Day 10

Today started early. At first I thought someone’s spot tracker was misbehaving (they flash sporadically) but then I realised it was lightning. From my vantage point inside our three-sided (and very spacious) shelter I could see the flashes on the horizon coming closer.

It was about 4am but I wasn’t sleeping well anyway, sore legs and probably dehydration. Soon it started to rain, then pour, then the thunder started. The decision not to camp had been an excellent one! When the alarm went, we packed up and had breakfast in our nice dry space, and we could also bring the bikes inside to load them.

We’d meant to leave at 630 but it was still pitch, so we waited till 7. It was still pretty dark so we walked the bikes for the first 30 mins, when some others who’d set off early from blue duck lodge caught us.

Then we started to ride. I was relieved to find it was much easier than last night, with more friendly mud despite the rain, which continued to pour. My granny gear sounded like a concrete mixer but I persevered and we wound our way up to the summit.

It felt pretty surreal riding in these hideous conditions – but though wet, we were lucky that it remained relatively warm. We started the descent, which was long, muddy, watery and at times sketchy. I was running very low pressure in my rear tyre and I felt very thankful for its relatively aggressive tread.

Generally I followed Josh, who rides his bike like it’s an extension of his body, following his lines apart from when they didn’t work! Some puddles were so deep you lost all momentum and risked coming off. Some of the stream crossings were growing serious and we worked together to get the bikes across.

We had booked the 11am boat – thanks to Ian we knew it had taken him about 4 hours on his cross bike, so we were hopeful our more mtb-like mounts could manage the same time even in these conditions. We didn’t feel rushed but we only had very short snack breaks.

It was a very focused four hours. The rain was continual and towards the ends there were some serious slips, one newly grown where Wayne, who had passed us, had nearly taken a serious tumble down. As we approached he was just clambering up with his bags, and warned us to be very careful.

Eventually we made it to the bridge to nowhere, and we knew the pick up point was only 15 mins away. We rolled into the shelter at 1102, and Ash, who we hadn’t seen since the climb, was two mins behind us!

The boat soon cane and our assembled group of seven helped load the bikes. The river was massive, brown and full of debris. And unfortunately something quickly snagged in the intake and wouldn’t clear. We had to beach the boat and take all the bikes off so the driver could get at the engine… eventually we got to Pipiriki, about two hours after we got in the boat, and I was pretty chilled.

We cleaned our bikes and I had a quick shower, both free thanks to the support the company’s giving to TA riders. They cooked us a burger and we considered what to do next. By now it was nearly three but the weather had improved. Josh and I decided to head on but agreed Whanganui was too far, we wouldn’t have got there till 8 or 9 and it had been a long day already!

We pulled into a very basic DOC campsite at 6, finding two tent sites down the bank in the trees. This proved smart as a massive wind soon came up. We were grateful for our excessive food purchasing in Taumarunui and shared cheese, tuna and a BCC for dinner, plus chocolate.

An extremely talkative Canadian cycle tourist showed up and we walked for a bit. He tried to entice us into further chat by offering red wine, but we told him we were over-serious cyclists with an early start planned. We were both feeling pretty wiped out by the day’s adventures and it was great to get to bed a bit early for once on this trip!