When we started in Dunedin, we still had some reasonable weather. Our route took us along the coast where we visited the beautiful Tunnel Beach and saw some beautiful coastline. We left the bigger street which got us onto a small and very hilly gravel road through a very nice but also exhausting countryside. It felt like the hills would never end but when we finally rolled out of the hills, it was already evening and we were looking for a place to sleep. The first farm we came by looked very nice so we asked whether we could put up our tent somewhere on their ground. The owners Duncan and Kate agreed but even offered us to sleep in their wool shed which we gladly accepted. We took a quick shower from our water bag before eating our leftover pasta bake and got to bed early.
After 10h of sleep we got back on our bike quickly as there was no tent to pack up. Our biking lead us through some nice scenery, we met a cute dog who befriended us instantly (we think it was for our lunch) and in the afternoon we arrived in the city of Balclutha. There we got some new groceries before getting back on the road. The head wind picked up and made the last kilometres very hard but we arrived at our destination of Kaka Point eventually. We checked in at the campsite where we planned to stay for two nights as the weather forecast predicted a full day of rain for the next day. At night the rain started so we spent the whole next day inside the campsite kitchen. During the day we tried to repair my ultra wide-angle lens which has fallen apart the day before (some of the screws have fallen/broken out which lead to the lens falling apart). Unfortunately on of the cables ripped during that process, making my most important lens useless. This makes me pretty sad and it is really hard to come by a replacement as Samsung has shut down its camera business and we will probably have to buy a used one in Germany and somehow ship it to New Zealand.
The day after that had some more decent weather and before getting back on our route, we hitchhiked to Nugget Point which is a nice viewpoint on a rock. With wind gusts up to 120km/h we did not want to cycle there as it was a very exposed place on the coast. We were picked up by a nice German woman who toured New Zealand and on our way back two Austrian girls gave a lift back to our bikes. After that we packed up and got on the road after a quick lunch. The whole day was cycling through some beautiful forest in the Catlins Forest area (see articel image) and we even came by the awesome Matai and Horseshoe waterfalls. In the evening we arrived in Papatowei and put up our tent at the local campsite. In the evening we had some nice pasta for dinner and met some other travelers from New Zealand, Scotland and Germany and had some nice chats with them.
The next day was supposed to have great weather so we got up early and were back on the road before 9am. We even took our time to take a detour to the Mc Lean Falls which had us go down a steep gravel road that we had to go back up afterwards but the waterfall was definitely worth it. Just the walk through the rain forest was really cool already and the waterfall made it even better. The rest of the day was a pretty cool ride and during our lunch break at Curio bay we could even see some dolphins swimming and jumping through the bay. Unfortunately the weather got worse and the wind picked up which meant an exhausting ride for the rest of the day. We had planned to reach the free campsite in Fortrose but the wind made it impossible to cover those last 30km. After climbing a hill somewhere halfway we decided it did not make sense to cycle on so we asked at the next farm whether we could put up our tent. We were greeted warmly and not only given a spot to camp but Sheila (the owner and mother of the family that lives there) even offered us a cute little shed with a bed and a heater to sleep in and we were even invited to have dinner with the family. During the evening we found the weather forecast to be very rainy and windy in the next two days so Sheila offered us to stay for these days in exchange for some helping around the house. We gladly accepted the offer and spent two really cool days with the family. We helped making apricot jam, sorted baskets full of fruit and cleaned out the kitchen in exchange for accommodation and food for the two days. On our last evening we had some time on hand so we decided to make some nice Käsespätzle for us and our host family. It took some time but turned out to be delicious!
On Friday the weather got better so we decided to make our way to Invercargill where we hoped to find a store that could help us with the broken camera lens. The weather was horrible, giving us 65km of head wind and some nice rain with it. Unfortunately I (Jonas) was stupid enough to leave my phone in my rain jacket's pocket during the rainy part of which I knew it was not water proof. When we then arrived in Invercargill my phone was soaking wet and does not seem to work anymore as well. So now we have a broken lens and a broken phone and I just now had to rewrite this whole blog post as it was deleted in a server crash during the night. There are these times when everything seems to be s**t. We try to stay motivated and are looking for options to fix the situation. Wish us luck for that!
All the best,
Keep cycling,
Vroni & Jonas
