Normal

Riding a bus from Christchurch to Nelson, driver is a white-haired gent who raises the first two fingers of his right, sometimes left, hand to any large moving vehicle every time we pass. Ships in the early morning hours. Friendly gestures on the road. Is this how these people keep themselves connected while they roam the land in their graceless highway elephants?

I've had two days by myself due to being infected in the chest (and what a frustrating double back to Christchurch, knowing what I was missing out on ahead - the Lewis Pass) and the solitude has jarred some unexplored parts of my brain into thought. On this most extraordinary of trips, and during what is an extraordinary time in my life in a broader sense, I have found myself rethinking and challenging the notion of my “ordinary” - the normal circadian pattern of everyday existence, the rituals I keep and why I keep them.

Routine has not been a hallmark of my past two years. I have slipped and slopped and tripped from day to day, resisting any consistent form of structure outside of that required by the working week. At times this was delightful and I was giddy, and at others I was unstable and very sad.

Now, I am in a different place than I have ever been before. On a daily basis I am stretched and tired and resigned and euphoric. Virg and I have talked about how your emotional radar goes into overdrive in these circumstances. You've never been so sore; your food has never tasted so simply good before.

As part of this, I have noticed my conceptions of “normal” fall away. I'm now thirsty for unfiltered tap water. We eat pasta for breakfast. It's commonplace to nap in my sleeping bag on the side of the road in broad daylight. We dine on the grass and cook in a tiny skillet on a gas canister. I care less and less about the clock and more about the intensity of the sun on my skin. We shower at dirty campsites and have perfected the one-handed Macarena on our bikes. I ride with a thumb-sized hole in the thigh of my bike shorts, a reminder of the time at Taeri when Lee scorched my pants as I tried to dry them on the warm top of an oven. A month ago, this hole would have bothered me for reasons I would have been uncomfortable sharing with you. Now, it's just part of the landscape, an extra patch of skin I need to remember to put sunscreen on.

From all of this I have learnt that normality is so adaptive, so fluid, that we mustn't be scared when our old normal sheds its skin. It is normal for me to want to blog this experience perfectly, with cutely-worded recaps and distances covered and gorgeous pictures. And I'll get to that. But for now, I'm falling in line with this new pace and pattern and taking my time, with the pressure off. I want this blog to be an expression of how it really was for us, not doctored up and delivered on a regular posting schedule.

This post has been more self-directed than anything, but I still wanted to share this part of the journey. Future posts will probably jump around a bit more, and that's all good. We've got a lot we want to tell you all about, and you'll have to forgive me if it isn't told in order. I am learning to embrace the chaos!

Leg 1: Dunedin to Invercargill

If you could humour me and put from your mind these past two weeks where I have been AWOL (classic overestimation of physical and mental fortitude at the end of the day when I commonly think "oh, I should blog" and then pass out, a mess of quivering muscles and trail mix, in my sleeping bag), I'd like to tell you where we have been and where we are now. I'll give you the first two legs (Dunedin to Invercargill and then Invercargill to Queenstown) today, in separate posts, and will return tomorrow for the Queenstown to Christchurch stretch (by far the most fraught and exciting, so don't go anywhere).

Lee also has some posts of his own to guest-blog, including a poignant piece comparing the Dipton pie to the Lumsden pie (you'll really marvel at his nuanced rating system). And finally, I must tell you about what is quickly becoming the most-anticipated event on the bike trip: the Waihi burger showdown, where Lee will pit his bottomless stomach against Virg's slow-burning yet powerful metabolism as they race to be the first through 1.5kg of burger! There's talk of live-blogging the showdown ...

Dunedin to Invercargill via the Catlins
Leg 1: 240km

When I last blogged, we were all fresh and green at the end of day 1. I think our average mileage was around 30km per day in those yonder times, whereas 70 is now more or less where we end up. I believe I dropped you off in Milton, so let's begin there.

