Saturday was ride day this past weekend and Colin's general plan was "somewhere out East with grub at Porangahau". This appeared to be enough to entice Brett and John along too - although I think that John wanted to put some miles on his 120km old 1290...
Anyway the plan was to meet in Pahiatua before heading out towards Pongaroa. I got underway a bit early at just after 8 so got in my only gravel fix on Tararua Road before fueling up at Pahiatua and discovering I'd left my wallet at home...wonderful...Luckily, I managed to pay for the gas without having to part with any body parts or do something I might regret and soon the others arrived to laugh at me.
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| Might have to put a complaint in about the weather |
Leaving Pahiatua we made our way through to Pongaroa, riding over plenty of new seal and the odd slippery section and then turned onto Route 52 for the ride through to Weber and Porangahau. As usual the road was "interesting" in the normal places but there actually were signs of some road repairs in places. On the video you may glimpse some of the interesting bits.
Oh, and by the way, I got fairly heavy-handed on the hyper-lapse recordings. I quite like them and they make the editing very easy. The only issue is that there is no sound and Googles free offerings aren't the best. Let me know what you think - hyperlapse or video?
Arriving in Porangahau we parked up for a coffee and a bit of a snack while sitting outside in the sunshine.
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| Yeah, that place again |
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| GSA social distancing, owner asleep on seat behind table... |
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| New KTM parked next to a quality machine |
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| Old Suzy in the background - only 10,000km on it's odo... |
From Porangahau we carried onto Waipuk and Waipawa with Colin wanting to do a run up Middle Road. I disappointed him (briefly) by ignoring this and instead making for Elsthorpe to take Kahuranaki Road up the opposite of the Tukituki River. I thought it was time we rode that road (and Middle Road) in the opposite directions 😁
On the way up we came managed to enter a cycle race and as we saw none, I reckon we won...
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| Click pic for the important news article... |
As we made our way across Havelock North I decided a wee diversion was in order and took the lads up Te Mata Peak to have a wee looksee. It was worth it even if it was a bit hazy looking out across the Bay.
Dropping back down the hill we stopped at the loos for some old men to take an...errr, break.
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| Aiming the 10 down a mountain bike track... |
Back down from altitude we finally hit Middle Road, I hope Colin was happy...
In Waipawa, we stopped for gas, a drink and some more yarning before puttering over to Onga Onga and SH50. After spotting a multi-coloured car on SH50 I decided that I'd had enough of busy main roads and led us off to Takapau and the back roads through Ormonville to Dannevirke.
Along the way we had another group of Adventure bike riders go past in the other direction - great day for it but why wasn't everyone out flipping stones?
From Dannevirke it was time to get of the main road again so we took more back roads along against the ranges to Woodville where we waved off John and then enjoyed a quick flick through Ballance and back over the track.
By the time I got home it was around 4:30 and definitely a bit cooler. Nice to have a relax with a hot drink after a great days riding.
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