I’m not actually sure what “maxin” means in this context. But I’m a 30-something so the phrase is wedged into my brain.
Gotta multitask when you're on the move! Flossin' and a walkin'
The first thing Kerry and I did – after a long sleep of course – was to walk slowly to the general store. Kerry flossed at the same time, because we are true heroes of efficiency.
Along with the usual candy and soda, we found enough ingredients here to make a decent Indian dish for lunch and dinner.
Along with the usual candy and soda, we found enough ingredients here to make a decent Indian dish for lunch and dinner.
So far all the roads we've been on have been scrupulously well maintained. We told a couple of locals how impressed we were, and each of them laughed and said "Naaah".
So far all the roads we’ve been on have been scrupulously well maintained. We told a couple of locals how impressed we were, and each of them laughed and said “Naaah”. Maybe there was a recent push to improve the roads?
On the other hand, sidewalks and curbs are rare here, and the lanes are narrower, and most of the bridges are one-way.
Kerry’s leg was feeling cramped and sore, so we walked very slowly to the beach. There were only a few people around, and the weather was fantastic! Here’s a video of some of our antics, using the helmet-camera planted in the sand:
Whoooo bodysurfing! I almost lost my hat a few times.
Kerry went back to the beach house to rest some more, so I decided to walk to the Mermaid Pool formation in the meantime.
Go quail go!
[/ptwsgallery]
I think this little kerchief is supposed to mark the beginning of the trail … But it might just be a lost swimsuit!
This is a STEEP trail. In some places you have to hold on to ropes to stay upright.
The trail, by the way, is steep. In some places you have to haul on ropes to stay upright.
At the top of the climb, you enter a lovely chunk of tropical forest. The cicadas get so loud they drown out the ocean, and the trail twists and curves so much that you can’t see it beyond the next 15 feet.
I wouldn’t want to carry a surfboard or a cooler through here! Of course, first I’d have to drag it up the hillside…
I can’t remember the last time I’ve wandered in a forest like this one. Perhaps this is the first time. I was fascinated by the texture and color of the trunks, and kept brushing my hands across them as I walked.
Eventually I emerged and saw the ocean again.
That's where we're going tomorrow!
In the distance I could spot the “Poor Knights Islands”. That’s where we’re going tomorrow! Sweeet! Then I looked down, and saw the pools…
First sight of the Mermaid Pools, from the top of the hill.
Quite lovely! And due to the lateness of the day and the season, I had them all to myself.
It's a very colorful place...
There are strange things growing in the Mermaid Pool. I suspect it's a mixture of salt-water and fresh-water organisms.
I didn't spot any mermaids, but I did spot quite a few snails!
The pools are filled up slowly by the high tide, then drained slowly by the low tide. The water is a bit warmer than the ocean, deep enough to swim in, and a lot less turbulent than the surf. And of course the colors are amazing, even on a less-than-perfect day like today…
This is an example of why modeling the physics of water is difficult.
Here’s a handy example of why modeling the physics of water is difficult!
The waves would constantly send water thundering up the rocks and just over the edge, causing a little bit to flow into the pool on the other side.
A classic Mermaid Pool shot. Farewell, pools. Gotta get back before nightfall.
I lingered for quite a while, enjoying the wind and the light, and the all-encompassing boom of the surf. Eventually the sun dropped below the horizon and I reluctantly started back. Here’s a little video I took while creeping through the forest:
Tromp tromp tromp!
Trekkin' back to the beach house...
Anyone know what this is? It's very light, like bleached bone.
Eventually I wandered back to home base, and had a lovely dinner with Kerry. This little critter spied on us for a while, until I tossed it out the door:
This tiny little fellow flew into our room, so we shooed it out.
First time I’ve ever had a praying mantis wander into the house!
All in all, our stay in Matapouri was very restful, which was just what we needed after the previous day’s ordeal. We weren’t looking forward to the early-morning bike ride that would take us to the snorkeling activity, but we couldn’t find any good alternatives to it. In retrospect we could have hired an independent shuttle operator to pick us up, and probably our bikes too, if only we’d known the contact number for one in advance. Oh well… Knowledge gained for the next trip!
