Lord of the sandflies. The Wild West Coast to Wanaka and celebrating half way.

Think about your partner, the person you love, the person you enjoy spending time with. Now think about how it would be to spend 7 months alone with them, sleeping in a space which measures roughly 4 x 6ft square…..?

The shed of New Years Eve; Following Tasman’s Great Taste Trail.

People often worry about putting on a little weight over Christmas, just usually it’s not in their panniers.

When your life is dominated by the weight of your possessions, the tradition of gift giving on Christmas day has the potential to be fraught with difficulty. Because of that we made a firm commitment definitely not to give each other gifts this year.
Which we then both ignored.

It’s beginning to look not like Christmas

If, like me, you have grown up in the northern hemisphere, December is  most definitely a time of winter. It’s a time of crisp, cold weather, warm fires, woolly gloves and scarves and very occasionally, if you’re really lucky, a snowman. In no way is it synonymous with bbq’s, beach wear and sun cream. That’s just…..odd!

The Small Things: New Zealand, heading South.

You know that quote that says “The whole is greater than the sum of its parts.” For me, cycle touring is the classic example of that.

When you are away from home for months, or even years on end, you seldom step back and view the trip as a whole, as an epic adventure, instead, what you notice, what you remember are the multitudes of constituent parts, and in particular the things that make a difference are often the small, things.

Waterworld

Before arriving in New Zealand my biggest concern was that they wouldn’t let us in. Not due to any nefarious character traits but the dirt particles on our bikes. Therefore our last days in America were spent with a toothbrush and bleach, scrubbing every minute speck from every scrap of equipment we owned.
As it turned out, getting in to the country wasn’t the problem.