink was welcome.

And that was pretty much it, I rode home the boring and slow way, behaving myself all the way, getting home not long after 2pm with plenty of daylight left that I could have used.

The poor old girl now needs a bath and some tyres...