The slow grind of plate tectonics separated New Zealand from Gondwanaland about 85 million years ago. A dramatization of the event would go like this:
Gondwanaland:
“Dang, I feel like I have way too many hills. There’s got to be something I can do.”
Hill:
“Hey, I’ve got an idea! How about if you bundle a huge pile of us together, and shove us out to sea, and we can make our own island?”
Gondwanaland:
“Are you sure? Wouldn’t that be kind of suspicious, having an island made completely of hills?”
Hill:
“Tell you what – throw in one flat piece. And a few lakes. If anybody asks, you say it was an accident.”
Gondwanaland:
“I’ll do it!”
And so, the South Island was created.
Gondwanaland:
“That went really well, but I’ve still got a bunch of smaller hills to deal with.”
Smaller Hill:
“Hey no problem – just do it again! And since we’re smaller, you can pack even more of us closer together! We’ll enjoy it. We’ll have a hill party!”
Gondwanaland:
“Hahaha! You little guys are crazy. But if that’s what you want, I’m totally doing it.”
Smaller Hill:
“Closer! Cram us even closer together! Yeah!”
Gondwanaland:
“You got it! Have fun out there…”
Smaller Hills:
“Wheeeee!”
And so, the North Island was created.
Okay, so there’s a difference between historically accurate and dramatically accurate. But it’s still accurate. Kerry and I got direct verification of this New Zealand hill thing on day 3, when we attempted our first day of fully-loaded bike touring.
On paper it looked like a long, but manageable day, if we took our time and paced ourselves.
34 miles, which is just a little bit over my standard budget of 30 miles a day for touring. I figured it would be okay, since we had all day to ride, and the day after we would just be hanging out at the beach.
I WAS WRONG. I was so, so wrong!
WRRRROOOOOOOONNNNGGGGG.
Finishing touches to the bikes before setting out...
Kerry's good luck charm!
We started out in high spirits. We put the finishing touches on our bikes, including Kerry’s good-luck-charm leaf from Limestone Island.
Bike shipping boxes all wrapped up for sending to New Plymouth.
We left them in the hotel lobby and the shipping company picked them up for us the next day. Very handy!
Then we spent a while taping up the bicycle shipping boxes for delivery to New Plymouth. We left them in the hotel lobby, and the shipping company picked them up for us the day after we left. One of the perks of cycling in a “first world” region!
Ready to go! Head-mounted camera activated!! DORK ALERT
Ready to go! Head-mounted camera activated!! DORK ALERT veep veeep vreeeep
It looked dorky, and the footage it recorded was very shaky, but after running it through Adobe Premiere’s stabilization routines (which took a very long time) I got a nice video of the first few minutes of our ride in fast-forward, as we crossed Whangarei to Mainfreight Transport (shipping out a few more items) and then made our way north out of town, towards the dreaded Highway 1:
The first thing you’ll notice about this video (aside from riding on the left) is that the road appears to be nice and flat most of the time. That’s New Zealand lulling us into a false sense of security. Oh, you evil, deceptive country…
Our first snack stop of the trip!
Our first snack stop of the trip!
We were late getting on the road, so it was lunch time when we reached the edge of Whangarei. We’d already experienced the hassle of roundabouts, and had to push the bikes up one really steep hill that was being used as a traffic detour, making is especially noisy and hazardous. But we were still in good spirits.
We chatted on our helmet intercoms the entire time, exchanging directions and making jokes, or just making fart sounds. Those intercoms completely altered the experience of riding together – suddenly it was extremely easy for us to hear each other, all the time, no matter what the traffic noise or the wind was like, or how much we drifted around on the road. We could just chat like we were sitting together at a restaurant.
It got to the point where, when we got off the bicycles and shut down the intercoms, we would have to say “what?” all the time, because we were so used to being heard loud and clear just by muttering. When the batteries died – which would only happen after 7 or 8 solid hours of riding, or when we forgot to charge them the previous night – we felt the lack of communication acutely. We were riding together, but we weren’t really together.
Long story short, those things kick ass.
