Hey!
Right around now, hundreds of people are gearing up to participate in the Tour Aotearoa, a self-supported bike ride from North Cape to Bluff.
I once entered the thing, but didn’t front up for various reasons, and nowadays I am not at all sure I ever will, but I do like the idea of it.
Thinking about it reminded me of when Glen and I spent longer than most TA riders will take to pedal the entire country just bicycle camping around the bottom half of the South Island.
We took the Haast Pass from the east, made morning tea and a cup of coffee using the memorial structure at the top of the pass as a kitchen, then descended in pouring rain, following the cataracts of the Haast River to cross it at more or less sea level.
These days there is a campsite after the bridge is crossed, but back then it was just a highway rest area. There was a concrete structure, a sort of large box with one side missing, with a concrete table and seating in the centre of each of two ‘rooms’. I guess the structure was created in response to the incessant rain and the high probability that the river would flood and wash anything not made of concrete down to the ocean.
We got to this place at about midday, and installed ourselves in one of these spaces. We decided to stay there, and move on the next day, in the faint hope that it might not be raining. During the time we inhabited this brutalist picnic device, we had a series of interesting visitors.
The best was a young fellow from Rotorua, who arrived, dripping wet, from the west on a very rudimentary bike packing rig.
As we shared tales of life on the road, his back story unfolded. He had started a building apprenticeship, but after he had been at it long enough to find he really liked it, the company he worked for went broke. This was around the time of the ’87 crash, and he was struggling to find a gig to continue his training.
He got on the dole, while he genuinely looked for work. That caused a lot of pressure in his home life, dad did not approve of dole-bludgers.
So he strapped a bit of gear onto his old ten-speed, and hit the track.
Every two weeks he would park his bike somewhere safe, hitch-hike back to Rotorua, complete his paperwork, have a look if there was any chance of work, then hitch-hike back to his bike and pedal on.
By the time we met him it was around 50/50 riding and hitch-hiking, it was taking most of a week for each return voyage to the dole office.
After a luxurious night trying not to roll off our respective concrete picnic tables, we went west an he went up the pass. We never saw him again, of course, but we still talk about him sometimes.
We reckon he probably made a go of something, he had the right attitude.
