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.