I'm not sure what "Mother & Lift" is, but it's for sale here.
Anyway, we had snacks! I’m not sure what “Mother & Lift” is, but it’s for sale here. We bought the first of many fistfuls of candy, and ate some “fush and chups” spread out on greasy paper, on a tiny table by the roadside. Salty and delicious! A few birds landed nearby, including one who kept scaring the others by doing that same “RAAaaaaaaahhhh!” thing we saw yesterday. We tossed food scraps to the other birds, just to piss that one off. Hah!
Then we rode … And hit Highway 1 … and rode, and rode, and rode. The hills got really big, and the traffic got really dense. Often the trucks couldn’t move aside because some other driver was sitting in the adjacent lane, so they roared by us at close range, as we sweated our way up yet another hill on a shoulder that was so narrow it barely existed at all. We took frequent breaks but it was hard to keep morale up, since it was obvious how much danger we were putting ourselves in.
In the early evening we finally turned away from Highway 1 and drifted into the town of Hikurangi, and planted ourselves in front of a convenience store, considering our options, and eating snacks to try and brew up some more energy. Here’s a movie of me “enjoying” chunks of licorice that looked like pavement:
Deliciouthh!
Hikurangi had a motel that looked alright, but if we spent the night there we would lose a day in our schedule, and lose our chance to hang around on the beach in Matapouri Bay. We’d booked a bunch of really cool stuff at the beginning of the trip, in a short span of days – kayaking, the beach, snorkeling, a waterfall, some caves – and it wasn’t flexible. That was a mistake.
An even bigger mistake was hauling so much gear around. We both overpacked, and that amplified the pain of climbing hills. If you can keep your momentum it doesn’t matter so much that your bike is heavy – but when you glide to a stop at the foot of every hill and then have to haul everything hundreds of feet up, then burn all that energy into your brake pads on the way down, it’s just punishing. The question “Why am I doing this to myself?” plays over and over in your head with every turn of the pedals.
Kerry very gamely agreed to push on towards Matapouri and our fancy reserved cottage, even though it was getting late and the route promised additional hills. I told her I was overwhelmed by the difficulty of the route so far, and if I’d known, I would have cut the day into thirds, and avoided Highway 1 at any cost.
“I know,” she said. “I can tell you really want me to like bicycle touring as much as you do. You wouldn’t have deliberately scheduled a first day like this, because this sucks. It’s a terrible first impression.”
She was right!
Of course, we pedaled out of Hikurangi and immediately hit this. Another crazy hill, followed by several more.
Exhausted with still many miles to go, but in good spirits!
This first day of biking was murderous. Way more hills than I expected, and the Highway 1 traffic was brutal.
Miraculously, we both kept our spirits up, even though we cursed the hills and the traffic regularly. I think it helped that we were high on endorphins and could eat all the sugary snacks we could handle.
Dark, spooky forest. Elves in there, no doubt.
We took another long break at around 8:00pm. The sun was below the horizon but still coloring the sky with pastel rays, and the air was still warm. From the road we took this picture of some very dense and spooky woods. Back home, trees don’t usually grow this close together. We imagined small children wandering in there with baskets of goodies and vanishing forever. WooooOOOoo!
An after-sunset shot. We were taking a break partway up the last of the nasty hills, debating what to do.
When we took the next break, half an hour later, it was almost fully dark. (The shot above was a long exposure.) We were both quite exhausted and very worried about making it to the cottage without simply weaving our bikes into the ditch along the way – or worse, over a cliff. It didn’t help that I had to stop for quite a while and lay down in the road to try and fix my rear fender, which was making a very unpleasant grinding noise.
On the plus side, the cars had tapered almost completely away. Most of the time we had the road to ourselves, and we rode in two glowing pools of light, feeling the wind move softly around us. No engine noise, just our own voices and the occasional bleat of a sheep, the whinny of a horse, or the moo or a cow, and a crash in the bushes as some mammal or bird dove aside. It was like going on a night-hike while camping, but more comfortable. At one point we shut off our headlights and looked up, and saw a night sky crammed so full of stars that it was hard to pick out any of the usual constellations.
