I can’t remember if I mentioned that on the next to the last day of our bike trip both John and I had blow-outs of our rear tires… luckily neither of us fell, but we only had one spare tire! Guess who got it. So, for the second time on the trip we had to call Bike Friday in Oregon and arrange for another Fed X package delivery (which is not easy when the package has to cross the international dateline, go through customs and reach you when you usually are spending only a day or two in a place! Luckily, this time our plans called for a week in Wellington, so it all worked out.
Anyway, back to the bike trip. The van carried a spare bike, but John decided that spending the morning in the van, reading the newspaper, talking with Alex, taking pictures and watching us all struggle with the very high humidity and heat as we rode some medium hills was more his style. To his credit, he did ride the mostly downhill afternoon part to Rotorua.
Rotorua was just a delightful small town with hot springs and quite a number of interesting Maori buildings to visit. We were ready for a rest, although I did explore by bike, John rejoiced in the fact that his was broken and spent time on the computer and walking in town.
So, back to Wellington…Thursday was another perfect day in Wellington. We went into the city with Elizabeth and I spent most of the day just riding around the city and getting familiar with the layout. I made a much-needed appointment to get my hair done on Friday. That night we took Elizabeth and Michael to one of their favorite restaurants. I had a goat dish, made with tomatoes and slow cooked. It was terrific! As always, their desserts were just too good. It’s a good thing we’re riding or none of our clothes would be fitting at this point.
Elizabeth is head of a national department that is very involved in using ePortfolios to offer certification to those working in fields like tourism. Since John was here, she gathered about 20 of her colleagues from a variety of agencies—from K-12 through university and others to have a discussion. It was a good session and although I was the only one in biking shorts, I still participated and was only looked briefly as being sort of weird.
That night my cousin Peter picked us up and we went to their city house for dinner. Peter and Carol’s daughter has just moved back home and brings with her 3½ year-old daughter, Elinor. As you can imagine, I was in seventh heaven—she is a blonde, vivacious doll!
Dinner was lovely and we planned our weekend outing to their summerhouse in Greytown. It is about 1½ hour from Wellington.
Friday both John and I got our hair done and we received the four tubes and tires for the bikes, so we John’s bike fixed. We had lunch with Peter in the city and then went and did our share of the shopping. We found the specialty cheese shop and the liquor store. We both had backpacks, but we had to carry the extra tires separately, do we were loaded down. However, it was a lovely day, with only a bit of wind and we decided rather than put our bikes on the bus we’d ride back to Elizabeth’s house… hmm, a bit of wind, when you get out of town and riding next to the ocean turns into what feels like a gale—besides it was significantly further that it seemed in the car. Needless to say we were whipped by the time we made it up the last hill. But a good shower and a glass of wine were greatly restorative and by the time Peter and Carol picked us up, we were ready.
The drive over is through lush mountains and really delightful. Their house is great, with lots of antique fireplaces and a large garden that is yielding wonderful fresh tomatoes, beans and corn. Their fantastic plum tree is ripe with fruit and Carol’s jam is wonderful.
Saturday was again a lovely day and we went to the equivalent of a country fair—the A&P Show (agriculture and produce). Peter and John drooled over the tractors—even though he has less than an acre of land—it’s just a boys’ thing!
I must admit I was taken by the knitting and the cake entries. We also watched some good horse jumping. As usual, all the carnival-type food was crap, but we ate it anyway.
Today is Sunday and is again lovely, although it rained last night. We have been so lucky with the weather thus far…
I’m not sure what our plans are for the day, but breakfast calls, so more later.
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