We went from Milton to Balclutha (In Balclutha, tattered and rough Maori bikers introduce us to their kaumatua and I eat my first deep-fried Mars Bar; we have our inaugural argument as a trio and cool off by watching the local sheep shearing competition and admiring Southern boys) to Owaka (we stop for lunch at a cafe/bar here and thus begin the lunchtime beer tradition; Virg is fascinated by a house dedicated to tea cups) to Papatowai to Tokanui (quickly and earnestly dubbed our favourite tiny town thus far; we camp out the back of the dairy cum supermarket - it's the only one around - and EUREKA! there is an open tavern and coulditbetrue? they're showing the cricket; Virg is subjected to a rigorous introduction to the gentleman's game; we return to our tents with whiskey and fall asleep happy) to Fortrose (we meet a German man on a campervan trip with his wife; he tells to look for life's signs, because he just saw the hessian bags he worked with in Papua New Guinea in his youth used as retro cushions in the cafe we've stopped at) to Invercargill. Up until recently, the ride into Invercargill had been our hardest. The rain pissed, the headwind blew, and the road signs kept lying to us. We rolled in to Invercargill, three drowned rats, and spent as many days waiting out the rain and recuperating. Our next "big" destination: Queenstown, place of tourists and thrill-seekers.

Virg and Lee muse over our route at Brighton beach

Tree dwelling.

Virg-o.

 

Days 1 and 2

Oh hey there neglected blog of mine, I'm late to the party, but better late than never, and I think it's time I paid you some serious attention. We've now been on the road for six days and I'm going to take you through them, in the present tense.

We strike out proper on day one from Dunedin and we push through to Taieri, a good 30km away. The first big hill, innocuously perched in the middle of an otherwise tranquil southern Dunedin suburb gets me nervous: we're pushing, already? All I can taste is hot breath and all I can smell are my thighs burning. 

Brighton is the next town on the Scenic Route, and it's all beach. Lee and I draw in the sand with sticks. Coming through downtown Brighton (I never saw an uptown) we are ferociously greeted by a bedraggled dog dragging its leash. Its owner, an old man with wild hair, wilder eyes, and his left arm in a dirty cast, limps over to us, trailing another pup with heavy paws behind him. He tells us not to worry, that our barking attacker is named Hairy, of course after Hairy Maclary although, I think to myself, you wouldn't find those fleas on a dog from Donaldson's dairy.

When we limp into Taieri we camp at a site where the owner charges us 50c under the quoted price and I'm touched by the small gesture. We pitch a tent underneath a sturdy tree and eat packet meals, densely loaded with many calories but not much taste. We leave Taieri reminded of what a small world it is: two of our fellow campers were lawyers, him a retired partner at Bell Gully, her a lawyer at the PCO. She gives us her business card and a place to stay if we're ever in Wellington (which, funnily enough, we probably will be in 2013).

Day two: the goal is Milton and to get there we must conquer what later becomes the benchmark for further climbs - the hills at Waihola. We puff and push and blaspheme our way to the top and when we come whizzing down the other end I feel so high on endorphins I swear I could achieve world peace. Unfortunately we are met at Waihola not with trumpets and fanfare, but rather with the sour face of the odd woman at the general store (Lee, ever inquisitive, asks her where she's from: she shrugs snidely, oh I don't know, everywhere - I call her a bitch in my head and maybe out loud, too, and decide that she's being so evasive because she's on the run from the law - ask me why she matters at all and I couldn't tell you, other than that she's the first person down south to meet us with anything but a smile). We eat lunch by the lake and Lee has the worst milkshake of his life (all froth, no ice cream, and quite possibly a gob of sour-faced spit).

Our afternoon riding is utter bliss: a flat highway and a tail wind, I am flying and I see why people do this over and over again - it's for this purposeful motion and the physical declaration that is each pump of your legs and each rhythmic inhale/exhale. I know that the scenery is gorgeous and the sun is out, but I'm fixated on the road being pulled under my wheels and the way I can feel myself starting to be at home on this bright green bike of mine (I named her Envy early on). 