And of course, we found roadkill. This is dead possum. They look a bit different than the possums we’re used to back in California. Less rodent-like and scruffy. For the health of New Zealand, a dead possum is actually a good thing. You can read about it here on the Department Of Conservation website.
Finally we reached the seashore, close to 10pm, after eight hours of very hard riding. It would take another hour to get past the remaining hills to Matapouri, but we celebrated here anyway. Whooo!
Finally we reached the seashore, close to 10:00pm. Since Whangarei, we’d been riding hard for almost eight hours. We lounged on a bench, breathing the salt air and resting, while the surf crawled endlessly into the cove below. There was still more ground to cover.
The road turned south, following the coast along several more long, rolling hills. We moved slowly and it took another hour to reach Matapouri and find our little beachside cottage. We barely had enough energy to haul the bikes inside and creep into the bed.
In retrospect, I can say without a doubt that this was the hardest day of the trip, by far. Even the brutal Tonragiro Crossing in -8 degree wind chill was much easier than this, because we weren’t each hauling a hundred pounds of gear up multiple mountains – just snacks and water. The next day, on the beach, I thought for a while and made a short list of the toughest days of bicycling I’ve ever done in my whole career as a bicycle tourist, and this day came in second.
(In case you’re wondering, the day that came in first place was this one in Missouri.)
We flew in to Whangarei (actually pronounced more like “Phongaray” due to some interesting linguistic shenanigans) because there are a lot of different outdoorsy things to do in only a short distance. The closest among these is kayaking, and for that we made a reservation with Mark (pronounced more like “Mahk” due some cool kiwi accent shenanigans) of Pacific Coast Kayaks.
We were both pretty tired, but game for an adventure. Plus it would be a nice break from tinkering with bicycle parts.
He picked us up right from the hotel with all the gear we needed, and it was only a few minutes to the beach. Along the way we chatted about ourselves. “You’re a musician of some kind, aren’t you?” he asked. “I like to think I am,” I said. “Great! I thought so,” he said. “There’s something we’ll see during the tour that I think you’ll like a lot.” Intriguing!
Colorful beaches!
First find of the day!
The beach itself was quite colorful, and littered with many shells that would have been snatched up by curious kids in an instant if they’d been spotted back home in the Bay Area.
While we got ready, a few birds checked us out. They lingered next to a dead crab that washed ashore near the kayaks, until one bird in particular landed and scared the rest of them away, by ducking its head down, fluffing its wings up, and charging straight across the ground at the other birds, screaming “RAAAAAAAAAAAHHH!”
I could easily imagine a flightless dinosaur doing the same thing, millions of years ago. Coincidence?
Eventually, we were all ready to go. Look at those goofy excited grins!
Our first ride on the kayaks went directly across the bay towards the east side of Limestone Island to check out the ruins of the old lime refinery. The sea was a bit choppy, and we were too nervous to get our cameras out, but we made it to the shore without incident and went strolling around.
There were some handy signs around to tell us about the restoration efforts, and the geography of the island. They also warned us about the animal traps:
As a human you’d have to work pretty hard to injure yourself in that, but stoats can just walk right in…
The ruins were gorgeous, even on this overcast day. It was interesting to see the different styles of architecture and engineering used during the two phases of the refinery’s history, in the 1850’s and the 1880’s. Everything made of wood is of course long gone, but with some imagination you could almost see how the structures came together. Mark pointed out a barracks, and a cement foundation that was all that remained of a dance hall.
In fact, Mark knew a great deal about the island, from the Māori occupation all the way up to the present-day ecological efforts, and he told it to us while we hiked around taking pictures. In the above photo he’s explaining how that mound of dirt was deliberately shoved in front of the furnace opening to try and keep tourists from wandering inside and getting hit by loose masonry. Not a complete success, given how the plastic fence is bent out of shape. Hah!
One of the main attractions was the giant multi-chamber processing tank, built right next to a hillside with unrefined chunks of limestone practically spilling out of it. We looked at those for a while and then wandered inside, where we discovered the surprise that Mark told me about: Inside the high walls of the tank, you can play the exposed rebar like a xylophone!
