Well day one has been a blast. I was awake this morning from about 4am with my mind racing through everything I needed to take again and again. Sleep was something elusive so it was a welcome sight to see the dawn break. I decided not to check the forecast today because it didn’t matter; we were leaving no matter what, so what a great surprise to have pretty perfect riding conditions all day.
We headed south down old faithful, SH1, and turned off towards Tauranga after the Bombays. It was a fantastic ride through countryside I have only ever seen through the car window in the past, noticing so much more.
We passed through several small towns where you wonder what every that lives there does. Towns like Maramarua, Turua and others of the same ilk. We put our feet up at a rest stop about 1 hour out of Auckland and met a nice deaf man, who has embraced modern technology and used his mobile phone to communicate with us. Myra has had trouble with her ear plugs since we bought them for her and needed to reassess the situation inside her helmet, so once that was done it was back on the road.
Next stop was Paeroa, for the obligatory L&P bottle shot, with a twist. The coast was clear so we couldn’t resist a park up for a candid picture. From there we shot through to Papamoa with only one small town dairy visit for a thirst quencher. I think Tauranga must have had a whole lot of road works recently because there were numerous times when Karen, our Aussie tour guide that lives in the GPS, became completely disorientated. It was a fun exercise trying to navigate through non existent roundabouts and turns that were not there!
Eventually we made it to Papamoa unscathed, only to realise we could not remember the place we were staying, so it was to the car park of the local dairy to unpack the rear pannier so we could find the details. Once we did sort it out, we saw we were only 450m away.
It was excellent to get out of our riding gear and into some shorts. The place we are staying is the Papamoa Village Holiday Park, and it looks like a small town preparing for war. The influx of youth and alcohol to these types of establishments really is something they are battening down the hatches for. One of the locals we met in particular was in no mood for out of towners, and did not mind letting that be known! The people that reside here through the year must dread New Years.
We visited an awesome little authentic Italian restaurant in Tauranga for tea called Bel Mia Pizza. Giuseppe cooks a mean pizza, and the family establishment is an awesome place to dine, even if they did seem a bit rushed of their feet tonight.
So that was day one, a good start, I’m looking forward to the long haul to Te Puia Springs tomorrow. The roads look nice and I’ve never been in that part of New Zealand, so it should be a great day.
