Sight seeing

Today was a cracker of a day and as I hadn't ridden a motorcycle since Monday I needed to fix that.  I also had a hankering to check out North Range Road on Mighty Mouse.

I got away from home just after 10 and after putting a whopping 9L into the WR scrambled my way up the track (no stop-go men like on the TT) and hit the gravel after turning onto North Range Road.

A short squirt got me to a nice spot for a couple of pics looking out over Palmy.

A few minutes later I crested the rise and began the drop down into the start of the rougher sections with all the mud holes.  This time around there was a lot less water as we've not had a lot of rain lately and I didn't drown or get stuck at all.

At the gate at the bottom of the rough stuff I tried out another 4WD track going up over (and avoiding some bogs) a wee hill.  It went fairly well thought there was a very steep decent down the other side which had me taking a wee bit of extra care.

After the next section of windy and sometimes muddy track I popped back out onto the gravel road again and stopped for some more pics.

The road now was more open and I got to use all of the gears occasionally before getting to the top of the downhill section into Balance.

Whariti in the distance

As you can see from the video, I took it fairly easy going down the hill as there were a few mountain bikes and other vehicles around.

My next stop was in Woodville for a quick lunch before tackling the climb up to Whariti.  This was my first time up here on the WR and it was a blast.

On the lower parts there was a bit of decent graded gravel that was quite nice to slide around on and the little bike handled the scramble up the rougher stuff near the top with no issues.  I bet I was quicker up there on the WR than on the Ten...

Riding down off the hill, I took it quietly and just enjoyed the views out towards Woodville/Pahiatua.

At the bottom of the hill I had a decision to make - which way to go to get home?  Well, it was either seal over the Saddle or Track or return the way I'd came over North Range Road...guess which option won?