We pull into Milton, where I pay $2.70 for six free range eggs and five small sausages from the butchery. Lee picks up three eye fillet steaks for $5. His South Island meat obsession begins here and is yet to show any signs of waning. The ground is dry and the showers are hot and we sleep under the stars because we've had cold beer and stayed up late talking and, even at 2 metres, our tent is too far away.

That takes us through to the end of day two, and that's enough for now. Next post I'll let you know about days three to six: highlights include a lunch spent with some Maori bikers who, and I love this, called our trip a hikoi, Lee seeing spiders everywhere and screaming accordingly, and cooling off in the ocean at Kaka Point. 

Thanks for reading, chaps. Some photos of what we've been up to, to finish.

South to north

Life has thrown us so many curveballs since my last post that I don't quite know where to begin telling you all this particular chapter of my story. I could describe how our plans to spend the year in Japan were lopped off at the head after, having been given the first interview, we were told it was impossible to post us in April. Or I could tell you about a shonky agent named Edwin who promised us a car from Auckland and then pulled a fast one on us, leaving us standing in the bleak rain of a South Mangere car yard. I could tell you about the mad scramble to drive up to Auckland and get three bikes boxed and on a plane in the space of a morning. I could and I will tell you about the people, already on this journey, the people, who have shown us dazzling and totally unexpected kindness, like the man from NZ Fastway who gave us a couch to sit on, offered us tea, and booked us on flights from Auckland to Dunedin. When we returned his car the next day, scrambling mad, he whizzed us to the airport and saved our arses and our sanity in the process.

So, these are all my stories to tell, and tell them I will! Right now, however, it's time to go and watch the sun rise fully and do yoga on the beach and smear Nutella on bread toasted in a tiny skillet. We are on the road, finally.

Preparations: getting places and remembering we went there

Takapuna Beach, November 2012

Getting places
Our course is fairly well planned (more in a later post).  During the trip there are several key dates like getting admitted to the bar, job interviews, and a wedding that require our non-negotiable attendance (and given the Black Caps'recent series win over South Africa watching them play England in Napier has been hastily added to the bike trip agenda).  Accordingly we've had to be a little bit more rigid with dates than initially planned. Virg, who I cannot wait to meet because inter alia she endorsed my idea of glowsticks and sparklers at night on the trip, has been very cool with and accommodating about all these things.

There are going to be small stretches where we might bus either to avoid shitty traffic (Auckland) or loooooong stretches through hilly country (Te Ureweras, and not just because we want to avoid the terrorists ...). We're trying to keep bus trips to the very minimum, but (remembering that none of us are seasoned tourers), there are going to be places where it's inevitable due to timing or safety. Hopefully no bus ride will be longer than two hours and hopefully there will be no more than two or three bus rides.

In terms of navigation, a good old paper map of New Zealand will be the primary tool. I'm looking forward to marking off our location each night and seeing where in this country we've ended up that day. I have the googlemaps app on my phone to check our precise location and for any emergencies, but I would prefer to save the battery for picture-taking (more on that below). 

Remembering we went there

I've kept a journal in one form or another since I was a tween. Last summer I was lucky enough to travel with a dream team of friends through Southeast Asia, and while my journal keeping was more sporadic than it could have been, these words on their tattered pages are incredibly evocative for me:

Koh Samui is a glorious cesspit, frothing at the mouth with freedom, luring out the hedonist in you with a wink and the promise of obscene fun. Eat what you want, drink where you want, f*ck who you want - it doesn't matter amid all the pulsing. The city is labyrinthine. Streets are narrow, commerce crammed into every space. A young woman cooking road food sits on the dirty steps of a MacDonald's. A prostitute (wiggly hips, tiny shorts, gender indeterminate) saunters into a 7/11, joins a queue of three men. They're all out of this world high with eyes as large as saucers and one of them carries a full glass of what I think is whiskey in his right hand.

