Leaving the immaculate Akaroa in beautiful weather with a huge journey ahead of us was tough! I would have been very happy holed up there for another week or two! We took to the streets nice and early with a very long to Dunedin to make. This is the longest leg and something we were not looking forward to at all. The weather forecast for today was awful, with thunderstorms even possible, so we were wrapped up with pretty much every peace of clothing we could take.
The winding road out of Akaroa really is a treat, but for some reason the bike was starting to handle strangely. I really had to muscle the bike into the corners to get round them and approach each corner with quite a bit of caution. This really made the going tough in the early section, but the rain was holding off which was a blessing. Once back onto the main road from Christchurch to Dunedin, the road is pretty great for churning out kilometer after kilometer, at times it is gun barrel straight as far as the eye can see. Needless to say the handling problems were not apparent for the rest of the day, and something I just put down to us having a bad riding day.
We really did eat up the miles, with minimum stops and very light traffic; we managed to cut the ride time down to about 4.5 hours. This was without excessive speeding either, I’m not sure if the roads have changed a bit since the GPS unit had it’s last map update, but we were absolutely stoked to not have to spend the 6 hours it estimated on our backsides.
The rain did hit us hard in the last hour or two of the trip though, but the thunderstorms thankfully never came to the party! The BMW gear we bought really is the business, it has kept us bone dry all the way so far. The only point of failure has been my feet, as I didn’t find a pair of waterproof boots before we left. My boots are pretty good, and I’ve only gotten slightly damp so far, but I will definitely get this sorted before our next roadtrip.
We stayed in a great sized room at the Top 10. The place was as expected but the people on the counter need to work on some people skills. I don’t know if it’s because they breed em tough down here, but surely a pool towel for a place that advertises a heated pool isn’t too much to ask! It’s a shame for Top 10, but I think these guys have let the team down.
We were in such a rush to make it to Dunedin we didn’t take any photos, but the architecture here is amazing. The buildings we saw as we navigated through the city were stunning. Even the high school is amazing. I can see why getting an education here is a fantastic option. One thing I did notice from a motorcyclist’s perspective is that whoever designed the roads here has a unique perspective on how to do things. It seems nothing here is straight or level, there are hills everywhere, but the roads are also skewed. So everything is on a crazy camber. Getting around is pretty confusing as well. It was good times.
After a great day on the road, we celebrated with a couple of beers and then some wine at tea, and an early night. Next up, Bluff!
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