So, of course, we jammed for a while.
The next attraction was even more amazing, I think. We left Limestone Island and set out on a hard route into the wind, east and then south, and eventually reached the entrance to a mangrove forest. The tide was rushing inward, and from there we mostly set our oars aside, and rode on the current all the way through the forest, from east to west. I took out my phone and made a time-lapse recording of part of the journey.
It was amazing. And as we went deeper into the forest, the weird mixing of ocean and sky intensified, until it was like drifting around inside an optical illusion.
You know that scene in Spirited Away where the main character travels across a water-drowned landscape while piano music plays? This was that, in real life.
You know that scene in Spirited Away where the main character travels across a water-drowned landscape while piano music plays? This was that, in real life.
I would have taken the kayak deeper, but the scrape and crunch of branches turned me away.
Eventually we emerged into an area about the size of a football field where the water was about 10 inches deep, clear, and dotted with tiny emerging mangrove shrubs. It was there I encountered my first piece of rare New Zealand litter (and compared to the Bay Area, it really is rare) – a large glass bottle, about the size of a wine bottle, filled with sand and plant debris. I reached down and pried it out, rinsed it a few times, and stowed it inside the kayak for recycling.
Just keeping things tidy for the next guy…
Our next stop was back on Limestone Island, for lunch. Mark made us some very tasty sandwiches. We also met the resident groundskeeper, and I spotted one of the ten zillion cicadas hiding in the foliage.
What the sheep won't eat, the tractor shaves down!
From there we went on, circling the rest of the island.
We checked out some cool rock formations …
We made it to Limestone island!
The island beach was a massive heap of colorful mussel shells.
… and landed at another beach so we could check out the remains of the foreman’s residence.
When all the walls were plastered and the windows were intact, it must have been quite lovely. Now instead it looks mysterious and gloomy. It makes me imagine that there’s some unsolved murder haunting the place, or a buried treasure somewhere on the island with half-destroyed clues still visible on the crumbling mantelpieces or sneakily encoded in the geometry of the rooms!
The inspiration for the halls or Erebor, no doubt.
The basement was especially spooky. And, the inspiration for the halls or Erebor, no doubt.
This car is a "Carry 4WD". Here's Kerry next to it!
Kerry also found a “Carry” car. Cute!
Kayaking victory!
After that, we headed for the mainland, and the spot where we launched. Then we spent the rest of the day lounging around in the pool, napping, and eating more food, trying to shake off the rest of the jet lag and prepare for our first bicycle ride.
Look at the size of those containers. That’s two recumbent bicycles and all associated gear – a little over 200 pounds total. The airline hauled all that, plus the two of us with our backpacks, over 6500 miles across the Pacific Ocean in less than a day. The modern world is amazing.
Still, there were a few snags. The shuttle that arrived to take us to the airport could not fit the longest box, because a plastic divider was installed in the back, separating the seats from the luggage area. We’d called ahead multiple times and given the dispatcher the exact measurements, but the dispatcher apparently ignored all that and sent the standard van anyway. There wasn’t enough time to call another van, so I ran inside my house and fetched an electric screwdriver, and removed the plastic divider myself, handing the loose parts to the driver as I went. The driver didn’t mind; he was just happy that we had a solution to the problem. Extra points to him! Zero points to the dispatcher. Boo! Hiss!
Once we actually got the boxes to the Air New Zealand check-in counter, the attendants there could not believe we were allowed to bring such huge items as luggage. It wasn’t that they had any specific policy in mind that disallowed it, it’s just that the sight of those boxes made them want to say no. In fact, they assumed it was against the rules, until I called up NZ Air’s own baggage policy website on my phone and showed it to them, and read the relevant parts out loud.
The policy is this: A recumbent bike is an oversize sporting item. If it’s disassembled and packed into a container within 1.8 meters on the longest side and under 70 pounds, it is permissible. A bike divided into multiple boxes to fit within the per-container size and weight restrictions is still counted as a single item of luggage.
So, according to their rules, this is two items of luggage, each one oversize and overweight. We had no other checked items, so all we needed to pay was the oversize and overweight fee for each bicycle.
