Wedding bells...

...so things didn't look too promising on the morning of the wedding! Rain was coming in from the south horizontally, and it seemed pretty much set in for the day. Although a little late in proceedings, the Wedding Day Gods did eventually get round to casting an eye over events. They made a great job of halting the rain, and after much muttering, even managed to calm the persistent southerly! They offered some pertinent advice to the tug boat captain who steered our floating wedding party to a sheltered cove in Lyttleton harbour where much merriment was enjoyed by all!

Congratulations Kris and Olivier

(oh and Kris, just remember that no one likes to see a grown man naked...

...yes follow that advice and your married life will be long lasting and blissful!)

Back to Christchurch...

...and back to the rain! Unbelievably the rain continues it's deluge. I'm heading back to Christchurch on the bus for Kris and Olivier's wedding, and the weather is just awful. As an Englishman I feel responsible, 4 years ago when I was last here, the same thing happened, months of drought then nothing but rain as soon as I got off the plane! The tugboat cruise around the harbour could certainly be eventful if this southerly keeps up!

Take me to the River...

So another handful of clicks up the road finds me at Steve and Annie's Batch. I rode up yesterday and experienced a hill for the first time! So far I've been riding on the coastal strip which in Canterbury, barring the odd volcano is mostly flat. As I head inland a bit, there are a few more bumps to get over, but nothing serious till getting to the Alps. Today was a lovely relaxing day, cut the grass in the morning then took a wander down the Hurunui river and snoozed intermittently on the bank.

...and it Rained...

...and rained and rained...


The promised rain arrived right on que and didn't it just! John's rain guage registered 110mm over 24hours a true deluge. Of course nothing is perfect, like all farmers they're glad of the rain, but 'grizzling' for some 'drizzling' instead of it all coming in one great deluge, which compacts the soil and a lot just gets lost in run off.



Despite the rain, I think I may have found 'carrot heaven!' All the produce tastes fantastic, but if forced to choose, when I appear on Radio 4's forthcoming new series of 'Desert Island Veggies' I'd take the carrots! They are the sweetest I think I've ever had, but everything tastes so much better pulled straight from the ground.

Why Mac are eerie...?

...camped last night at the Macintosh fishing hole on the Waimakariri River (pronounced Why Mac are eerie!).

The sunrise this morning was just spectacular, but the fishermen that started rolling in soon after first light all warned of an impending southerly loaded with rain so I decided to 'sail' the as yet dry southerly up to Amberly and John & Michele's 'Stonecircle' organic farm.

On the road...

So off I set...

I'm not intending to get far this week, I will have to return on Friday for Kris and Olivier's wedding so will probably get the bus and leave the bike somewhere. The road is straight and rather uninteresting so I only want to do it once. In fact the most interesting thing to occur was when, unbeknown to me, my drinks bottle fell off the bike and I rode right over the top of it, nearly spilling me into the gravel shoulder. I was just looking back and cursing the stupidity of whoever had discarded a hard aluminium drinks bottle carelessly in the cycle lane when I realized it was me!

Let Jagged

So just how let jagged do I feel?

Well, I've travelled across a dozen or so time zones and to be honest clicking into Pacific time has been about as smooth a transition as could be expected. I've forgotten the true horrors of the flight, and am starting to feel almost normal again. A good test of any tret setting javeller is their ability to mix it with the 20'sumins on an all night stag do a couple of days after landing. Kris gets married next weekend, but tonight is his final blast. I made it till about 2 am then slunk off with fellow oldies, Steve and Gary, back to the sanctuary of Avoca Valley to recover ...


...so now I've finished packing the bike, made some last minute adjustments, and I'm heading north. The original plan, to head up through Lewis Pass, across to Nelson, then the Sounds and back down to Christchurch is becoming more fluid, I'll go where the wind takes me. First stop the Waimakariri river...