I'm aiming to say something, a paragraph or two or three, about every town we spend some time in on the bike trip, and my disordered scribblings will hopefully provide some fodder more interesting than "we're in Waihi, we had a flat tire on the way, we saw some mines, we left" for the blog. When Lee biked from Quebec through to San Francisco, he used a little yellow Rite in the Rain journal that is completely weatherproof (pages and all, provided you write in pencil), and he got me one for Christmas because he is awesome like that.

Although I can't claim any skill or knowledge other than pointing an iPhone at things, photographing the adventure is important to me. There's a balance to be struck between being present in the moment and wanting to capture the moment, and I'd like to strike it here. My iPhone is going to be riding up front with me (on a weatherproof bike mount I can't find the link to but which allows you to use the touch screen through the casing) and it will be the only "real" camera I take. I'm also going to grab a couple of weatherproof disposable cameras because there's something about processing actual physical photos that reminds me, I'm a child of the '90s. Photos taken on my iPhone are edited with a very well-designed app called Afterglow (yeah, Instagram is too trendy now and the filters are too much), and then uploaded to Photobucket using an app called Snapbucket. Once they're on Photobucket I can resize them for the blog and voila! They will end up here.

I've discovered that it's quite easy to charge on the road if you use either a solar-powered charger (there are such things!) or an independent battery pack. A common complaint with the solar chargers seems to be that they don't have the guts to charge an iPhone battery to full, and to be honest I've left it a little late to Ebay it. I'm just going to cross my fingers and go with what I can find on trademe, unless anyone who happens to be reading this can point me to a good make/model?

OH HEY, it's just over a week until this thing kicks off! You can expect a more frequent posting schedule this week!

Preparations: keeping clean

Christmas is over, we've somehow chomped through most of January, and suddenly ... it's just around the corner, this bike trip of ours, and I'm yet to write anything substantive about our preparations. Preparing is something I savour and Lee doesn't. This has meant that I've been left to my own happy devices in terms of finding nifty gadgets, multi-use products, and tested strategies for doing everything from laundry to solar-charging your iPhone while on the road. First up: keeping clean.

Camping and tramping websites have been (not-so-refreshingly) honest about one thing: adventures of this sort are not pretty and you're probably going to pong a little bit along the way. The potential for this on a two month bike trip is ... palpable. But with these six things I think we'll be sorted - we'll be able to clean and dry our clothes, our bikes, our dishes, and ourselves (both when we're lucky enough to come across a stream when we need one and on those odoriferous occasions when we don't).




Some things to bear in mind ...

Ability to launder clothes = fewer clothes = lighter bike. One of the concerns I had with a portable washing system was the weight. However, this isn't logical - if you can't get properly clean on the road you'll want to take more clothes which will naturally mean more weight. The people at Scrubba had exactly this in mind when they filled a gap in the market and, by the looks of their reviews, filled it well. And a nice touch: shipping is included in the purchase price. While I normally wouldn't fork out for this for a one-off occasion, Lee and I are hoping to spend the year in Japan and this will give us flexibility as we'll be in hostels until we find an apartment post-arrival.

One soap to rule them all. I'd heard that there were some wonderful natural products out there that would do everything from clean my hair to clean my bike and wash away without pillaging the environment in the process (as we're freedom camping and facilities will be few and far between, this is a concern for us). Plus, multi-use products means less gear to carry. Dr Bonner is a cult brand. Their peppermint soap made the label famous, but as we're using this for everything (shampoo, body wash, laundry detergent, bike wash, dish detergent) and the peppermint scent can be quite strong to some, I went with citrus.

This shouldn't cost an arm and a leg. If push came to shove and the cost of an on-the-road laundromat was going to be ridiculous, I was more than happy to take my chances and wait until the next stream. I had a look at some elasticated clothes lines and then I realised that we could just use a bungee cord (and we'll have lots of those handy). Some improvisation will keep the price down.

Keep it simple. Three quick-drying microfibre towels and a gauze sponge that you can use to shower and to clean with should do the trick.

Next up in the preparation series: getting places and remembering we went there