If you’re patient enough and make your case with confidence, and don’t mind waiting around for the inevitable discussion with the managers, and perhaps the managers’ managers, you’ll make it through at that price. If you’re paranoid, you can do what I did, and overpay the luggage fees in advance, but be warned: Even though the website says the ‘oversize’ and ‘overweight’ fees are interchangeable with the ‘extra bag’ fee, the person at the counter might claim otherwise, and ask you to pay them all over again, minutes before your flight, without letting you apply the extra value of one to the other. Then, your flight will leave too soon for you to get a refund for the ‘extra bag’ units you purchased, screwing you out of many hundreds of dollars.
I say, if it looks like that’s about to happen, pitch a genuine fit. That’s just plain wrong!!
Anyhoo, we got our gear checked, and spent the next 15 hours in a series of highly uncomfortable chairs, barely getting any sleep. You know the drill. Long-haul international flights!
Here’s the view passing over Auckland. Pretend the window glare is a hallucination due to lack of sleep!
This is us in SFO, then us in Auckland a zillion hours later. As uncouth Americans, we made sure that our first meal in New Zealand was a terrible one. We’re both utter zombies at this point. I’m running on about half an hour of sleep.
To catch our connecting flight we had to walk about half a mile outdoors between terminals. Not a fun thing to do while hugely sleep-deprived. I was muttering the whole time: “Honestly, New Zealand, what brought about this failure of urban planning? Is this some sort of hazing ritual for foreigners? HUrrrr. BRAAAAAAIIIIIINS.”
Anyway, we caught our connection – a charming little prop plane that flew nice and low, giving us an enticing view of the terrain we would soon explore – and then we had one more oversize luggage wrestling match, this time with the shuttle from the airport to our hotel. The only strategy that worked was to commandeer an empty shuttle and stuff the box down the passenger aisle, blocking the whole thing, then shove the smaller boxes into the luggage area, filling it up.
Luckily it was a slow day, and we only had two other people riding the shuttle. They were very gallant about the situation – even hopping out help us unload! We left a nice tip.
We checked in and I pulled the ripcord on my luggage. KABOOM! The view out the windows was lush and inviting. It rained three separate times while we cleaned up and organized ourselves; a warm tropical rain with sunbeams visible on the bay.
We napped for about half an hour, then spent almost all of the rest of the day doing this, in a sleepy haze. The time-lapse video stops after the first 75 minutes or so because the phone battery died, but we kept going for another five hours.
So you’ve arrived somewhere, and you’ve unpacked your bicycle(s) from the Crateworks box(es), and now you want to send the boxes to your destination? Sounds great. But what if you’ve forgotten how they fold up?
It seems straightforward enough. A Crateworks box only has four plastic pieces and three cardboard pieces – the tandem box slightly more – plus some straps and padding. But if you’re paranoid about fitting things together the “intended” way for shipping (as I am), some photo documentation is helpful.
This is what it looks like to unpack a shipped Crateworks box. To re-pack one, just follow the photos in reverse.
It arrives like this, in a cardboard box 54 x 32 x 6 inches. Interestingly, the box for the tandem/recumbent version is exactly the same size as the single version.
And here’s what it looks like to unpack:
And, just to round things out, here’s what a bunch of Crateworks boxes look like on an airport terminal scale:
And here’s what those same three boxes look like, folded up for shipping and taped thoroughly shut:
Bike shipping boxes all wrapped up for sending to New Plymouth.
We left them in the hotel lobby and the shipping company picked them up for us the next day. Very handy!
It’s possible to ship the Crateworks boxes without using an enclosing box, if you use enough tape – (we did this very thing in New Zealand) – but the above photos show a serious problem with this. The top and bottom ends of the compressed box are open. Unless you cover them thoroughly, with tape or some other material, all the panels inside will slide easily out.
I really think Crateworks should include an extra rectangle of foldable plastic on the long sides of the bottom piece, so we could fold it to cover the ends of the compressed version, holding all the other parts inside. Then we wouldn’t need to go through an entire roll of packing tape just to seal the ends.
